The tripod in my classroom that the artist draws on was faced so that the artist’s back was to me and the class. We could see what she was drawing, but she couldn’t see what I was doing. I turned the tripod so that the artist could face me. That has helped with the problem of artist’s not paying enough attention in class, as they always seem to become distracted by their drawing.
Another thing is that I am going to ask the artist to draw in pencil and color everything in later, or during a break or at the end of class or before class the next day but never during the story. Just sketch it out, take it home, whatever. I would hate to lose this fun and fascinating (to the other kids because kids in schools love to draw, right?) but I have to change the artist’s focus.