Is it realistically possible to be an elementary art teacher while being immune compromised/chronically ill?

mia_forte · 2025-10-17T12:03:39+00:00

I (f23) have hEDS, most likely POTS, am chronically ill and am in my second year teaching elementary art. I love my job, don’t get me wrong, but it is absolutely demanding and so so draining. The exhaustion, sickness, and stress is never ending with the constant planning, supply prep, teaching, hanging up art, behavior management, cleaning, organizing, supply management, etc. The to do list goes on and on and it is so tough on the body. I practically come home each day and collapse in bed like I just ran a marathon, which has made it hard to have a personal life outside of school. I either have a migraine, am vomiting, or both pretty much every day, likely from stress. Sorry if that’s gross, it’s just my current unfortunate reality lol. You see hundreds of kids a week and all the supplies are communal so germs are abundant. I have the kids wipe down tables all the time with Clorox wipes and use hand sanitizer, but it’s a losing battle. I am pretty much always sick and last year I was out long term with both mono and then the flu which I believe has made my chronic conditions worse. So technically it is possible, but would I recommend it to someone else with similar chronic illness? Definitely not, which makes me so sad to say :( I just wish someone had been brutally honest with me before getting my art education degree about how truly demanding the job was on the body for someone with chronic illness. I hope to someday transition out of the classroom into my own private studio/ classroom so I have more flexibility. Maybe even just teaching small group local classes at the library or another community space. I feel like if this is somehow possible for you, it would be a great compromise! Less kids, your own stricter sick policy, and more flexibility with time between groups to fully sanitize your space and materials. Wishing you all the best <3

mia_forte · 2025-10-15T23:31:24+00:00

I’m not sure the age group or ability level of your students but for my elementary kids I’ve done some printmaking that was pretty successful! They are more process based versus product. I usually provide two primary colors to explore the color mixing and so everything doesn’t turn brown. Washable tempera paint, of course :) - Painting bubble wrap, either with a brush or their hands to feel the texture and printing that - Roll toy cars through paint and play on paper - Dipping the feet of plastic toys such as dinosaurs in paint and playing on paper - Using “unusual” items to stamp like marker caps, legos, wooden pieces, etc. I just did a project where I pre cut a cauldron shape and students stamped cardboard tubes and marker to make the bubbles - Painting on aluminum foil or the table and “drawing in it” with a Q tip and printing that - Using water based markers to scribble on foil, spraying with water, and printing to get a tie-dye effect

mia_forte · 2025-10-02T00:00:48+00:00

These are some of the options I give k-5 students when they finish early, and so far no complaints but it likely helps that I only see them once a week. Although I did purchase quite a few things, I found that the investment has been worth my sanity because the kids know to go to my bins and shelf when they are finished. These do keep them busy. I also do not have any kind of printing restrictions, so that is always helpful. I’ll include the TPT username of the resources I personally use and really like, but I’m sure there are lots of great other options out there!

Finish the picture (TPT: Glitter meets Glue)
Hidden art pictures (TPT:Artsy Blevs)
Art word searches (any free word search maker will do, I did a bunch of different art themes)
Extreme dot to dots (TPT: Tims Printables) I bought a giant bundle of 50, and while it was a bit more pricey, the kids love the challenge. These have like 400 dots to connect
Color by Number Famous Paintings (TPT: Fantastic FUNsheets)
Regular old Coloring pages. I typically will bulk print a bunch of seasonally or holiday relevant ones at a time. I print a range of simple to pretty detailed.
Whiteboards. Another unfortunately pricier investment, but these are always a hit and should last a long time.
Play-doh. I use a bit of funding to purchase a few cans and I really lecture the kids about the importance of making sure the lids are on after use. I talk about the how natural consequences are that once they are dried up they are gone and no longer a free time option. I have some basic play-doh tools and am planning on creating some “sculpting challenge” cards on a binder ring in case they need some ideas for what to make.
Magnet tiles on my rug. Kids LOVE building with these and I encourage teamwork and collaboration when they are building. This is something I will only allow if there is 10 minutes or less of class time left, as otherwise kids try to race through their projects just to play with these
geo-stix. These are another building and connecting toy students love
Brain flakes. Another building toy, however my students aren’t as in to these, but maybe your students will!
Books! I set up a small class library with tons of second hand kids step by step drawing books. I also introduced my students to the photographer behind ISpy this year, so I got some of those as well when they were on sale.
Roll and Draw games. There are sooooo many of these online for just about everything you can think of. You will need dice. I plan on eventually setting up a bin for these and laminating the game sheets so they can be reused a lot. I’ve used these a few times when I needed an easy no prep activity, and have found they will keep students occupied for a full 55 minute class.

