Color Mixing, Two Ways

I usually only let J paint with one color at a time, because I'm mean like that, but I decided it was time to start expanding our palette. This also allows for mastery of color mixing facts, which always seemed to me to be the key to preschool science LOL. :)

First we did yellow and blue paint on Jackson's easel...

And then I set up this Pinterest-inspired activity, wherein the kiddo spoons colored dilute vinegar onto baking soda. It's colorful and fizzy! This kept him occupied for an incredibly long time, until all the fizz was gone and everything in all three containers was green.

Another Great Art Book Series for Little Kids: Colleen Carroll's How Artists See Series

I've loved discovering high-quality art books for children because I think that there's no reason they shouldn't start seeing grown-up art at an early age. There's no need for high-level analysis or art history for years to come, but just having these images in their visual memory banks can't hurt and there's no reason to think it won't provide the same kind of vague cognitive benefits as early listening to great works of music.

ANYWAY, I just found another series I love, in addition to the Lucy Mickelthwait and Philip Yenawine books I've recommended in the past. These are by an educator named Colleen Carroll and they're all called "How Artists See _____." Each book contains sixteen works of art, divided into four themes. For example, How Artists See America is divided into West, South, Northeast and Midwest.

At first I thought the books were a little more text-heavy than I preferred, but as I actually read through the first three I found at a library booksale (People, Animals and Weather), I came to really appreciate her thoughtful questions about what techniques the artist used to convey feelings or ideas. She uses a great range of eras and styles, and isn't noticeably repetitive of other children's art books in my collection.

The cover of How Artists See Families uses a relatively recent painting of an American family.

This painting called "First Steps" by Vincent Van Gogh is much sweeter and more wholesome you'd expect. Van Gogh's brand is "genius with violent mental problems" but this is more like one of Mary Cassatt's family images. 

I'll try to post a full title list here soon, but in the meantime, if you spot one of these at a yard sale, grab it!

Secret Sequel? A Child's Book of Prayer in Art

One of my favorite book treasures is A Child's Book of Art by Lucy Micklethwait. It's fairly popular amongst homeschoolers, I believe because it's recommended by the Sonlight curriculum. Anyway, imagine my joy when I eventually discovered there was a "sequel," also done by Micklethwait, called A Child's Book of Play in Art. For some reason, the second book is much less celebrated than the first, despite being equally ideal for talking to little kids about a variety of concepts, not to mention exposing them to a wide array of art styles. 

Anyway, I always thought the second book had a rather odd title, because according to marketing law, the sequel should have been named something like A Child's Book of More Art. Well, I just found another book by the same publisher (Dorling Kindersley) from the same era (early 1990s) called A Child's Book of Prayer in Art, devised by Sister Wendy, and I think the mystery of the odd title is solved. 

I suspect there was a DK editor out there who saw a possible series idea in these A Child's Book of X in Art, but for some reason, the concept never really took off. Anyway, the Prayer book is organized differently than the other two, but it is just...I swear it's made me cry it's so beautifully presented and written, and I am a grinch. Reading this book gives me the same feeling I got watching Archbishop Desmond Tutu on The Daily Show: Everybody is wonderful, and everything is gonna be all right.

Sister Wendy says that looking at art is one way of keeping in touch with god.

The book is fiercely non-denominational while still being deeply spiritual. There are Christian images in the book, but for the pages on Choosing Heaven, Sister Wendy chose a picture of Charon crossing the Styx, rather than something about Jesus, which might have been the obvious choice.

Little-Kid Concept Books That Use Fine Art; Lucy Micklethwiat Bibliography

This post is almost more of a mental bookmark than anything, but as we're working on color, shapes, numbers and letters, I find that some of the books that make me happiest while also seeming to please the child are the ones that use historic and contemporary art pieces to illustrate the subject in question. I don't think they're going to make my kid smarter than if he reads a cartoony book covering the same information, but as the mama I will certainly have a better time studying the material with him when the books are this dense and interesting.

Anyway, so far I've found three main sources of such books, and I'm looking for more!

• MOMA's six-book series by Philip Yenawine: Shapes, Lines, Colors, People, Places, Stories
• The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Museum ABC, Museum 123, Museum Shapes and the mysteriously out-of-print Museum Colors
• Everything by Lucy Mickelthwait. Dear god I love her. We started with Children's Book of Art: Great Pictures, First Words, and then found Spot a Cat at the thrift store, and just checked out I Spy Shapes in Art from the library and man, she just does flawless work. I wanted to know more about her catalog, so this is a bibliography I just pulled together. (Note: Can someone reassure me she's not dead? Because she seems to have stopped publishing in the 1990s and there should be more from her!)
• I SPY SERIES: 
• I Spy Shapes in Art
• I Spy an Alphabet in Art
• I Spy Colors in Art
• I Spy Two Eyes: Numbers in Art
• I Spy a Freight Train
• I Spy Animals in Art
• A CHILD'S BOOK OF ART SERIES:
• A Child's Book of Art: Discover Great Paintings
• A Child's Book of Art: Great Pictures, First Words
• A Child's Book of Play in Art
• SPOT-A SERIES: 
• Spot a Dog
• Spot a Cat