Homeschool Art Curriculum

The Monthly Plan from Creating a Masterpiece provides me and my boys with excellent art instruction introducing us to a variety of new art forms.  I love the opportunity to discover new ways to create art so I was super excited to jump in and review the Monthly Plan from Creating a Masterpiece!  We were able to finish several Masterpieces during this review as well as learn new techniques.  I can’t wait to share more about what we learned and created.  First I will explain how the monthly plan with Creating a Masterpiece works, then I will share how we used it and last not but not least what we thought of our experience and what we created.

Creating a Masterpiece Monthly Plan

Sharon Hofer is the artist behind Creating a Masterpiece.  She has taken her fine art school online so that it can be enjoyed by all of us.

Creating a Masterpiece was designed to build confidence in all emerging artists by helping them to succeed at creating a piece of fine art that they can be proud of.  The program is designed for all ages and the monthly plan gives you access to a wide range of skill levels. You can began at any level you are comfortable with or skip around like we did.  There are 5 different skill levels starting with beginner all the way to level 5.  There is an Art in History section that includes the Greek, Romanticism, Civil War, impressionism and post impressionism periods.   New classes are being added all the time.  A wide variety of art mediums are covered in Creating a Masterpiece including :

• Acrylic
• Batik
• Block Printing
• Carving
• Conte’ Crayon
• Copper Tooling
• Glass Mosaic
• Gouache
• Ink
• Mixed Media
• Oil Painting
• Oil Pastel
• Pencil/Charcoal
• Sculpture
• Silk Painting
• Soft Pastel
• Watercolor
• Wood Burning

Sharon provides a list of materials needed for each of the projects with many of the projects sharing materials across levels.  There is also a link that will take you straight to Dick Blick Art Materials where all of the materials will be picked out for you and all you have to do is add them to your cart and purchase them.

How we used Creating a Masterpiece

I put my first order in for supplies right away and as soon as we had access to the lessons we began.  We (myself, son 14 and son 16) started with “a lesson in ink” in the beginner level. This was a fun lesson where we used a marker, water and paintbrush to make a beautiful cardinal picture.   We moved next to level one and sculpted turtles out of clay.

When babysitting our neighbor boy who is eight and loves to make things we decided to do a lesson in Charcoal together and we made beautiful sketches of storks. This was a level 3 lesson but we did fine. We had fun and he brought his picture to school for show and tell the next day.

My boys and I went back to level one and made bluebirds with soft pastels.  This was our first experience with this medium and we had lots to learn.

We tried a lesson in Gouache next which was completely new to us as well. We found Gouache lessons in each level so we started out in the beginner level.  We made crabapple paintings with this medium.

In level one we tried soft pastels again and made beautiful lake scenes.  We jumped to level 4 next and tried copper tooling and ended our review period painting a lighthouse in level 2 using acrylics.

Our Thoughts on Creating a Masterpiece

I have to admit I love everything to do with making things and so this was pure heaven for me.  My boys on the other hand are not as enthused as I am about art.  If a homeschool art curriculum can get my boys interested and having fun then it has to be good.

The 5 things I liked most about this homeschool art curriculum: (I liked more than five things, but these are the three that hold this curriculum out in front of other art curriculums we have tried)

1. The fact that you could order the supplies online that had already been sorted out for you.  We live 89 miles from the nearest art store so this very helpful for me.  If you live close to a store you can print out the supply list and pick out the supplies yourself. Sharon also provided information on how the supplies could be shared and used with multiple students.  You can order the supplies for the lessons you choose to do.  The only problems we had with this was that some of the paper and copper was smaller than was shown in the video so the boys found that frustrating.  I didn’t pay any attention to the sizes when ordering assuming it was all picked out for me.  I realize it would be difficult to make sure all the supplies are the same over the years when products change and are discontinued.
2. I liked the variety of art that is offered.  Such a variety will offer opportunities in the students finding the medium that suits them best.  Plus, it is so much fun to try so many different mediums.
3.  I like how the lessons are presented in video with Sharon doing the project right along with us. When the video is over she provides a picture for you to look at so that you can work on your own after the video and have a picture to reference of what yours should look like.  She makes sure you see what an artist needs to see in their art, wanting you to take your time and do your best and end up with something you will be proud of.  My boys felt like she talked to them like they were babies but we were mostly in the Beginner level after all.  🙂
4. The quality of the finished art project is definitely something to be proud of!  They are definitely not baby projects!  Some of our projects didn’t turn out as beautiful as we would have liked but we now have enough confidence to try it again and know we will improve.  We also have the skills necessary to start a project on our own with any one of these mediums.
5. My boys liked it, they acted like they didn’t want to do it each time, but really had fun once we started.  The turtle sculptures were their favorite so far.  They are excited to put the liver of sulfur on their copper tooling, but we haven’t gotten that far yet.

My daughter will be home from college for spring break soon and we are looking forward to digging into every one of these lessons and creating masterpieces together!  She was sad that we had the opportunity to review something so fun after she left for college.  The boys will join in too, they won’t be able to help themselves.  I will be adding more pictures to the gallery below as we finish projects.

My boys already have several projects ready to bring to our County Fair this Fall and maybe will win some blue ribbons especially with their newfound knowledge and experience they will be able to share with the judges.

If you are looking for a worthwhile art curriculum for your homeschool, I think Creating a Masterpiece is an excellent choice!