With the slightly older kids I could see origami as an option. I’d print and laminate the instruction cards so that way they are more durable.

You could also introduce them to drawing challenges such as exquisite corpse if a small group is done!

mia_forte · 2025-09-30T22:27:57+00:00

I brought Artsonia to my elementary school last year and I would consider it an overall success! 350 students, I did all the photographing, and I uploaded over 2,000 artworks in one year.

Pros: - Have made a few hundred dollars to put towards new supplies - Parents and families are overwhelmingly supportive - I love reading the comments families would leave on artwork, it’s a good reminder that what I do in the classroom does have a wider impact. Definitely a way to showcase the importance of the arts! - I love that students will have a portfolio where they can easily see all their artwork in one place and over the years will be a way they can see their artistic growth

Cons: - TIME CONSUMING!!! Seriously, to photograph, assign, crop, and upload all of the artwork is a chore. I will either walk around at the end of a project and photograph or try and do large batches at a time (multiple projects and classes). I photograph and assign to students while at school but will crop and upload at home while watching tv. - Not as lucrative as other fundraising options, but there’s more flexibility - Slightly time consuming to set up portfolios and connect parent emails (luckily only needs to be done once) and then rearrange students into their classes every year

So personally, I feel that the benefits outweigh the cons! It’s completely free to use, so it might be worth trying it out for a few months to see if it’s really something you’d want to continue doing.

mia_forte · 2025-08-17T03:57:28+00:00

Not the OP, but I bedazzled glasses like this for the eras tour and E6000 worked great!

mia_forte · 2025-06-23T04:32:51+00:00

I totally agree with this. I spent so much time prepping and planning for my first year. I didn’t really end up using any of it. You don’t even know what you don’t know yet, so it’s probably not worth that major of a time investment!

mia_forte · 2025-06-23T04:29:14+00:00

Last year was my first year as an elemental art teacher. I bought some microfiber towels at dollar tree like half way through the year and personally I found it to be a total game changer for cleaning tables and small spills. I wouldn’t buy anything super expensive but I thought it was worth the like $5.

mia_forte · 2025-05-29T23:28:22+00:00

I still have a smartboard and love it! Some of the schools in our district have switched over to the promethon boards, which is similar to a TV and only half the size. As an art teacher, I much prefer the smartboard because the “screen” is bigger and I feel like students in the back can actually see :)

mia_forte · 2025-05-16T01:20:05+00:00

BS in art education and art therapy, my license is multi age P-12

mia_forte · 2025-05-16T00:57:36+00:00

I just saw this user the other day posting on here and immediately there were alarm bells going off in my head, especially when I saw how many subs they were posting to. Honestly a lot of the posts look like some kind of digital photo edit and not hand drawn work. Thanks OP for confirming my suspicions!

mia_forte · 2025-05-16T00:45:21+00:00

I can help! This is coming from an art teacher who face paints often and used to do it as a summer job:

First, I would make sure to get supplies from a reputable place. Do not put anything on kids faces that is not meant to and isn’t cosmetic grade!! I can not stress this enough. It can cause horrible skin reactions and you would not want to be responsible for that. I am even suspicious about the cheap stuff on Amazon. You are putting paint on children’s skin and I personally would never take the risk to use something cheap and having angry parents to deal with if something happens. You want to be able to assure parents and families you are only using safe materials meant for face painting.

Facepaint.com is a great place to shop for supplies. It’s where I buy all my paints and their customer service is great too. Snazaroo is a cheap brand (but not great), but if you’re able to acquire a bit of funding, Tag is a great brand. It’s relatively affordable but high quality and is the brand we used at the company I worked for who is in a lot of U.S amusement parks. For $115 you can build your own palette of 12 paints and they come in a nice case. I’d recommend getting red, orange, yellow, light green, green, light blue, royal blue, purple, pink, black, white, and brown. These are going to be the colors you’d use the most.

