JoAnn Gann, left, considers artwork by Snow Rogers Elementary School students with her granddaughter, Gardendale Elementary School fourth-grader Karlee Mayfield.

The Birmingham Botanical Gardens was alive with color on Thursday, and it didn’t come from the flowers.

Artwork from students at every elementary school in the Jefferson County school system was displayed at an annual exhibition at the gardens.

“We live in a visual culture,” said Stacia Jacks, art supervisor for Jefferson County schools. “Students deserve to have a variety of ways to learn. Different students learn in very different ways, and we need to meet all of those needs.”

All of the artwork was done during school hours in some sort of art class. One Gardendale Elementary School artist, Triston Parsons, painted a flower for the exhibit.

“I like drawing flowers. It’s usually what I paint,” said Parsons. He said he originally wanted the painting to be mostly orange, but his teacher encouraged him to use more color variety. He ended up putting a color on the painting he didn’t mean to, but ultimately liked how the finished piece looked.

“Sometimes accidents are good,” he said.

The exhibition had over 600 pieces; each school was allotted space based on the size of their enrollment. Teachers select art throughout the school year to be shown at the exhibition.

According to Jacks, every elementary school in the system has at least one art teacher on staff, even if it’s a part-time instructor that’s shared between two or three different schools.

“If art education is taught in an age-appropriate way, it helps with problem solving, critical thinking and a number of other things,” Jacks said.

She also said “sequential art” is a focus for Jefferson County schools, meaning that students continually receive art instruction year after year.

The majority of north Jefferson County elementary schools share a teacher. Schools are budgeted a certain number of “teacher units” based on enrollment size, and Jacks said many schools use their units on more academic subjects before pursuing artistic ones.