The second grade students in Michael Putney’s class recently completed a project in painting a landscape scene using the techniques taught by the legendary host of the Joy of Painting, Bob Ross.

Dr. Mary Rockey, WACS elementary principal, said she was amazed when she first saw the paintings on display.

“I was looking at all the paintings and I said out loud ‘Jeepers, creepers, how did they do this?” she said.

Putney expained that his students watch different videos during lunch every week.

“One day I said, ‘Has anyone ever seen Bob Ross?’ Of course no one knew who he was,” Putney said. “We watched an episode and everyone loved it and I said, ‘Maybe we should try to paint like him.'”

Putney obtained a grant from the PTO to purchase the necessary materials, including paints, pallette knives, and several types of brushes.

“The PTO has been fantastic,” he said.

Before they began their Bob Ross paintings, Putney said the students watched a video on How to Draw the Grinch, and learned a step-by-step process. Those drawings are also on display in the elementary hallway.

After this, they began their paintings, complete with water in the foreground, mountains in the distance and happy, fluffy clouds in the sky.

There was a lot of guidance and the students began helping each other, Putney said.

“It was a beautiful project … now they have new skills and they know about things such as perspective,” he said.

The students were very enthusiastic abouat their experience. Jude Moliter said he thought the best part was doing the trees. Moliter was also the class mixer of paints.

“I did a lot of mixing. It was hard and I had to try not to get too much of one color,” he said.

Eleanor (Ellie) Maras said she had to learn how to fix a mistake.

“I put too much of the water in the painting and had to cover some of it up,” she said.

Rockey chimed in, “that was a happy little accident.”

Brooklynn Hazelton said the clouds were the hardest part for her to do because “you have to use the fan brush and I wasn’t used to using it.”

Ayla Roets said she enjoyed using the fan brush.

“We put it up and down to make the clouds,” she said. “My hardest part was doing the white stuff at the water,” Arrington Mitchell said.

Putney said he is often amazed at the students in this class with their eagerness to learn.

“If you give them the guidance, they will follow through,” he said.

Rockey said she was so impressed with the second graders’ work that she posted pictures of the paintings on the school website and said “Can you believe that these were created by our second graders? Absolutely lovely. Way to go, Mr. Putney’s class.”

Looking at these works of art, it is hard not to agree with Ross when he said “We show people that anybody can paint a picture that they’re proud of. It may never hang in the Smithsonian, but it will certainly be something that they’ll hang in their home and be proud of. And that’s what it’s all about.”