Stick figures are to be treasured.  Paint smears to be admired.  An ice-sculpture with colored salts to be fun and playful.

The curricula for arts and crafts is designed to enable the children’s practice using a variety of mediums (e.g. crayons, paint, clay, glue, etc.) and explore how those mediums are creatively applied in the world for personal expression, culture, and innovation.  It was Steve Jobs’ exploration of calligraphy practice that later influenced the emphasis he put on design and user experience for Apple products that sets them apart to this day.

“Throughout the campus (Reed College) every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed…I learned [through their calligraphy instruction program] about serif and sans serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture.” Steve Jobs (former CEO of Apple), excerpt from Stanford’s 2005 graduation speech.

Creative arts, like the intellectual exploration of the sciences, is one of the defining human characteristics that sets us apart from all other creatures.  Self-expression, the reflection of our human self-consciousness, is a daily influence in our personal lives and society.  We learn art standards, but personal creativity is also highly encouraged.  For example, if we are painting a sunflower and using real sunflower seeds for decoration, while the children will see a model of a sunflower painting and be given the seeds and paint to produce their work, I let them develop the painting as they wish…this may mean the sunflower has just a few purple petals, a single seed, and a bluish-green stalk; we would discuss the feelings the painting evokes and how it felt to create it.

A unique aspect of our program is that arts and/or crafts are done every day!  Here is an example of how the Arts and Crafts period is connected with the curriculum:

February (Time and Travel), Week Three (Modes of Transportation), Thursday (Boats): for this day, we are designing a boat (2D or 3D) with scrap materials.  Parents’ collaborate by selecting a few scrap materials from home for their child’s project; this could be a napkin, some Q-tips, an empty milk carton, or other such item.  Their child will then use these materials as the primary building parts for their boat, being able to supplement with our scrap materials here as well.

Other examples of art throughout the year:

 

 

For Dr. Seuss Day / Reading Across America:  handprint paint art from the Dr. Seuss story, Horton Hears a Who. (Paint, ink, and fuzz ball)

 

 

 

Learning how to color within the lines. (Pencil and oil pastels)

 

 

 

 

 

Learning how to draw full bodies and illustrate a story scene. (Pencil, marker, and crayon)

 

 

 

 

Learning about seasons (handprint trees during winter and spring shown here).  (Paint, paper, and  mixed materials)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Learning how to draw faces (portrait of dad). (Crayon and pencil)

 

 

 

In addition to daily arts and crafts, special learning day projects, and art available for free time and Montessori/Waldorf, we also have an Art Exploration program that has monthly learning themes of style and mediums that culminate in an original “masterpiece”.  Teaching objectives are based on developmentally-appropriate and individual standards, yet the goal is to provide a joyful experience and exposure to the practice and vocabulary of multiple forms of art.

2019	Academic Theme	Art Form/Medium	Masterpiece Project
January	Jobs and Money	Collage	Cut and paste “vision board”
February	Time and Travel	Photography	Styles (B&W, angles, etc.)
March	World Cultures	Textiles	Fabric textile/weaving designs
April	Life Cycles	Decoupage	Faberge-style Easter Egg
May	Maker’s Fair	3-D design	Shadowbox
June	Performing & Fine Arts	Felt & Velcro	Moveable Felt Family
July	Imagination Camps	Free-style with multiple mediums	Made-up magical creature
August	About Me!	Portraits	Oil pastel self-portraits
September	Community	Fingerpainting	Community Murals
October	Plants & Animals	Nature stamping	Leaves & Flowers as stamps
November	About Earth!	Watercolor	Landscape
December	Space Exploration	Black Scratch Paper (abstract)	Spaceship window