Its #MinecraftMonday and I realized that as I’ve been posting about our lessons are majority History and ELA, but we really do much more within Minecraft, so I switched up the lesson today. My kiddo is meh about art. He’s happy coloring, building, and painting but actually learning about techniques. artists and types of art is well a struggle to say the least. However, he loves museums. So I thought why don’t we combine Art and Minecraft for our lesson today. So I came up with a few ways to work it. He wasn’t totally thrilled but I think thats because he’s been doing a lot of amazing architecture within Minecraft to show off to his friends.
First thing we did was find some art museums to take a virtual tour of (we are still staying home but going to local museums is great and can absolutely lead into lessons as well). However this gives us an opportunity to see far more from home without spending a lot of money. Here are just a few of our favorites but you can check out our Virtual Art Museum List.
MOMA ( NYC) – Virtual Tour
Musee D’Orsay (Paris, France) – Virtual Tour
The MET (NYC) – Virtual Tour
Van Gogh Museum (Amsterdam, Netherlands) – Virtual Tour
The Frick Collection (NYC) – Virtual Tour
Smithsonian Art Museum (Washington D.C) – Virtual Tour
The goal of the lesson is for students to become more familiar with masterpieces of Art and the museum where they are housed. There are several parts, and its good for all grades. For the younger begin with introducing art as a whole, the museums and some of the artworks. For older grades, you can have your child pick a museum, artist or even a type of art to study. Here is how it would work:
- Select a work of art, research the artist, and recreate that masterpiece in the student’s chosen medium. The Art is not limited to painting, ceramics and sculpture can be chosen as well. This gives students a new appreciation for Art they might never have been in contact with, and the time to explore the history of the Art and techniques used to create it.
- Ask Questions, which might include: Who is the Artist? When did they live? What was their life like? What led to them becoming an Artist? What medium are they known for working with? Why did you select this piece of Art? Where is the Art housed? Is there a story behind this particular masterpiece? What time in history was it created? If it is not a painting what was the use/purpose of the Art? (See Research Guide in Student Activities)
- Have the student research the floorplans and architecture of the museums. Based upon that research, working collaboratively (if doing this with other students), they re-construct the exterior and/or interior of the museum.
You can also find a Museum within our Mod add ons and explore. I did find a couple, some had a few pieces of work but you can have your child narrate their own museum. We used the mods to change it up.
