Art Field Trips

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Now that the standardized test is behind us, we can have some fun with subjects like foreign languages and art, which I tend to de-emphasize in the months leading up to the test. We visited two art museums recently, to get our art juices flowing: Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts in Gatlinburg and the Knoxville Museum of Art.

Girl looking at digital art

My daughter looking at digital art, in Knoxville, at the Museum of Art

At Arrowmont, we caught the tail end of the juried exhibition from Sevier County residents. We live in a community full of talented artists. It was inspiring to see all the different pieces and media.  Continue reading »


Develop Artistic Talent with Holiday DIY Project

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With Christmas coming up soon, it’s a great time for moms to work on DIY projects with their homeschoolers. We shouldn’t get so caught up in teaching our children the alphabet and math that we forget about art. Encouraging kids to be creative and artistic is something all parents should be doing.

Not very artistic yourself? It’s no problem. There are still a lot of fun, easy ways you can help your kids develop their own artistic talent.

Here are some ways you can help your child work on his or her creativity in the coming weeks:

Continue reading »


60 Ideas for Arts and Crafts

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Many people use “I’m not a teacher” as an excuse for not homeschooling. It’s a mentality they grew up with. I did too. I understand. I got out of it when I felt called to homeschool my children, slowly but surely.

The Industrial Age has turned all of us into specialized professionals along the assembly lines of the world. Each of us has been instructed to take care of only one job and so we go through life assuming teachers teach, bakers bake, pilots fly planes and architects design.

60Ideas

In fact, you CAN teach your child. You can! It’s as simple as picking up a teacher’s manual and reading the lesson the night before. In this post, I am illustrating the point by giving you 60 ideas for arts and crafts. I’m no artist. My kids can draw better than I can. But I teach them art with the right tools.

Even if you yourself are not that great at art you can teach your children art. To teach means to educate. And “educate” come from the Latin word “educare,” which means “leading out, taking somebody from here to there, guiding.” So you can guide your children through the process of discovering art. Take my case: I am not an artist, but I appreciate art. And, I discovered, it does not take much to expose my children to arts and crafts.

Here is a list of 60 arts and crafts you can do with your children:

1. Visit your local Museum of Art. For us, it’s Arrowmont in Gatlinburg and the Knoxville Museum of Art.

2. Visit your local children’s museum. The closest one to us is in Oak Ridge and we have not been yet. I have only heard good things about it, but it’s just been a little out of the way for us.

3. Visit your local science and technology center. Check this list out to locate one near you. They are bound to have craft tables, among all those scientific projects. If you travel, it would make sense to invest in a membership. That way, you can visit everywhere for free. We got a membership at The Muse in Knoxville and have already visited another science center for free (the Discovery Center in Charlotte, NC). That’s what you can do any time you travel.

4. Visit your local natural science museum. They usually have programs and tours for children which end up with a craft. We go to McClung in Knoxville for their free stroller tours.

5. Visit your local artisan shops. Sometimes they have artist at work demonstrations. Exposing the children to the creating process inspires them. We go to the Arts and Crafts community on Glades Road in Gatlinburg – 120+ shops to explore.

6. Visit the National Gallery of Art website for kids and virtual shop. You will gain four things: knowledge, inspiration, ideas, and pretty things to share with friends and family.  Continue reading »


Katie Meets the Impressionists Review

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Homeschooling moms tend to be curious, life-long learners because teachers must be willing to learn constantly. Personally, I love studying new things. I almost feel selfish at times for all the fun I have learning and reading and preparing my lesson plans for the following day. Take, for instance, art appreciation.

Recently, I came across a series of art books for kids, featuring Katie, a little girl who goes to the art museum and can enter and exit paintings as needed. James Mayhew, a graduate of Maidstone College of Art, wrote at least a dozen of these books, from what I can gather, and I want all of them! Do I sound like the nerdy kid from “The Polar Express” movie, when they passed by the toy store window?

We bought two titles to get started on our collection: “Katie Meets the Impressionists” and “Katie and the Spanish Princess.” My children asked me to read each of them twice the first time we cracked them open. That night, they asked daddy to read them again.

Auguste Renoir (French, 1841 - 1919 ), A Girl with a Watering Can, 1876, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection

My three-year-old recognized this painting. We have seen it before in “A Year in Art.” It was the first confirmation I received that my art education efforts are paying off.

In “Katie Meets the Impressionists,” our heroine meets Jean, Claude Monet’s son, as well as the Girl with the Watering Can, the girl on “Her First Evening Out,” and lots of Blue Dancers – all mesmerizing characters in famous paintings by Monet, Renoir and Degas.

I was very proud of my three-year-old daughter who reacted as soon as she saw the Girl with the Watering Can – “She’s the girl from that other book!” My daughter recognized the girl in the painting because we have been using “A Year in Art” for our tea time and this painting is featured in there.

Charlotte Mason advocated exposure to art. Most educators believe in the refining influence of art education. “Katie Meets the Impressionists” provides a gentle introduction to or an exciting continuation of art appreciation.

For the French names or words in the book, a Google search like “Degas pronunciation” helps.

Your own copy of this book, which you can show your children again and again, will create great homeschooling memories.

Creative Kids Culture Blog Hop

3 Simple Solutions for Music and Art in Homeschooling

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In homeschooling, just like in traditional schooling, it can be tempting to set music and art aside for when we have time (or money). How can a busy homeschooling mom add music and art to an already full schedule? Here are my solutions (besides violin lessons):

1. Can You Hear It? will start you on this quest to steal a few moments for classical music and art appreciation simultaneously. My kids love this book and CD, which we got from the library. We soon got our own copy from Amazon.

I play the music during meals, but, also, while I cook and they play nearby. We open the book and turn the pages as the tracks change. Sometimes I read to the kids from the book. Other times, we listen and comment on what we see.

Small girl having tea and looking at painting

My daughter listens to “Carnival of the Animals – Aquarium” while looking at the corresponding painting in “Can You Hear It” and enjoying a bagel and raspberry zinger tea; my son is not in the picture because he was finishing up a LEGO project before joining us.

2. A Year in Art offers us visual pleasure as we enjoy our afternoon tea time, a tradition we started about a month ago. Around 4pm, I put a tea kettle on the stove and get out some scones, or biscuits, or bagels, or graham crackers, or toast. I use what I have on hand.

We open the book and look at 3-5 paintings while sipping tea and enjoying something sweet. They have questions. We look for answers together. Sometimes we locate towns and countries on a world atlas.

3. Free concerts – We catch the Knoxville Youth Symphony concerts several times a year and, also, the Sevier County Choral Society concerts (December and May). I used to sing with the Choral Society before I became a mom, so it sort of feels like a reunion for me. If you check your local newspaper or Google free concerts in your area, you should find similar offerings where you live.

I have felt the liberating and relaxing effects of art and music in our homeschooling enough, that I am thinking about experimenting with doing music and/or art before math, reading or writing. I’ll let you know if I have enough courage to implement it on a regular basis. So far, I have done it once and we all loved it.