Comments on: Start Your Summer Artist’s Date with Inspiration

By: Erin @ Letter Soup

Erin @ Letter Soup — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 17:21:21 +0000

I love lots of the resources you’ve mentioned, and I can’t wait to check out the rest! Great, informative post! We’re hoping to have a more artistic summer, so this will come in handy! Thank you!

By: Victoria Hanley

Victoria Hanley — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 13:40:23 +0000

Thanks! My kids are grown now, but your post inspired me to take some time this summer pretending I’m a kid again myself. (Okay, maybe I don’t have to pretend very hard.) What a great list of ideas and resources.

By: Audrey Vernick

Audrey Vernick — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 19:18:15 +0000

This is fantastic, and there’s so much of it, so it’s enormously fantastic. Thank you!

By: Emily

Emily — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 16:23:37 +0000

This is a great source of information. I love all of the ideas for keeping kids doing and learning. Thanks for sharing.

By: Olugbemisola

Olugbemisola — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 16:14:03 +0000

Thanks, everyone! Jen, you sound like my kind of family — maybe we can support each other while we plan. 🙂 I am trying to get myself organized now too, and at first, I was thinking of a 3 day a week plan, to go with all of my other 3-day a week plans for science, summer book clubbing, outdoor time, puppetry, bookmaking…yeah. So we spoke yesterday of trying to set a theme each week, with one day each week set aside for Summer Artists’ dates that incorporate the theme, even if it’s only for a portion of our allotted time. I’m going to make a poster-sized version of our plan so that we can see it every day. If my daughter gets really enthusiastic about something and wants to spend more time on it, then I’m ready to go with the flow. I do want to have a structure in place first, for my own peace of mind, and for hers; I think that will free us up even more and keep us from getting too bogged down in the planning stage. We also talked about keeping a journal of how we think things are going, sort of an informal reflection/evaluation tool, that might help us adjust our plan as we go along — and can also include art (drawing our response, etc.). I remind myself that we don’t have to do everything, it’s a good thing to have so many choices, whatever we choose to do will be enjoyable and enhance our learning! I’m hoping that the summer will only be the beginning, and develop the habit so that we continue with this in some form. Finally, I loved the “How I Plan Our Art Activities” post over at The Artful Parent (there’s a link in my post above); I think that’s very helpful.

By: Jen

Jen — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 15:04:36 +0000

Wow- what a plethera of ideas! My brain is spinning now for sure! Can’t wait to visit the art museum with the girls this summer, also going to visit Warhol Museum- hopefully get some inspiration from there, too. They are anxious to do splatter painting outside as well on one of our dates and study abstract art. Need to start organizing my ideas for this summer and collecting supplies! How often will you have artists dates? Just wondering, because we want to do water activiites, science experiments, and outdoor exploring. We can incorporate art and writing, too. A summer journal, maybe. Also, doing summer reading and involved in state postcard project write now- have incorporated some art here as well. (drawing and clay so far)

My kids aren’t done with school until the 10th due to crazy winter. Looking forward to summer fun!

Jen
Creative and Curious Kids!

By: Jean Reidy

Jean Reidy — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 14:47:51 +0000

Gbemi, What a wonderful article. I remember artist dates with my son – who is now an architect – such messy and joy-filled fun. And Melissa this site is simply fabulous. Thank you.

By: Kristi Bernard

Kristi Bernard — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 00:52:34 +0000

This is a great source of information. I love all of the ideas for keeping kids doing and learning. Thanks for sharing.