I carry a selection of pencils, in a black canvas roll-up case. When I unroll it in the classroom for the first time, students think I'm crazy - after all, who needs so many pencils! When I demonstrate the range of qualities each pencil can produce, my students begin to understand my "obsession" and many buy their own sets of drawing pencils for class.
Last week I subbed classes that had not received much instruction in drawing so I gave them a crash course and had them do a little value drawing. Out of 125 students, 30 got the idea and maybe 5 went above my expected level. All of them took the next lesson more seriously, though, and I saw a level of improvement with most of the classes.
I'm going to stay off of my soapbox here and not go into the rage I feel when school districts hire incompetent "art" teachers. I am going to post the little sample that I did, for the classes and myself. I like to do whatever I assign to my students; they get the benefit of guided instruction and a clearer idea of what I expect of them. Besides that I always learn something, as well. In this case I got to play around with different pencils and found out a few characteristics that I hadn't noticed before, especially since I never made a comparison between them. Try your own value design - incorporate different brands as well as grades of graphite.
