Our family has really enjoyed adding more art study to our homeschool this year. We’re using the text God and the History of Art to guide us, but we also enjoy doing our own art projects, apart from the text. I keep all of our supplies easily visible and accessible in a clear, locking tote…but, what’s in a well-stocked art kit? My top picks are:
Tempera paint. We use the washable kind, so it’s easy to clean up. It’s also easy to mix and produces nice colors.
Acrylic paint. This is not as easy to clean up, but produces really nice, bright, vibrant colors. I also discovered, via God and the History of Art, that, because it’s water-based, you can freeze whatever is left on your palette for the next use, so there’s no waste. We haven’t actually tried this yet because there hasn’t been a need, but it’s in the back of my mind.
Paint brushes. We picked up an inexpensive classroom pack at one of the local hobby stores, which gave us several sets of a variety of brush sizes, so that we each can have several sizes to choose from when we paint.
Paint palettes. Although we often use paper plates so that we have more room when we have a lot of color mixing to do, we really enjoy the paint palettes that we picked up for just $1 each at a local hobby store. They’re plastic, so they’re easy to wash out when we’re finished painting for the day.
Paper. I purchase some heavy paper, just for painting, from Miller Pads and Paper at our local curriculum fair each year. It still curls up a bit, but not as bad as plain printer paper and, of course, we use cardstock quite a bit.
Sharpie fine-point markers. We use these for detail work on mixed-medium artwork and I plan to use them for our pen and ink drawings, though we haven’t started those yet.
Art postcards and prints. The postcards came with our God and the History of Art set, but I know you can order sets from various places online, including Dover. I picked up some inexpensive prints of many of the artists we have studied and will study at Wal-mart.
Our art text suggested drawing pencils and kneaded erasers, but I haven’t gotten those yet. I hope to soon, but, for now, we’re just using regular #2 pencils. And, of course, we have standards like colored pencils and washable markers. My oldest has a nice set of Prang pencils and markers from when she took an outside art course, but, for now, my younger two are making do with Crayola.
What about you? What items do you consider necessary for a well-stocked art kit?
Kris is the sweet-tea-drinking, classically eclectic, slightly Charlotte Mason, homeschooling mom to her three Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers.
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"Art" isn't something that we've ever made into a specific homeschool 'subject' ~ it's been mainly something that was done for fun, whatever projects the kids were interested in… although, we'd do specific artistic projects in OTHER subjects…
I do have "Geography Through Art" on it's way here though – we're going to add that to our Geography study…guess it's still not "art class" though LOL
As for what we have around – a whole wide variety of things like paints, crayons, markers, pencil crayons, pencils, glitter pens, stickers, feathers, foam, fabrics, construction paper, corrugated paper, felt, pipe cleaner, sequins, beads, paintbrushes, popsicle sticks, toothpicks, yarn, white glue, glue sticks, magnet sheets, playdough, FLOAM, model clay, cross-stitch stuff, and whatever else is in those bins over there…sometimes I'm afraid to look! :-P
This year, I bought quite a few nice art supplies — watercolor paper, watercolor crayons, paint brushes that you have to buy by the brush (LOL) instead of in a pack together, ebony pencils, etc. We are using Artistic Pursuits, and they kids are really inspired by using nice art supplies. Heck — it inspires me too! ;)
ok, I'm a bit of a nut so we have "tackle boxes" and bins with different genres of media.
- drawing pencils, pen and ink, and calligraphy pens
- watercolors and supplies
- paints and supplies
- sculpting materials
- crafting materials (beads, yarn, buttons, pipe cleaners and doo dads)
- pastels, chalks and other messy materials
- colored pencils and nice markers
I also keep every kind of paper on hand on a shelf.
I went to school for art, so much of this was a learned habit and yes, we use it all : )
Derwent colored pencils, especially the watercolor pencils, are at the top of my list.
I need to get a clear tote. We just downsized from a plastic three drawer unit to a smallish box in moving. What made the box: Your list plus pony beads, lanyard, wood burning, hot glue gun, popsicle sticks, Pipe Cleaners and felt.