Why teach them art?
- To foster a love for things made
that are good, beautiful and true.
- Over your head. But that is your key. Remember this. Keep perspective when doing your projects. It will keep you grounded.
- Also to assist in the
development of fine motor skills, imagination, and expression.
- To explore color, building,
thinking in 3-D.
- To experience joy, beauty,
pride in creating.
- If they take an appreciation
of the Arts into their adulthood, they may carry this love and knowledge over
into their communities.
This is our problem: How to
get Art in your homeschool?
- Art is
the last thing on your list after a long day of math and history.
- No time or ideas
- Dislike mess and clean-up
- Unsure about teaching art
because you cannot draw a straight line
Three
things may help: (then I'll give you a bunch of ideas and projects)
1. Redefining Art or broadening
the definition.
- The problem is that you’ve
decided that all art is framed in a gallery.
That you need to teach them how to draw, paint or sculpt. Remember, not all art is learning to shade
from dark to light or drawing a box in perspective, or learning the primary
colors and the color wheel.
- So, I put Art in two
categories: The Fine Arts and Arts & Crafts. For our purposes Fine Arts should include drawing, painting,
sculpture, ceramics and architecture. And yes, you should expose them to the
Fine Arts. Museum visits, good books
(Sister Wendy, etc), Architecture books, Ceramics classes, lives of famous
artists, and art history should be included in all history programs. But this
still seems out of your reach, your expertise.
It doesn’t ever quite feel complete. And your still not producing much
art!
- So, enter 'Arts and
Crafts'. This will include all of the
aforementioned and just about everything else creative and hand-made! Knitting, crocheting, stenciling, Origami,
paper mache (for those of you brave enough), gluing, cutting, constructing,
etc. And a gluttony of projects we'll get to in a bit.
2. We are not teaching them art
so they become artists. Much in
the same way that we teach them math, they may not become mathematicians.
3. How many of you are
mathematicians? Astronomers? Chemists?
Artists? Well, in the same way
that we aren’t mathematicians, geologists, or writers, we teach our children
these subjects just fine. So even
though you aren't an artist you should be able to teach them Art with just as
much confidence and ease.
However, there are special
circumstances. And I’ll pause here momentarily to say that if your child does
exhibit a natural ability or interest in the fine arts (drawing, painting,
sculpture), get them to a professional.
They can teach your gifted child to become an artist. (Or at least entertain the idea for a
while). Just as we all hire out for
piano, violin, French lessons, etc. I
would consider this around the middle school years.
Back
to our original problem of getting some projects into our homeschool.
- To solve the problem of
time, ideas and not wanting to add another 'subject' to your long list I weave
my art projects directly into my existing curriculum, overlapping art projects
and other subjects.
- I have found this to be
beneficial in many ways. It makes for a
whole, cohesive curriculum. The subject
matter is repeated and studied more in depth.
(I am always going back to my school experiences and what I remember
most are the ‘hands-on projects’) Your
history, science and even math becomes fun!
And you are more likely to have done some art at the end of the
year.
There,
unfortunately, is no textbook for my approach.
But here are some examples of what you can do:
Civics: Political cartoons,
political buttons, bumper stickers (slogans)
History: Obvious to me to incorporate the arts and crafts of the time
period being studied.
Bean mosaics (use beans glued to
stiff posterboard to simulate a real mosaic)
Egg tempera
Print making
Houses/buildings (miniatures &
architecture)
Colonial – hand dipped candles,
stitching, quilting
Egypt – make paper, hieroglyphs
Medieval – Coats of arms, flags,
calligraphy
Science:
Booklets
Collage
Botanical drawings
Pressed flowers
Posters (cycles)
Collections/displays
Woodworking (birdhouses)
Birds (gourd houses, bird baths)
Gardens (designing gardens –
Medieval-herbs)
Language Arts:
Illustration:
Dictation or copying a good verse (also handwriting) and then illustrate
it. Dovetails memorization. Bible history (reading, retelling then
illustrate).
Some
topics you haven’t considered:
Decorative Arts (garden design, stenciling
a box or doorway, quilts, crocheting, and sewing)
Drafting
Illustration
Fabrics: Tie-dye tee-shirts
Computer Art (you can even transfer them
to a tee-shirt)
Photography
Tracing paper (cut paper in half
it’s easier to work with, lightly tape down to book and trace with #2
pencil. Later photocopy this
tracing. It’s a beautiful effect. The kids can even color this copy.)
Marshmellow/toothpick sculpture
(structures, symmetry, bridges, patterns, a molecule, etc)
Tips for preschoolers:
1. Put glue in a cup and use a
paintbrush. Or dip objects to be glued
directly in cup of glue.
2. Cutting: you hold paper and
have them cut it with scissors.
Tips in general:
1. Break up projects into
do-able sections. Spread large projects
out over days or weeks.
2. Short sessions - to keep
interest
3. Have supplies on hand. Have an
art bin/ carrier full of supplies. Lots
of paper on hand.
4. Do 'set up' steps the night
before.
5. Encourage putting down
newspaper to cover work area. Have an
art area in the house. Or a 'Gallery'
to display work.
6. Frame your children’s
artwork. To make a quick paper frame,
simply fold your construction paper in half and cut away a rectangle then open.
7. Getting some supplies from
the grocery store. Wax paper, freezer
wrap paper, paper plates, cups, spoons/forks, marshmellows, toothpicks,
shoestrings.
8. Keep a recycle box. Paper towel tubes, oatmeal boxes, etc.
9. If you need a non-crooked
piece of poster board or a straight line across a poster, measure down from the
top on both sides and mark with a dot.
Then connect these dots with a line.
Your line should be straight and true.
10. To transfer a drawing: Turn drawing over, turn pencil on its side and
rub back of drawing. Turn over and
retrace drawing on new piece of paper or posterboard.