An Artist Residency in the School Library with Juana Medina

One of the joys of being a school librarian is the unsupervised fun you can get up to when given the chance, the partnerships you can make, and the adventures you can bring into your school through books. I had the unique pleasure in May 2025 of bringing author and illustrator Juana Medina in for an artist’s residency in partnership with An Open Book Foundation and after twelve classes over four days, my second graders and myself feel filled with adventure and creativity.

Four Days of Fun

When I was approached by the foundation to bring Juana Medina to my school, I was immediately intrigued! I had done author visits before in a traditional sense—focused on one book, the writing experience, and geared towards one class. This was something else entirely—a four day artist residency where Juana would see each of the three second grade classes for nearly the entire school week. This required some moving around of my schedule and the students, and their flexibility and the support of my Inner Core (Specials) team provided a great chance for collaboration.

Day 1: What Makes You Unique?

We started the week by introducing Juana, who shared about her upbringing in Colombia and her semi autobiographical book, Juana & Lucas. She then invited students to turn to their own stories and write about what made them unique—what did they like and dislike? Did they have pets? What made them excited? This, as a librarian, also provided me a chance to learn even more about my students, and make a final decision against serving brussel sprouts, which apparently are still not popular amongst the youth.

Sketching & Practicing Imperfection

Day 2 found the students with a blank piece of sketch paper and a simple pencil. Juana Medina walked them through the ways you might draw a portrait of yourself step by step, a dozen ways to do noses, different explorations of hair, and more. The utilization of technology allowed this rapid-fire sketching to translate well to our students who immediately began their own work and learn to practice imperfection, to varying degrees of success. Luckily, the foundation provided each student with a trusty eraser to support this, and we found that classmates were quick to support each other and offer encouragement in the face of frustration.

Self-Portrait Time

On Day 3, our students finally cracked open their brand new case of colored pencils and their Micron pen and began their self-portraits. They outlined their sketches, added more elements, and brought themselves into technicolor. Each student’s self-portrait was a unique representation of themselves—some focused on faces alone, with their portrait ending at the neck, others had bodies, many gave themselves props, and a few chose to eschew a face for something else entirely. Skin-tone
colored pencils allowed each student to make their portraits feel like their most authentic selves, and students pressed the tips against their hands and wrists in an attempt to color match with their table mates. Class ended with students adding the unique-ness from day one around them—-just like Medina uses in her book. What makes them unique? What are the words they associate with themselves and want someone to see when they look at their self-portraits?

Polishing & Presenting

Our final day found the students finalizing they portraits with the last details, and then taking to our makeshift stage (a step stool) to share their self-portraits with the group. Watching the students practice presenting while modeling positive talk and description fit perfectly with our school’s focus on student voices, and our other classmates go to practice respecting the space that the presenters were taking up while showcasing our “same” sign when they shared a commonality. We had lots of hands flying when people talked about loving their family and friends. As students packed up on their final day of this residency, they took home not only an envelope of art supplies but a newfound friendship with a real-life author and illustrator—someone they could learn from and aspire to be one day.

It was a delight to have an author that I love and enjoy as much as Juana Medina in my library for four days, and I cannot wait to see the way that the successes of this week carry on in the lives and legacies of these 60 second graders for years to come.

All photos courtesy of Aryssa Damron
Photo releases on file at Van Ness Elementary

Today’s guest contributor is Aryssa Damron. Aryssa is a school librarian in Washington, D.C. and the co-chair of the ALSC Children and Libraries Editorial Advisory Board.

This blog post relates to the ALSC Core Competencies of I. Commitment to Client Group and III. Programming Skills.

Please note that as a guest post, the views expressed here do not represent the official position of ALA or ALSC.

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