Chewing Pencils

If you’re a brave soul and don’t mind a bit of public speaking, then your local school may be an untapped source of income. A few times now I’ve taken a deep breath and stood in front of groups of 20-30 ten year olds to talk about what I do, draw a few pictures on the board and then help them create their own cartoon characters.

The first few minutes can be terrifying, but once you’ve warmed up and the kids have warmed to you, it’s lots of fun.

The majority of sessions I’ve taken have been single, one hour classes of 10-12 year olds, where we simply talk about face construction and perhaps body construction if we get time. There’s lots of time given to drawing and telling jokes and having lots of fun. Half the class can draw better than me, but I’m learning to live with that…

The other type of classroom job I’ve taken on board is a ten-week series. In these sessions we can go into a bit more depth and work together on a group comic book of some sort or perhaps getting t-shirts or mouse-pads printed. Again, there’s always lots of fun and plenty of time to draw. The kids love it and by the end of the ten weeks, many of the parents/teachers are sitting in having a go too!

Many schools will have a budget to invite ‘guests’ to come and talk about their area of expertise. I tend to quote $100/hour to go into a school, a bit less if there are multiple sessions, but always try to be mindful of the economic situation the school is in. If it’s a school for really disadvantaged kids, I’ll aim to cover my costs or consider it a community project to which I will donate my time.

So if the ‘drawing’ work goes through a bit of a dry spell, consider doing some ‘teaching’ work in your local school.