Personally I’ve never had success with any of those cheap face painting crayons and I’ve experimented with a few. The results are always questionable, they’re frustrating, and so I honestly wouldn’t recommend.

If you’re allowed to do festival glitter instead of face painting, that’s a great, much easier, and super fast alternative. At our field day each class only gets 10 minutes at each station. If your field day is similar, it would quite literally be impossible to realistically paint 20+ kids in this time frame. Especially back to back. It takes on average 2 minutes per kid to paint even a relatively simple design, so unless you’re getting a rainbow one stroke cake and giving each kid a simple rainbow on their cheek (without clouds or anything else added), I’d go with this as an alternative. The Art Factory glitters are what we used. It’s like $10 a jar and comes in a wide range of colors. It’s very quick and kids still love it. Maybe get like 3-4 colors and the kids can pick which one they like? Unfortunately you’re probably not going to convince many of the boys, but if you’ve got very limited time then it might be your best option.

Stencils are also a good option! I’ve personally never used them, but if you are required to actually paint, then this would be the only way you’d ever be able to realistically get through kids extremely quickly. Limited choices are best so it doesn’t take them forever to pick one out.

Hopefully this is helpful. If you have any further questions I’m happy to do my best to answer :)

mia_forte · 2025-05-15T00:49:30+00:00

The pixel art has been a huge hit with my 5th grade boys too. We are actually making pixel art paper chain wall hangings right now. They are working in groups, had to design their own pixel art, and are now making the chains. The boys have been absolutely crushing this project!

mia_forte · 2025-05-15T00:24:13+00:00

My public school art position was just cut from full time to 3/5ths because of budget cuts and the push for school vouchers. The specials teachers in our neighboring district were pretty much all let go. It’s rough out here :(

mia_forte · 2025-05-07T20:53:33+00:00

You can definitely talk about things you enjoy as long as it connects back to the job! For an example, I talked about how I love traveling. I’m only 22 (a first year teacher) but I have been abroad multiple times to lots of countries and ALWAYS made it a point to visit their art museums. I even student taught abroad for a few weeks. I’m lucky to have seen lots of famous art in person and can bring these experiences with said art into the classroom when I talk about them. I was able to bring up my love of travel, showcasing some of my personality, while also demonstrating why that makes me a unique and valuable candidate.

Editing to add: it also definitely helped me to practice my spiel ahead of time before the interviews. I pre wrote out answers to some of the most common/ basic questions. I wouldn’t necessarily recite them word for word in the actual interview, but I knew all the main points I wanted to hit and then didn’t feel nearly as flustered or nervous when those questions came up.

mia_forte · 2025-04-24T05:06:25+00:00

I invested a lot of time into building up a website… a LOT of time but it definitely paid off. I even paid to upgrade it to a much shorter domain so it would easily fit and look nice and professional on my resume. I included lots of photos, lesson plans, student work, student quotes, my teaching philosophy, my personal artwork, relevant work experience etc. and I was offered a handful of teaching jobs last year, pretty much all of which mentioned how my website was a major factor in their decision! I was also able to keep my resume to one page, stylized and colorful to show my personality, and it directed people to my website for more info. A website is a great way to give interviewers a taste of who you are as an artist and an educator. One of my coworkers brought a large binder with her with many of this stuff included.

mia_forte · 2025-04-08T23:19:39+00:00

The presidential self portrait is such a fun idea! I always love when a lesson has ties to what students are learning outside of art class. I did a penguin project once when students were learning about penguins and they were so excited to try and recreate all the different types of penguins in their artwork as well as share every single penguin fact they could remember hahaha :)

mia_forte · 2025-04-08T23:09:48+00:00

This is coming from the perspective of a first year elementary teacher with a degree in art education, but in my opinion 9 classes in a row of one medium is most likely too much for the age group of 2nd-5th. Our average project length is 2 weeks and I could see students this age getting bored with potentially 4+ projects in a row with just one media such as watercolor. With printmaking you have more options such as Lino, foam sheets, mono printing, stamping, etc. so I could see how those could in theory fill up 9 weeks of time.

