what do you do with your dc's craft/artwork that they bring home from school.....

[mum2samandalex]

ds has just started reception and is forever brining home artwork or craft which he has made. On friday it was a massive boat and rocket that he made out od cereal boxes. Then yesterday and egg box with variuos things glued to it plus a few pictures. Ive displayed aome on the wall but now im feeling a bit overwhelmed and have no idea what to do with it and dont want to hurt ds's feelings

(whispers) - recycle!

I alo have an underbed storage box which I put the best bits of 'art' in, but so much that they bring home at this age is just a few lines on a peice of paper, or a drawing which has been half colored in.

Decent ones go up in dining room - we have a magnetic strip so can hang up 4-6 pieces ata time. Then they are dated and go in her memory box if still looking ok.

Certificates etc. go on the door of one of the kitchen cupboards for a bit before going in her memory box.

rest are put in the recycling

i have a folder for anything that can fit in plastic wallets to go in. 3d things get displayed somewhere or played with then thrown when they get too tatty. or given to grandparents for them to decide what to do with

I greet it with huge fake joy, leave it somewhere prominent and the 'disappear' 90+% of it discreetly after a few days. The remainder stays on magnet board in the kitchen, or similar board in each of DC's rooms, and a couple of masterpieces from each 'stage' go into an art folder to be preserved for posterity.

I photograph everything and store it on the computer.

then keep a couple of bits and have a couple up on the fridge etc. The rest I recycle. I like the photo thing as it's kept forever that way.

I use the artwork as wrapping paper - it goes down great with grandparents

I display a few things on our kitchen cabinets and fridge.

I keep everything for half a term, then get it out of the large cardboard box on my kitchen cupboard and chose 2 pieces that are fairyl representitive of them all. Save those and recycle the rest

is everyone else really tidy then?
i have a string with fancy pegs round 2 walls of he kitchen where pictures/stories go
until the string is creaking..then they go in a crisp box for a couple of years when i can face pruning them

a living room where there always seems to be a train/boat/caravan big enough to sit in in front of the tv

a windowsill or 2 for old boxes and ribbons models

i photograph the models and they stay on the window sills until they get pushed off into the bin

If you let them play with models (rockets etc) they will soon destroy them.

I am overwhelmed with art. I have four kids and three of them do art all the time.

I think you need to choose an area which will be your gallery, then you keep it contained and refreshed. When new works arrive, bin the old ones.

I know it sounds harsh but you have to toughen up and be ruthless or drown in art so plentiful you forget to look at it.

Tell her how fabulous it looks, take pictures of some of it, stick some of it on the wall, and eventually, over the course of a few weeks when she's not looking - bin the lot of it. Otherwise our entire house would be buried underneath a pile of crap.

recycle it put it on the wall.

when they do junk modelling let them give it to Grandma

Good on you pinky red.

The rubbish clay bowls are particularly annoying as you feel you have to hang on to those for a bit longer.

I have one big wall in the kitchen with pictures.

Put them in the attic, then move house.

I have to be brutal sometimes as DH is fond of junk modelling with them so there are four prolific artists in my modest abode.

They also love bringing home rocks and sticks.

Grrrr!

I post it to the grandmas!

I bin it.

It is the process that is important, not the end product.

the proccess is important but dd loves looking along the string and reading her stories/talking about the pictures...i thnk that they are a bit like a diary to her...usually about school or friends or hols

I'm a primary school teacher and will think twice about ever doing something nice in art lessons again with the kids. Honestly for the teacher, art lessons can be a nightmare. THese lessons take so long to prepare, you use up most your budget for the year on the materials, it's hard to think of something new and different that the kids haven't done every year before, I ALWAYS end up with a thumping headache after the lesson as it's normally chaos and mess and noise (think 30+ excited kids in a small space, all cutting, pasting, painting, chatting...)then there's the after effects, a messy classroom to tidy up afterwards. And this is how most of the end products finish up? In the bin? . Sob sob sob. But then my DD is only 7 months old, so she hasn't started bringing home "junk" yet..... maybe I'll think differently in a few years' time?

By the way, some of you have thought of excellent places other than the bin for all the work... letting them play with it is brilliant, better than wathcing tv or playing computer games, lets them use their imagination a bit. Hanging it up and encouraging them to talk about it....brilliant.Ok, I'm probably beginning to bore you all now with teacher talk so I'll shut up. I once saw a simple peg with something attached to it that says "Look what I made this week" for display, if I find one of those I'll be getting one to keep it all neatly stored. Don't think I'll want to turn my living room/kitchen into another classroom with a pinboard tho!

Pinkmarshmallow - I also do a lot of artwork with the urchins at home and yes it is messy/noisy/expensive, but even that I throw most of it away, they just keep the very special and best example to show off.

I just thought you teachers didn't want to clutter up your bins with it so sent it home!

My DD is 3.2 and i am a hoarder. I know i will find it hard to cull the artwork.

I love it at the moment and our small hallway displays all her masterpieces at the moment.

Using it as wrapping paper is a good idea.
But i also intend to find a box/trunk for her memory box and i am planning to decoupage the best of it inside and out

I use these folders for the drawings/paintings as they are large enough to store them and I do throw away some !

Things I especially like go on the fridge. Luckily not too much 3 dimensional work seems to happen .

The rest is filed under B. For Bin. Although maybe I should say filed under R for recycling