Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Spears Art

Spears Art Studio, Inc. has a Christian Art Curriculum I have been priveleged to try with the kids. Diane Shields Spears has created a digital curriculum on disk that you can use to teach your kids art at home.
About the creator: "Diane Shields Spears has a Bachelor of Arts from Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas, in art, English, and education, a Master of Arts in Christian Counseling, and a Doctorate in Christian Education/Art, both from San Antonio Theological Seminary, an extension of the Minnesota Graduate School of Theology. She is state certified for both elementary and secondary, has been an educator off-and-on for thirty years."
Built into the curriculum are basic information on the definition and kinds of art, philosophy of art education, main components, and detailed curriculum. There's an exhaustive glossary of art terms.
The curriculum itself is broken into monthly lessons. Fully created for K-8, the scope and sequence is vast and varied - a rich resource for those of us to whom teaching art doesn't come "built in." I love the complete supply list included broken down by month - this is a plus for the less-organized momma in me. We have purchased a curriculum that was broken down by subject, because that's how we teach in our "everyday" school, thinking that would be more convenient. Because of this, I was hesitant to try to incorporate this time-table instead. I found it was easy, though, to pick-and-choose what I want to use for lessons, and it won't be difficult to find topic-related lessons from the well-designed appendix, either.
One of my favorite aspects of this program are the integrated scripture themes in each lesson - they tie directly into each project, making it both an art lesson and a devotional project. Teaching multiple children means that I like to combine in any area I can, and I LOVE that this curriculum does this! I also really love the projects - they're not overly complicated, but even as a novice, I can see the lasting principles learned in the lessons. Fun, fun, fun! Now we're off to grab our sketch pads...

2 comments:

Tami said...

sounds fun. let's get 2gether soon!

Unknown said...

yes, yes! whenyouwanna?