Introducing Your Child to the Arts: Your Child and the Visual Arts

Engaging Young Children in the Visual Arts

The visual arts reflect and interpret life. Artistic expressions can be found everywhere, from illustrations in children’s books to images on calendars to decorative artwork displayed in homes, schools, libraries, businesses, and parks. In the formal art world,museums and cultural institutions are environments where paintings, sculpture, and other works of art are cared for and shared with the general public. Early experiences with the visual arts foster important skills while providing a sense of joy and excitement that can last a lifetime.

Making Art with Young Children

Opportunities abound for engaging young children in making art. Visit any toy, craft, or art supply store to find child-friendly art materials such as crayons, markers, colored pencils, paints, modeling clay, and play-dough. Recycled materials found at home (scraps of cloth, old buttons, bottle caps) can be used for making collages.

• Create an “art corner” at home. Choose a place that allows your child to explore different media—paints, crayons, and clay—and lends itself to easy clean up. Draft “art making” rules with your child so that everyone knows the expectations. Younger children will probably need guidance for use and clean up of materials. Art materials should be safe and age-appropriate.
• Engage your child in the choice and selection of art materials. Vary the art opportunities by changing the materials every few weeks. One month the art corner can be a collage center with small containers of recycled materials. Transform the space to a sculptor’s studio at another time with modeling clay, play-dough, simple tools (Popsicle sticks or plastic knives), and an assortment of objects that can be used with the sculpting materials.
• Provide a place to exhibit artwork. A bulletin board or cork strip can be used for displaying art. A clothesline or drying rack with clothespins or clips can also serve as a place for children to exhibit completed projects. Some children will prefer to keep their art in a box or in a scrapbook for personal use rather thanexhibit for others.
• Plan an “art party” for your child’s next birthday. Your child may have some wonderful suggestions for art activities that will appeal to his or her friends.

For younger children, art is often more about the process of exploring materials than about creating an end product. Exploration should be valued for its contribution to self-expression and to learning. As children create art that is representational, some will freely talk about their creations while others will not. Some children feel more comfortable talking about the materials or colors used rather than about the ideas expressed in the artwork. Simply saying, “Would you like to tell me about your art?” gives a child the freedom to talk about the work from his own point of view. It is important to respect the child’s motives, preferences, and aims.

Encounters with Art in the Everyday World

Art is a natural part of our world. Explore art with your child by focusing on your child’s interests as well as his or her aesthetic and intellectual abilities. Find opportunities that encourage your child to:

• Find art in the everyday world (calendars, book illustrations, paintings in the home,murals in libraries, elements in architecture, design of ornamental gardens, monuments, and sculpture). Play a game when traveling in which your child searches for artworks in the environment.
• Visit a library or bookstore. The librarian or bookstore clerk can identify books honored for their outstanding illustrations.
• Look for patterns in the visual world (identify shapes or patterns formed by artistic elements in buildings) or search for similarities or differences in common objects.
• Talk about artwork by describing actual works of art. Most young viewers relate a possible story that comes from the image. Other ways to talk about art include exploration of line, shape, color, and texture.
• Make up a story that is related to the content of the artwork (for example, pretend to be a character in a painting and tell what is happening).
• Express personal ideas and feelings about individual works of art. Value your child’s perspective.
• Recognize art as an important aspect of life that represents different places and different cultures around the world. Art offers children a worldview.

Share and enjoy art with your child. Read about, look at, and talk about works of art that you encounter. Conversations should be casual, not like a test or lecture. Expose your child to art from different cultures and times in history. Encourage your child to talk about works of art by making comparisons, finding similarities, and identifying differences.

Museums, Galleries, and Art Centers

Museums house cultural artifacts, natural specimens, and works of art that all have visual attributes. Children enjoy looking at and talking about these objects by drawing parallels to their own lives and experiences. There are many wonderful books that introduce museums and encourage children to think about their role in the world.

A successful trip to a museum requires some thought and planning in advance, but the rewards will be well worth the time invested. The museum visit should build on specific interests of your child. Kids enamored with collecting bugs in the backyard will probably be interested in collections of insects at a science museum or a nature center to learn more about these unusual creatures. A budding interest in ballet expressed by a young child taking dance lessons might suggest a visit to an art museum to see paintings and sculptures of dancers. Whatever the preference, it is important to select exhibits or works of art that have a common idea or theme for your tour.

A visit to a museum should be fun and inspiring! Beyond planning your visit with your child’s interests in mind, remember that selecting a few pertinent exhibits or galleries is typically more effective than touring the entire museum.Value your child’s responses. It is likely that your child will show an interest in something not included in your plans.When you demonstrate respect for your child’s point of view, you enhance your child’s overall experience and attitude about museums.

