Artist and Composer Study

     For Artist Study, I choose a different artist every 3 months or so. I simply introduce the artist to the children by printing a self portrait of the artist, if one exists, and put it up on our refrigerator. I'll introduce one of his paintings every other week. The children will take turns looking at the painting for about a minute. I usually just print off the Internet, unless I can find postcards for sale of that artist. After they look at it carefully I'll take it away, and I'll ask what they remember from it. I'll ask them to describe as much of the painting as they remember. Once we do this, we simply put it up on the refrigerator and enjoy it until we switch artists. If the piece of artwork is inspiring to us, if we find it interesting, we make our own rendition of it with any media we want.

     Composer Study is even simpler at our home.  We choose a composer every 3 months or so. I'll purchase about 6 of his songs on itunes, or we just listen to them on youtube. Purchasing them is easier for me, because I can just have the song repeat in the background as they are doing some quiet work or in the morning while we are getting ready for the day.  If I can I'll print a portrait of the composer and put it up on our refrigerator. We spend most of our day in our kitchen. so we are often reminded of the artist and composer this way. Whenever I play the composer's music, I simply say, "I'm about to put Vivaldi on, and we will be listening to the Four Seasons - Spring." We just go about our day and enjoy the background music.

     We are a family of visual learners, and I have found this method to help the children get to know an artist and composer well and become familiar with their style.