There Will Be A $5.00 Charge For Whining: A TOS Review: ArtAchieve

I think every homeschool family should devote time to making art. As a matter of fact, all families should be making art! This, of course, can be overwhelming for some. It can be messy, challenging and how does one ‘teach art’ when he or she doesn’t consider themselves an artist or even artistic?

For the past few weeks, Josiah and I have been reviewing the Entire Level 1 from ArtAchieve. This online art curriculum might just be the answer for some of you.

As I mentioned, ArtAchieve is an online art curriculum. The video lessons are presented by John Hofland. You need not worry about knowing a lick about anything. Mr. Hofland does all the work. The only you thing you need to do is provide simple supplies. We had everything on hand. They included a black, fine tip marker, colored markers, colored pencils, oil pastels and acrylic paints.

The Entire Level 1 from ArtAchieve contains several FREE lessons that you can check out on your own. These lessons are for anyone who considers themselves a beginner. Josiah is 14 and while he has had plenty of art lessons, he is also dysgrahic. He struggles with handwriting and specifically the ability to reproduce a shape.

The lessons are intended for ages 6 to adult, so I felt confident that Josiah wouldn't feel like the lessons were babyish or meant for little kids. I was exactly right. There are 9 lessons that are available for purchase with Entire Level 1, plus a few free ones. You do notice that the lessons are ages 6-adult. Which means I got to play! (and you could to!)

Each lessons takes about an hour minutes to complete. I want to give you a little walk through one lesson to show you how it all works.

This lesson is The Haitian Gecko. All the art projects have been inspired by the author’s travels. The art project was inspired by Haitian artists who work with the metal from steel drums.

I began by printing off the Warm-up Exercise paper and the printout of the drawing.

The video comes in either Power Point version or Video Version.

Mr. Hofland begins by talking a little about Geckos and Haiti and encourages us to work through some of the cross-curricular activities found on the site.

There are also relaxation exercises. Deep breathes and rubbing your palms together!

The warm up consists of copying the lines in each of the boxes. This was harder for Josiah to do. I think maybe fewer boxes would have been less challenging. However, they are great practice.

When it is time to start the project, we are taken through the drawing step by step and then we are ready to color!

We are also given some time to reflect on our work.

Here is Josiah's finished product. I will say that I let him trace over the printout of the drawing and then trace onto another page. He has such difficulty with drawing to his satisfaction and I'm thankful that Mr. Hofland gave us the tools for Josiah to feel proud of his finished product.

This is mine. He was so much fun to create!

My Thoughts

We really enjoyed ArtAchieve! The lessons are fun and doable. I also love the fact that there is a little culture behind them. Mr. Hofland emphasis that it is okay to make mistakes. He also encourages the students to make the projects their own.

The supplies for the lessons are easy to find. I had everything I needed, but I think even those who lack an art supply closet will be able to find them easily.

Mr. Hofland also emphasis using background music while doing art. I LOVE this! Art class becomes much more of an experience. I also really appreciate the tools that are provided to help the student feel proud of the finished product.

Here are a few other projects we did.

This are my Hungarian Insect project.

This is Josiah's project. We were asked to use markers for this drawing, but would you believe that my bucket of markers ran away from home on that day? I feel like such a fraud. A homeschooler without a year's supply of washable markers.