My Favorite Lessons for Home-Based Art Education!

Hey, y'all! I'm about to share some of my fave home-based learning projects but...this is just the tip of the iceberg! I have a TON of art lesssons on my YouTube channel for you and your artists to explore. Be sure and subscribe as I'll be adding many more!

Currently, we as educators find ourselves in the most unusual of situations: away from our students for an unforeseeable amount of time and wanting to still connect, teach and create. If you are like me then your district has requested that you attempt to do just that with home-based learning. Because this is unchartered territory, the idea of teaching remotely is confusing, daunting and overwhelming. Where to even start? 

I've been putting some serious thought into this topic for the last couple of days as I create fun art activities for my students to do at home. I'll be sharing them all right here (for free, of course!) but in the meantime, I wanted to share with you the home-based art lessons I plan to use. Each of these lessons, videos and PDFs are FREE for you and your students can use right now. Feel free to include in your take-home packets or modify to fit your student's needs. Let's begin with this Monochromatic Self-Portrait lesson that is appropriate for kindergarten on up!

Just click for the video! Because many students may not have markers at home, you might suggest crayons for them to add color. 

This Colorful Village lesson was one that all of my students loved! I did it with my first through fourth graders and it was a huge hit. In case students don't have paint at home, markers and crayons can be used. Without those supplies, this could simply be a great drawing task for them to work on creating three-dimensional buildings. Here's the video:

These colorful houses were so fun to create!

My fourth graders always loved this Romero Britto-inspired self-portrait project. I do think that younger children would love it too. 

Again, consider suggesting students swap out supplies used for what they have on hand at home.

Chris Uphues is easily my student's favorite artist! And can you blame them for loving him so much, his work is just so full of joy! You can check out the entire lesson here. 

The link to this blog post also includes free downloadable PDFs!

Introduce your students to both James Rizzi and Vincent van Gogh with this fun lesson. Click the link for free handouts! Here's the video:

Of course, if you want to get kids creating, then you could always have them create their own sketchbook! I plan to create a video to show kids how to create one easily. In the meantime, they could use the Sketchbook Decoder Sheets found here to personalize their sketchbooks! 

If these look kinda familiar, we have done a similar project with my Getting to Know You sculptures. That project is also one that could be done at home with improvised materials!

Times like these could get you down...but we can't let it! So why not have students create drawings of people, places and things that they are grateful for? Click here for two free PDFs!

If you are required to send home a packet as we were in my district, you might consider downloading and printing out this sheet and including a circle sticker. These can be found at the dollar store. Children could access a telling of The Dot on YouTube and create their own work of art in the frame!

If your students have access to paper, scissors and glue, this easy Greg Mike-inspired project would be a blast for them! 

Without access to construction paper, students could simply use the paper that they have on hand.

A lesson that is always a hit with my students is making this pop-out star. They love creating the patterns and then writing about themselves. Again, think of an alternative set of supplies for students to use so they can create at home.

Alright, y'all! Stay tuned as I have much more to come. I hope that gives you and all the young artists out there a fun place to start!

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