What do you do with your kids for art? My daughter is seriously into art. So much so that she says she is going to art school instead of college. She's only 11 so we'll see about that.:)

Since Michael's is getting rid of classes and our local art school is expensive for classes, I will be looking for other ideas for art..

I put an ad on Craigslist looking for local artists willing to talk to my daughter and show her what they do. i got several responses. So when we get back with our vacation, I am going to see about meeting up with some of these local artists. I think my daughter will enjoy it.

So what do you do for art?

One thing that I think is really important is just to have supplies on hand and allow them time to create.  When I go to art shows I often ask questions of the artists.  Not many of them that I have spoken with had formal art instruction.  They found what they enjoy doing and experimented.

We do get those oversized art books from the library and do picture study.  They look at an image for 2-3 minutes, then describe it without looking.  I use this to practice observation skills as well as art appreciation.  I try to use artists and images that relate to what we are studying in history.

We have a local person who does art classes, but I have also seen art classes offered at area art centers and community centers. 

Gee Art is cool. They have a sample lesson online. The subscription is good for 12 months.

http://www.geeguides.com/demo/

Our HS co-op has art classes.  Our YMCA where we used to live had them, too.  Hobby Lobby has kids' classes.  Our local art association has kids' classes also.

I use K12's Art curriculum, which is fantastic.  It lines up with their history courses so it's more like "unit studies".  Part of the curriculum is the "Come Look With Me" series.

I love the Mike Venezia books for art history & appreciation.

If you check your local newspaper, you might find some classes. That is how we found the art classes at our nature park.

We are using Drawing With Children right now.  It's not very user friendly and this is the second time I've picked it up and we're making it work good enough.  We're using the Veritas Press cards and each week we draw our own picture for the topic and then we re-write the paragraph on the back using IEW techniques.

We're not doing much with Picture Study though we have in the past and I'd like to reincorporate it someday.  I'm thinking about doing some Artistic Pursuits as I think it incorporates great works of art into the creating process.  Art is not my strong point and I'm too poor/cheap to outsource it. LOL!!   So we're muddling through :-)  Always looking for new ideas.

Alpha Omega makes a terrific video program by Thomas Kinkade (yes, the famous Christian artist)!!  :)  My son loved it!!!  It's basically a one-semester Lifepac, but comes with a DVD of the actual lessons by Mr. Kinkade. 

Way back when, we used Artpac for art.  (They come in packets for grades 1 to 7.)  I liked that the pack introduced different media.  We only used one, but the art skills progress as you move into the next pack.  My daughter also took a couple of art classes at our homeschool co-op. 

Something else I used to do is to give her a small pad of paper and some colored pencils to take to the art museum.  She would find a bench and sit and try sketching her favorite paintings.  (I'm not saying her results were something the museum would be clamoring for, but the act of sketching helped her notice things about the painting.)  The art museum here in Cincinnati--and I think Dayton--has free admission, so we're a little spoiled.  The Boston Museum of Fine Arts was more expensive--but they had "kid kits" we could check out to help us explore particular galleries.  The Detroit Museum of Art--which has very inexpensive admission--has a hall full of knight's armour, along with a matching kids' guide.  (Can you tell we've homeschooled in different states?)  :)

We have used a wonderful book called - Teaching Art with Books Kids Love.  Great picture books are used to illustrated 15 different lessons.  We found it first at our library.  I loved that there was a basic lesson and then variations on the lesson.  Plus, we enjoyed the books as well, and it helped us to look at favorites in a different way.

I forgot that Fandex has the flashcards for artists. Not a curriculum obviously but it is helpful if your studying famous artists.

http://www.amazon.com/Fandex-Family-Field-Guides-Painters/dp/0761123598

Two books that I have borrowed from the local library and found very useful are;

Discovering Great Artists By Kohl and Solga    ISBN 0935607099
      This books introduces kids to some of the great masters and talks about the mediums that they used.The book also gives an art activity for each artist so you can try out that specific art medium.
 

Mudworks By Kohl   ISBN 0935607021
     Another great book by the same author. This book focuses on sculpting using different materials. Almost every activity uses ingredients found in your home. This is a great resource book to have for projects, rainy day ideas, or the extremely creative child who has a need to create often!

Love your avatar Christine. :-)

We use 2 different books/curriculums:

How Great Thou Art is put out by Barry Stebbing, there are books for all ages.  He explains pretty clearly what he wants you to do in each lesson, with an example.  The book that would probably be best for your daughter is Feed My Sheep.  It covers colored pencils, drawing, art appreciation, painting, anatomy, etc.  My DD has been doing it for a while and enjoys it.  It is very thorough.

The other book we use is Mark Kistler's Draw Squad.  He is very funny, and my DD absolutely loves his books.  He teaches you to draw more of a cartoon style though, whereas How Great Thou Art is more realistic drawing.

Well, I don't worry about art TOO much because both my husband and I are artists and so it is always going on in the house without really planning it.

But my son liked GeeArt so I got him a subscription to that - it was about 20.00 for the course, and he liked it and did it without complaining.  I sat through some of it and I loved it - and after I paid for it, I found out we got a nice Corel paint program that came with it!  That was a real bonus!

Oh - edit - oops - a link - www.geeguides.com

I just added Math Art by Darlene Writter to my bookshelf, if anyone is interested.

Someone just posted this website on a homeschool group I'm on somewhere else.  It's a free site with tons of drawing lessons on it--neat art resource!

dev.drawspace.com/

     As someone else mentioned, I recommend GeeArt.  It is a computer art class with lessons and also includes a program where your child creates art on the computer.  My 9 year old daughter learned a ton and it really stuck.  She would talk about the lessons and apply what she learned and she asked to go back to the Chicago Art Institute (which she hadnt enjoyed previously).  She would point out paintings and tell me what she observed about them for example "the artist is drawing your eye here by using this technique."  It is so reasonably priced and has lots of great information in a fun format.