Museums have different types of presentations. Look for interactive exhibits, special tours or programs designed for young children, and publications that offer suggestions that relate to specific exhibits. Family guides often highlight exhibits that appeal to the young visitor as well as suggest activities for engaging the child in a meaningful encounter with the art.

Art museums are often the most challenging environments for young children. For young children, keep the gallery activities simple. Think about those that would engage your child:

• Read a children’s book that relates to your museum visit. Reading can take place at home or at the museum. Select a book that has a theme that relates to the art you plan to see. Some works of art actually have children’s books written about them.
• See several different artworks that relate to the same theme.
• Create a personalized tour for your child using postcards from the gift shop. (Purchase the postcards before you bring your child to the museum.) Your child can look at and talk about the postcards before the visit to the museum. Encourage your child to think about the artwork. Since the postcard doesn’t show the actual size of the artwork, it is fun for a child to guess whether the actual work is large or small. During the visit, finding the works of art will add an interesting dimension to the experience.
• Orient the museum visit in a different way each time you go. For example, plan a “shape” day and look for shapes in art. Each time your child spies a particular shape, let him or her pretend to draw the shape in the air. Look for shapes in your environment on the way home. Once you return, let your child make a drawing using different shapes or create a collage using cutout shapes.
• Ask your child to strike a pose similar to that of a figure in a sculpture.
• Encourage your child to use his or her imagination through storytelling or pretend play. For example, when looking at a painting of royalty, let your child pretend to be the king. Ask your child to wear a majestic robe and crown and make up a story about the king.
• Allow your child to pick a favorite art postcard from the gift shop following the museum visit. Buy two of the same card and help your child begin a collection. After several visits, the cards can be used for a matching game at home. Cards can also be used for storytelling games or for planning future museum visits. Returning to see old favorites at the museum is often fun for a child. When relatives visit from out of town, your child can plan the tour using favorite artworks.
• Encourage an older child to sketch with pencil and paper something interesting found in the art galleries.

Education and Special Programs in the Visual Arts

Schools, art centers, and museums offer a wide variety of special classes that relate to art appreciation. Look for programs that engage your child in age-appropriate experiences. For the young child, art appreciation should provide opportunities for art making as well as looking at art. The actual process of creating art gives a child a better understanding of an artist’s work. It is also important to remember that young children take in information through a variety of senses. Programs that respect the learning style of the young child are probably the best choices.

An Introduction to the Museum

• Miffy at the Museum by Dick Bruna
• You Can’t Take a Balloon Into The Metropolitan Museum by Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman and Robin Preiss Glasser
• I Spy Two Eyes: Numbers In Art by Lucy Micklethwait
• Bonjour Mr. Satie by Tomie dePaola
• Museum ABC by the Metropolitan Museum of Art
• Mon petit Orsay by Marie Sellier
• Dogs’ Night in the Art Museum by Hooper & Curless
• The Shape Game by Anthony Browne

Family Guides to Museums

Many museums offer guides for parents and teachers that introduce visual arts to young children. Teachers and parents should ask their local art museum about similar publications.

• Museums & Learning: A Guide For Family Visits by the U.S. Department of Education and the Smithsonian Office of Education
• Family Guide by the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
• Behind the Lions: A Family Guide to The Art Institute of Chicago
• Looking Together: Introducing Young Children to the Cleveland Museum of Art

Resources

Books for Children Introducing Arts and Arts Elements

My Name Is Georgia by Jeanette Winter
Picasso and the Girl with a Ponytail by Laurence Anholt
Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson
A Color of His Own by Leo Lionni
Tout Le Monde Est En Formes by Ed Emberley

Parent Resource Books

Considering Children’s Art: Why and How to Value Their Works by Brenda Engel (available at www.NAEYC.org)
Oxford First Book of Art by Gillian Wolfe
Preschoolers and Museums: An Educational Guide by Sharon Shaffer (available through the Smithsonian Early Enrichment Center)

Web Sites

Smithsonian Institution
www.si.edu
The Web site of the Smithsonian Institution, the world’s largest museum complex, contains activities, games, and information for children.

Kids' Space
www.kids-space.org
Kids’ Space is a nonprofit Web site that provides activities to encourage artistic expression in children.

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
www.hirshhorn.si.edu/education/interactive.html
The Hirshhorn Museum’s Web site includes an education section with interactive features for children, including a Create a Sculpture feature.

National Art Education Association
www.naea-reston.org
The National Art Education Association's membership includes K-12 teachers, arts administrators, museum educators, arts council staff, and university professors from throughout the United States, Canada, and abroad. One of NAEA's services is to provide information on arts education, including such topics as the National Visual Arts Standards for students.