In Kathleen Loomis's preschool classroom at the Bennington College Early Childhood Center, the goal for children is not to produce beautiful and expressive artworks or to learn specific methods of working with art media--although those things do happen. Here, the curriculum is built around the philosophy that learning to think and create with art…

The importance of multicultural art education has been addressed by art educators over the past 15 years. Art educators maintain that art is capable of empowering mutual respect and appreciation for people, objects, and ideas among diverse groups. Although many educators/teachers use non-Western artworks or artifacts to enrich their art programs,…

This article explores the way young people's responses to an image evolve when they engage with it repeatedly. An analysis of the sequential encounters of six adolescents with a Renaissance painting reveals that, as they gained experience with the picture, the youngsters probed for increasingly deeper layers of meaning in the work. Specifically,…

The author of this article, an art teacher, describes a lesson in which her elementary school students used acrylics to paint a cityscape of Bombay, India. After seeing huge canvas paintings at an art gallery, the students wanted to paint their own. They performed an exercise in which they closed their eyes, thought about the city, and listed all…

This article describes a participatory action research study that examined participant's perceptions of community and of the West End neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio, where the study took place. It is argued that oppressive situations have developed strong collective identities and social capital among residents, which can lead to the development…

Elementary school students painted poster-sized portraits of Black Americans on kraft paper, plain brown paper used by stores to wrap merchandise. The posters were hung on the school's floor-to-ceiling bulletin boards. (RM)

Boston Common at Twilight illustrates that despite the urbanization of late-nineteenth-century Boston, one can still find a sense of peace and serenity there. This article describes Frederick Childe Hassam's painting, "Boston Common at Twilight." It highlights notable cultural, historical, and artistic elements in the painting and…

One of Michele Curio's favorite art lessons is creating a resist using oil pastels under black tempera paint. The process produces dramatic and creative results with a high success rate even for the most art-challenged students. The artworks have a sophisticated, painterly quality that is achieved with more control and less mess than direct…

Article investigated painting styles and a test devised to explore sensitivity to them. (Author/RK)

Article described a field trip taken by the painting class at Potsdam (N.Y.) High School as an integral part of their course. (Author/RK)

For the past two-and-one-half decades Robert Rauschenberg has proven to be one of this country's most imaginative and inventive artists. The story of his contribution to art history can enlighten students regarding their rich heritage in art. Material can be adapted to grade levels four through twelve. (Editor/RK)

Presents a lesson plan uses Edward Hopper's painting entitled "November, Washington Square." The lesson illustrates, for students in grades K-3, the ways an artist interprets the city in which he or she lives. Includes suggestions for classroom activities. (AEM)

Creates a lesson plan using Mark Tobey's painting, "Flow of the Night," to illustrate to students in grades 10-12 that artists may interpret their environments in a variety of ways, from the subjective to the abstract. Includes suggestions for classroom activities. (AEM)

This art activity introduces students in grades four-six to the popular 18th-century capriccio painting of Canaletto, one of the greatest painters of views of Venice, Italy. (RM)

Students in grades 10-12 are introduced to a romantic-realist approach to landscape painting using masterpiece by Robert S. Duncanson. The activity helps students consider the decisions artists make in choosing how they will interpret nature. (RM)