What to Read Wednesday: Artist Books for Kids

Discovering Artist Books for Kids

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This week’s theme is one of my favorites, because fine arts is a big part of our homeschool. Between music, filmmaking, and art, my boys are always creating something. We attend a homeschool art class, which has expanded our knowledge of art techniques, periods, and famous artists. When we visit a museum, the boys recognize details in the artwork now that help them figure out more about the style, themes, etc. This is a wonderful skill that carries over into other subjects like language arts, history, and believe it or not, even math.

When we are studying a particular time period or event in history, if we are learning about a region or culture in geography, or when we are reading a novel in literature, pulling in resources about related artists is a wonderful way to enrich and liven up our lessons.

We recently studied the slavery period and read Up From Slavery and Amos Fortune, Free Man. Our local art museum happened to have an exhibit at the same time that featured pottery from David Drake, a slave and artist from the town where my dad was from. I had heard of him before, but really didn’t know or understand the significance of his artwork.

After visiting the exhibit, we bought the children’s book about him, and even my youngest son pointed out elements that he had learned from the exhibit. This was a wonderful extension of our history and literature lessons and showed my boys that slavery was about people and not just a broad event on a history timeline. The art touches you in a way that really makes you connect to the humanity behind it.