Top Ideas & Resources for Art Lessons

Here is a collection of some of the top websites that offer art lesson plans to supplement the current curriculum you may be using. These are also great for the newbie teacher who may need help starting out.

Here you are at BrightHub! The education and learning hub at BrightHub.com offers information, articles and discussions about the topics affecting today's classrooms and universities. Within the K-12 Learning channel there are over 100 different articles detailing lesson plans and projects related to Art. Topics include: Substitute Teacher Ideas, A Man of Passion: Teaching Van Gogh, and India and Art in the Classroom. Other great website references are:

• The Incredible Art Department-http://www.princetonol.com/groups/iad/lessons/lessons.html
• Kinderart-http://www.kinderart.com/
• Ceramics & Pottery-http://pottery.netfirms.com/freesite/

Out of these links, The Incredible Art Department is a master of resources containing lesson plans separated by age group with ideas for substitutes, testing, and art games. In addition they have links to advocacy sites, jobs, and art news.

Another great wealth of are resources for teachers are the websites of art material suppliers! Most vendors now have an Internet site and many have been supplying teachers with ideas and inspiration on how to use the products they sell. Check out Crizmac Art & Cultural Education Materials for lesson plans relating to multicultural art education. Crayola for Educators (yes! the crayon company) offers a tremendous amount of art lesson plans with an outstanding variety. A great aspect of this website is being able to search projects by grade, subject, theme or Crayola product. It makes it easy to find specific types of art lesson plans. A few other good sites are Dick Blick Lesson Plans, Amaco Lesson Plans, and Nasco Lesson Plans.

• Crizmac-http://www.crizmac.com/free_resources/class_lesson_links_page.cfm
• Crayola for Educators-http://www.crayola.com/educators/
• Dick Blick-http://www.dickblick.com/lesson-plans/
• Amaco-http://www.amaco.com/amaco-lesson-plans/
• Nasco-http://www.enasco.com/artsandcrafts/page/ac_lesson/?%20utm_source=arts&crafts&utm_medium=showcase&utm_campaign=artworks

Are you aware of the many excellent resources available from the government and other non profit agencies? Check out Free Teaching Resources and Lesson Plans from the Federal Governement for over 1500 teaching and learning resources. FREE was conceived in 1997 by a federal working group in response to a memo from President Bill Clinton outlining his desire for Americans to have the best education in the world. The Getty is another website worthy of bookmarking. In addition to lesson plans, there is also access to view art online, the ability to learn about artists, a guide to building curriculum, and even a lesson plan template to help you plan. Other notable websites include: Arts Edge, a database from the Kennedy Center of lessons seachable by subject and grade, the National Gallery of Art's Division of Education where you can connect art and curriculum by borrowing free learning materials and where you can find Art Lesson Plans & Curriculum and last but not least, the mighty Smithsonian Education website.

• FREE-http://free.ed.gov/
• Getty-http://www.getty.edu/education/teachers/classroom_resources/
• Arts Edge-http://artsedge.kennedy-center.org/
• National Gallery of Art (lending library)-http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/loanfinder/
• National Gallery of Art (lesson plans)-http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/
• The Smithsonian-http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/index.html

Magazines are also a great resource for Art teachers. These are a few publications you may have heard of which are available for subscription. School Arts offers articles and lesson ideas for the K-12 teacher and you can even submit your own lesson plans for publication. Arts & Activities is another popular magazine similar to School Arts who offers the option of a digital subscription. For the classroom Scholastic Art combines lessons on classic and contemporary artists with hands-on workshop projects to support a balanced art curriculum for grades 7–12.

• School Arts-http://www.davisart.com/portal/schoolarts/sadefault.aspx
• Arts & Activities-http://www.artsandactivities.com/
• Scholastic Art-http://teacher.scholastic.com/products/classmags/art.htm

Don't forget to check out the local resources available to you! Your area library, college or university, and art galleries are chock full of books, images, and information to help you plan, create, and execute teacher lesson plans in art. There are also local and national organizations to assist you including the National Art Education Association and NYSATA.

• NAEA-http://www.naea-reston.org/
• NYSATA-http://www.nysata.org/

With all of this information available, there is no reason why you cannot create successful, effective, lessons.