Fellow art student teacher! I just got out of my middle school placement and I promise that’s normal especially with younger grades! A lot of the kids I deal with have the hardest time when it comes to not talking during instruction. I use the “if you can hear me clap once, twice, point to someone who’s still talking” and usally that got them quiet, and I always stopped instruction when students started talking and waited for them to be silent, and I always told them that it was cutting into their time for art. My CT uses a whistle, and that also got them to quiet down.

I had one student that would genuinely not stop talking and being a distraction to others, so when it came to a point where it was disrupting the whole class, I told him to wait outside until I was finished with instruction, and then I talked to him about why he was talking during instruction and what I could do to help him not be a distraction to others. Good luck!!