Whenever my kid has socialized in art class, it has been due to a combination of boredom, poor classroom management skills of the teacher and the inability of the teacher to make the projects interesting or creative. We have told our son repeatedly that studying art is a privilege and that art will make him be creative and give him a chance to express himself. We also told him to just finish the task quickly if he is uninterested in it and then go on to do other things in the spare time (they can do cutting work, craft work etc if they are finished). We also conveyed to the art teacher that she should pull out DS's desk to a far corner of the room and ask him to work alone if his chatter continued as we did not want our son to disrupt other people's work (we observed one class and it looked like other kids were very interested in their work). The teacher thought that it was harsh, but we insisted. He sat alone for 2 classes and decided that he would rather finish his art projects quickly and quietly and then spend the rest of the period going through the Art History books that the teacher keeps in the class than sit alone. That has been working for us for a few months now.
