First of all, I printed out three or four pages of examples of illuminated letters from a search. This gave the students some ideas. Then, if they wanted to, I would do a search for them specifically, like “illuminated letters 'M' ” and that way each individual student could find something that he or she really liked using their own initial. Next, I printed out the specific design that each one liked, and they began working on their own (freehand--no tracing allowed!) Here are the beautiful results.
