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Victoria in TX recently
shared with me her list of favorite art books for Preschool through early
elementary and gave a wonderful description of each of the books. I thought I
would share all that great information with you. Above is a link to her list.
She is currently working on a list for older children and a game. Can't wait to
see what she has for this. Thanks for sharing Victoria!! If you have any
questions please feel free to email
Victoria.
Clicking on
any of the pictures here or elsewhere in the site will take you to Amazon where
you can purchase this item. For series -- I just listed one book below. Search
by author to find more books in a series. By using these links and purchasing
items you are helping support this website. Thank you!
From Victoria:
I
put * by DS very favorite ones. These are both preschool and early
elementary. I have been adding to my various lists for all ages, but tried
to remove any books that are definitely for older children. However, I
think it is good to keep in mind that all children are different, my oldest DS
could sit still for chapter books at 4, so any longer ones didn't phase him at
all. Plus, the older he gets, the harder time I am having remembering when
he first read each one. He still likes all of them though.
The first ones listed are ones we own, or have checked out from the library (and
I remember them well), or have seen in person. The second list are ones
that I wrote down we enjoyed at the library, but don't exactly remember.
The third list are ones that have been recommended, or I saw on-line, but have
never seen in person.
*Dog's Night by Meredith Hooper & Allan Curless - contains reproductions of
paintings with dogs, dogs come out to party once a year, but this time they accidentally
got back in the wrong paintings
*When Pigasso Met Mootise by Nina Laden - her version of what might have
happened between Picasso and Matisse - her illustrations capture the feel of both
artists, cute story
*Mike Venezia - artist biographies (he also does musicians, and is starting a
new series on presidents) - he has so many, maybe 50? The text is simple for
preschool and early elementary, and are DS very favorite. However, the cartoons,
while enjoyed by the preschoolers, are really more appreciated by older
children, preschoolers generally don't get most of the jokes. So this book is
great to read to multiple ages. My co-op class with kids 10+ enjoyed them too.
Contains actual reproductions. The youngest preschooler may have trouble sitting
still for these, but when DS was 4 he did fine. DS takes these to bed all
the time (admittedly for the cartoons that he can't even read LOL, but I don't
care, he still sees the art work too)
*Squeaking of Art
(The Mice go to the
Museum) by Monica Wellington - each double
page covers a different topic - like pictures of children playing, portraits.
The author makes interpretations of famous paintings. We like to try to match
them to the art postcards we have. Although, we definitely do not have a
postcard for every picture in the book!
*Willy's Pictures by Anthony Browne 'monkey' copies famous paintings,
substituting in monkeys and gorillas. Also substitutes in other details - adds a
banana in a lot of pictures, also adds the pattern of his sweater. At the end
there is a pull out section with small reproductions of each of the paintings he
copied and you try to match them. Then if you have mastered that - there is
another section of reproductions where he has copied only part of the painting
and combined into the other paintings. Some of these are quite a challenge to
find, as you do not know what portion of the painting he copied. Very cute.
The Shape Game by Anthony Brown - story of a family visit to an art museum,
along the way, the boy sees some paintings, then they either use their
imagination or memory to see a similar scene in their minds (I'm not doing a
good job of explaining, sorry) At the end, he shares a game you can play with
your family.
Babar's Museum of Art by Laurent de Brunhoff - Babar story of starting an art
museum, contains 'elephanitized' versions of famous art work. Another fun one to
match up to postcards of the actual paintings. It also contains a pull-out
poster of the versions.
Elements of Art series by Philip
Yenawine (Metropolitan Museum of Art) - There
are several books in this series, such as 'Colors'. Contains actual
reproductions.
Smart About Art series - artist biographies - not quite as simple as Venezia,
but still for a young age, maybe early elementary. Contains actual
reproductions.
Adventures in Art (Prestel) - biographies, My library has several series by this
name, but most seem to be for older kids. This series by Prestel is fine for
kids who can listen to very long picture books. Contains actual reproductions
Jacqueline Preiss Weitzman and Robin Preiss Glasser -
You Can't Take a Balloon...
series. No words, just pictures to follow a cute story. There are actual
reproductions, but pretty small.
Famous Children series - artist biographies obviously dealing mostly with their
childhood. The one we have has a few reproductions of childhood art. Then the
last page has about 4 adulthood reproductions.
Series by Metropolitan Museum of Art that as far as I can tell has no name -
basically they are illustrated songbooks. They have music, and art from their
museum, could be paintings, jewelry, sculpture, most anything from the museum.
They also contain information both about the art and the songs. Titles I know
are Songs of the Wild West, Go In and Out the Window (childhood songs), one named
something about Lullaby.
Laurance Anholt series - he takes a true event in the artists life, and adds
what 'might have happened'. For example in Camille and the Sunflowers, Camille
was a true person, and Van Gough did paint portraits of Camille and his whole
family. Contains actual reproductions. Linea in Monet's Garden by Christina
Bjork, Lena Anderson - definitely more K or early elementary, 50+ pages with
actual reproductions. A story about a girl who wants to go see Monet's garden,
and gets an opportunity to do this.
