Skip to main content

Christmas Art Lessons

This post is the next is my series of art curriculum reviews.


Yesterday, I posted a review of See The Light's Art Class Curriculum.  See The Light has also made three illustrated videos with art lessons.  My kids and I have had the chance to watch 2 of them.  The Gift of Love and God's Runaway.  Each of the videos has a 10 minute story and three art lessons.  One is a creative lettering lessons, one is a drawing lesson, and the third is a chalk-art lesson.  They are each taught by different artists.


As a mom, I love the lessons from the Bible and the art that illustrates them.  It was surprising to me how much my kids enjoyed the stories even though they weren't animated.  The way the stories are filmed the illustrations come to life.  I enjoyed the art lessons and doing them with my children.  The art lessons are a little more difficult than the first lessons in the Art Class series, so I would recommend them to grades 2 and up.  First graders who aren't able to write all of their letters easily yet may have a difficult time doing the art lessons.  I would recommend the stories to ages 3 and up as See The Light recommends, but the lessons for grades 2 and up.  Middle schoolers would also enjoy the lessons.  


The Gift of Love is a video on the Nativity story.  There are three lessons.  I did the creative lettering lesson with my daughter who is 7 years old.  Here is her drawing:


and here is mine:


Autumn's star looks different because she was a bit discouraged by how her O turned out.  The colors she chose made it all blend together.  So, she drew her own sort of star.  I was surprised by how easy the lesson was to follow.  There are times that you want to be able to pause it and finish the step you're on, so be prepared to do that along the way.  There are also techniques and drawing tips interwoven in the lessons as well as how the art reminds us of God and points us to Him and His Word.  


I also did the nativity scene drawing lesson.  


This is the lesson that I think would be a little more difficult for younger children.  I was surprised by how easy the directions were to follow and that my donkey's mane really did look as it was supposed to!


This DVD would be wonderful for the month of December when you want to do special Christmas activities but still want to cover your subjects.  The lessons on this DVD teach children about art and not just cut and paste arts and crafts.  This drawing and the rejoice picture could be framed and used as special gifts for a family member.  I know grandparents would love them.  It goes right along with Pat Knepley's story about the greatest gift we've received--Jesus-- and how we give gifts to those we love at Christmas time.  That particular nugget is one I plan on talking to my children about often this coming Christmas season.    


Under the "fun stuff" tab on See The Light, there are additional free lessons and downloads available to go along with this video.  The videos on the site are for their Crossmaker DVD, but there is a downloadable chalk lesson of the angels under the downloads section on this tab.  


The second DVD that my children and I watched is God's Runaway.  This video tells the story of Jonah.  It is similar to The Gift of Love.  I can say the exact same things about it.  We all enjoyed the story and the lessons.  There is also a downloadable chalk lesson to draw the whale on the website to go along with this video.  Autumn and Sami enjoyed the creative lettering lesson and drew their whales.  



My children love to draw and they draw almost every day.  But, I loved watching them do these lessons and the art class lessons, because their art has begun to look more realistic.  Their skills are growing with the tips they have learned on these videos.  My children are pretty normal, I think.  They want to rush to the finished product and go like Speedy Gonzales to the end of the race.  These videos help slow them down and walk them through the creation process step by step.  This is very helpful!  You can see that Autumn got to the rushing point of wanting to be done with her star on the rejoice picture.  But, she focused through the rest of the lessons.  The art lessons on the DVDs do last between 18 and 33 minutes each, so it may be wise to take a break in the middle of the drawing or split it up over 2 days for younger students like mine.  I think older children would enjoy making the pictures in one sitting.  

These DVDs are available through the See the Light website HERE for $15 each plus shipping and handling.  I did notice that there were a few used copies of The Gift of Love available on Amazon.  If you have children that love to draw, these are some fun art lessons.  They'd be great whether your children are homeschooling or are in public school.  Actually, if your kids are in school and you really want them to know that it is the beauty of God that is reflected in art, these would be great videos to help them see and hear that.  

My kids have been asking every week and almost every day since these videos arrived to watch them.  That may be because we don't watch very many videos, but I suspect is mostly because they enjoy the stories and the lessons!

Please note that I received a complimentary copy of The Gift of Love for review from See the Light for review.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Comparison of Verses

Tonight I was reading the Mom's Bible again (NCV) and compared this verse: NCV Ephesians 5:22-24 22 Wives, yield to your husbands, as you do to the Lord, 23 because the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ is the head of the church. And he is the Savior of the body, which is the church. 24 As the church yields to Christ, so you wives should yield to your husbands in everything. NIV Ephesians 5:22-24 22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. The Message 22-24 Wives, understand and support your husbands in ways that show your support for Christ. The husband provides leadership to his wife the way Christ does to his church, not by domineering but by cherishing. So just as the church submits to Christ as he exercises such leadership, wives should likewis...

Grieved

Why is it that my generation (I belong to Gen X) and generations after us always seem to think that they know more than the generations that have come before us? Why is there such a lack of respect in our generation for our elders? Why do we think that the liturgy of the church and hymns are irrelevant? It is ironic to me that the emergent movement is saying that the seeker sensitive movement is irrelevant. It seems as if it was only a few years ago when it was the seeker sensitive movement that said to the traditional church that it (the traditional church) was irrelevant. I'm reading a book with all of these big words and I want to be honest--I didn't understand a lot of it. I'm not dumb. I understood most of it, but the author was assuming a lot of background knowledge on the part of the reader. Most of the time I learn deep theological concepts and then I have to store them in my "attic" (as Autumn would say) because there isn't enough room in the ...

ESV, NIV, or NASB and then there's the ICB, ESV or NIrV...which should we read?

I am so thankful for my friend's question about the ESV vs. NASB and NIV. I couldn't remember the difference so I went to look it up. I knew that John Piper and Tim Keller, both pastors and authors that I deeply respect have switched over to the ESV. All of the churches that we have attended over the past few years PCA or Reformed Baptist have also switched to the ESV. I did find a blog that explained the differences and that helped me ( http://thefoolishgalatian.wordpress.com/2007/10/22/niv-vs-esv-and-why-piper-switched/ ) I knew why I didn't like the KJV--it was written in the days when writers were paid by a patron and that often slanted the translation. The NKJV, from what I understand, is a revision of the KJV that uses more modern language. Most churches I have attended used the NIV until the ESV came out. The blog I found explained that the ESV is a more literal translation---like the NASB. The NASB is a very literal translation. The ESV has come to be consid...