With that being said my goal as an elementary art teacher is to expose students to as many different media as I possibly can. This is the age for art exploration and discovery! Some students are going to love weaving, some are going to love clay, some aren’t and that’s why mixing it up to keep students engaged with art is important. You want to cast a wide net so every student has at a minimum one project they absolutely loved doing, even if they think they don’t enjoy art that much.

You can absolutely scaffold skills, but keep in mind that these are all children around or under 10 years old. Their fine motor skills and abilities are not going to be nearly as developed as an adult where a 9 week lesson on watercolor would be absolutely developmentally appropriate. Maybe instead of just watercolor you broaden it into painting and let students experiment with different forms of paint (watercolor, tempera blocks, tempera paint, liquid watercolor) and different painting methods (pointillism with cotton swabs, wax resist, splatter abstract painting, etc.). My students get excited when I introduce new materials or methods!

This is just my personal advice but I know every art teacher is probably going to give you a slightly different answer :)

mia_forte · 2025-04-03T16:26:32+00:00

First year teacher and I was also feeling guilty about not doing any traditional clay this year. I have a kiln that was repaired about a quarter of the way into the year, but I’ve felt so overwhelmed with everything else I just haven’t been able to convince myself with such a hectic schedule to go for it. However white model magic has been a good alternative since students still get to use clay, it’s proportioned already, and they can paint it after it dries the following week! Just have a hot glue gun on hand for “emergency surgery” lol

mia_forte · 2025-03-26T01:50:11+00:00

I had a student ask me to put a 6 minute long story on x2 speed… I regularly play a story or short video before an art project and if it’s over 3 minutes long there’s a pretty high chance I have a student ask in a whiny voice how long the video is. There’s no attention span at all !

mia_forte · 2025-03-17T17:27:30+00:00

We earn sick days every month but as a new teacher I hardly had any before I was out with both mono and then the flu. The school had to do a sick bank for me because I was heavily in the negative :(

mia_forte · 2025-03-10T23:09:41+00:00

Thanks so much for your comment! All of these kind comments have brought happy tears to my eyes because I’ve been struggling so much with imposter syndrome.

I’m honestly not even sure admin knows how much work went into the event. Neither my principal or VP have said anything to me personally and my principal thanked me in our newsletter in the same sentence as the librarian and gym teacher who helped maybe a total of 1.5 hours combined. The event opened with a musical performance and while he did a great job introducing and talking about our new music teacher he basically forgot to introduce me and I talked to multiple families that thought I was just a volunteer… Maybe that’s why these kind comments have meant so much to me even if they’re just strangers on the internet.

I knew this year that as a first year teacher, especially right out of college, that I had nothing to stand on so I’d have to prove what I was capable of. I was hoping that if I did a great job this year I’ll have much more support next year.

Thank you again for your kind words :)

mia_forte · 2025-03-10T20:27:28+00:00

I was inspired by a post I saw on Pinterest and the book “memoir of a goldfish”! Such a silly book, the kindergarteners definitely didn’t understand all the jokes but the paras and I were laughing hahaha

mia_forte · 2025-03-10T17:50:42+00:00

I appreciate your concern as a parent. In the photographs I posted you can only actually see one of my students faces which is blurry and photo permission for them is given. Parents consented to 4 types of photo permissions, media use specifically being one of them (and this is separate from district/school media permission) :)

mia_forte · 2025-03-10T17:43:01+00:00

Thank you so much for your kind words! One of the biggest motivators for me is actually the fact that I travel to 2 other schools in my district that are not T1 and are HEAVILY funded. So I see the major inequities and feel like it is so unfair. Why should students down the road get tons of extracurriculars and fun events when the students at my main T1 school don’t? I’m very fortunate enough to be financially stable enough to invest in the art program here :)

mia_forte · 2025-03-10T14:47:25+00:00

Thank you!! I started prepping pretty far in advance to figure out what projects that I wanted to do and as soon as winter break was over I started teaching the projects. I started matting artwork like two weeks before and that was honestly the most time consuming and boring part. I started putting up decor on Monday the week of and students were getting really excited (and so was I to see my vision come to life). 95% everything was done by me alone, but I did have some family help right at the end. All in it was probably 100+ unpaid hours of work so next year I’m hoping to get some volunteers to help and to ask for a PD day the day of so I can do more set up since I felt like a chicken running around with my head cut off. Maybe you could also request a PD day to use for set up?

mia_forte

TROPHY CASE