Micawber
by John Lithgow - more about being an artist
Color by Ruth Heller -neat book about how color works - contains 1 see through
pages that 'adds' color to another page
The Art Box by Gail Gibbons - tells about artist tools
Can You find it by Judith Cressy - I Spy type book, multiple items to find in
each reproduction
Look! Zoom in on Art by Gillian Wolfe - reproductions with discussion
James Mayhew - Katie series - most people know of these, they contain actual
reproductions Visiting the art museum by Laurene Krasny Brown and Marc Brown -
family goes to art musuem, one child does not want to go, but finds it it neat
after all. No narrative, the story is told in cartoon form with speech bubbles.
Contains actual reproductions which are incorporated into the illustration.
Boy Who Loved To Draw (Benjamin West) by Barbara Brenner - biography - just a
few reproductions at the end
A Child's book of Prayer in Art by Sister Wendy Beckett - each double page
spread has a theme, such as respect. One page is a reproduction, the next page
contains a couple of blow ups of details, small bit of info about the painting,
some discussion of the painting, a bit of a prayer, and a lesson about the
theme.
Curious Cats (In Art and Poetry) Metropolitan Museum of Art - combines mostly
short poems and art work - paintings, sculptures, etc.
Art Up Close (from Ancient to Modern) by Claire d'Harcourt - oversize book of I
spy, several to find on each reproduction. The back of the book contains the
answers.
Jeannette Winter - Diego- biography of Diego Rivera - text in both Spanish and
English , and My Name is Georgia - biography of Georgia O'Keefe,
Cowboy Charlie
- biography of Charles Russell (I can't remember if these contains reproductions
or not)
Egg Marks the Spot by Mary Jane Auch - cute story which is a sequel about a
chicken who can produce 'fancy' eggs. She tries to copy paintings in a museum.
Meanwhile she helps capture a thief.
The Peaceable Kingdom by Ewa Zadrzynska - story surrounding the famous painting
The Christmas Story by Richard Muhlberger, illustrated with famous reproductions
The Girl with a Watering Can by Ewa Zadrzynska - I think this was similar to
Katie books
Ella's Trip to the Museum by Elaine Clayton - Ella keeps seeing paintings come
alive during class trips, but teacher does not.
Come Look with me series by Gladys Blizzard - she has 4 additional books to the
ones used by Sonlight, we have the Native American one and like it.
Dan's Angel: A Detective's Guide to the Language of Painting by Alexander
Sturgis - Dan Visits the museum and an Angel comes from a painting and helps him
to understand the meanings, origins, details of various other paintings.
Contains reproductions.
No One Saw by Bob Raczka - simple book with a reproduction, and a line like - no
one saw flowers like Georgia O'Keefe with a reproduction of one of her paintings
DS2 has a Baby Einstein Master Pieces, if I remember correctly there is both a
larger version, and a scaled down board book. We have one of them, and
unfortunately I can't go check on it, as he is asleep.
Lucy Micklethwait - of course we all know the SLPK offering, my favorite is the
one called Discovering Great Artists - it shows the size of the painting in
comparison to a 5 yr old, it asks questions and provides discussion. Then there
is one with pictures of 'play', and alphabet one, there are 2 oop ones Spot the
Cat and Spot the Dog, the rest are all I Spy... , including a counting one.
Discovering Great Artists: Hands-on art for children in the style of great
artists by Mary Ann Kohl - I have this one that I got for DH to do, as I am not
a crafty or painting type of person (well, I quilt and cross-stitch, but I don't
like to do messy stuff with kids!) He has not done it yet, but DH took a class
at co-op where they did a different artist every week using this book - he loves
it! Plus it didn't sound so bad, maybe I will try it some time (Oh, who am I
kidding!)
I am planning on adding the 'Off the Wall' museum guide for Egypt soon. This was
recommended by Veritas Press. There are several in the series, I don't know for
sure if this is good for PreK though.
The following I have on my list as having borrowed, but I don't have a good
recollection of them
First Words by Chermayeff
Oxford First Book of Art by Gillian Wolfe
Ah! By Josse Goffin (I do remember that we have checked this out twice and
really liked it, and that it is a little different, I just can't quite remember
the details though)
Rembrandt's Beret by Johnny Alcorn
Ernest Raboff - artists bios - these are definitely Oop - these are for early
elementary
Famous artist series by Antony Mason - for early elementary
Tony Hart - artist bios for early elementary
Other authors for early elementary -
Shirley Glubok
Richard Muhlberger
The following I have seen online or have been recommended - I have not seen them
in person.
A Picnic with Monet - this is a board book, and part of a series
Joan Knight - a series about Charlotte
Joan Sweeney - author of Me on the map has several art books (I believe these
are similar in type to the Anholt books - fictionalized acounts of an event in
the artists life)
Colors Everywhere by Tana Hoban
Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh
Pictures Tell Stories by John Grandits
The Shapes Game by Paul Rogers
Calder Creatures: Great and Small by Jean Lipman
Looking at Painting: An Introduction to Fine Art for Young People by Erika
Langmuir, Ruth Thomson - This is a Disney book, this looks like it has paintings
from National Gallery, plus stuff from Disney(???) I am very curious to know
about it.
First Look at Art series by Ruth Thomson - seems to be combination of
informative and hands on
Museum ABC by Metropolitan Museum of Art
How Artists See Series by Colleen Carol. Two of these books are used for the Art
2 Elective from Sonlight.
Usborne Introduction to Art
Usborne Children's Book of Art
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