Homeschool Art Box: Fine Arts Made Easy
Gena: [00:00:00] Hi, everybody. Welcome back to the Music in Our Homeschool podcast. I'm here with Sarah Harmeling today of Homeschool Art Box, and we're going to be talking about new ways to include fine arts in your homeschool that I haven't really talked about before.
If you are a homeschooler looking for ways to easily and affordably include a quality music education in your homeschool, you've come to the right place. This is the Music in Our Homeschool podcast. I'm Gena Mayo, homeschooling mom of eight and music teacher for over 30 years.
Gena: So Sarah, could you please introduce yourself?
Sarah Harmeling: Yes. Thank you. So I am the owner of, creator of Homeschool Art Box which I've been in business, this'll be my eighth year coming up. And what we do is have boxes that are open and go. So each art box includes a lesson about an artist, prints of their work, and then [00:01:00] instructions and all the art supplies for a related art project. So it was designed with the teacher in mind, really trying to make it easy and accessible for homeschool moms to include art in their homeschool. And I got started as a homeschool mom many years ago. And as I got involved in my local co-op, I just fell into that
Gena: art
Sarah Harmeling: teacher role because that's what I loved. So that has led over the years to this developing in my mind and developed into a business for me.
Gena: Oh, it's so cool. So the first time I heard about you was on World Watch because we start our homeschool day every day that we have, that we homeschool, I call all the kids together, and we start with World Watch. And I had been advertising on there, but then I saw you started advertising there, too, then we met at the ICHE, Illinois Christian Home Educators convention this [00:02:00] past year. I was exhibiting and speaking, and then Sarah was exhibiting, so that was super fun. My daughter, who was helping me, my 13-year-old daughter kept gravitating to your booth. I think that she found your stuff very enticing, I love art. I went to school to be a music teacher at Baylor, but, and I, one of the classes I really wanted to take was elementary art methods, but I never could fit it in my schedule because there was always a required music course at the same time. So I was so sad that I didn't get to, to learn all that stuff.
But recently I've started learning to paint, mostly acrylics and watercolors. But I think that you do way more than just acrylic and watercolor, right? Can you tell me some of the different techniques that your boxes teach?
Sarah Harmeling: Definitely. So our boxes are designed to introduce students to a variety of art media. So I [00:03:00] would ... It's not necessarily sequential in building skills in watercolor, for example, or drawing skills step by step. It is an introduction to a variety of materials. So over the course of a school year our boxes come out one each month. So each month we try and introduce students to a new art medium. So they get an introduction to a variety of different art media, a variety of experiences. And through that we do give them some tips and techniques to get started. But then next month we're gonna surprise them with something else.
Gena: That's so fun. Can you give me a, an example of some maybe that are your favorites?
Sarah Harmeling: Sure. The different art mediums. Through the course of the year, we use oil pastel, watercolor, watercolor pencils decoupage, art collage, sculpture. We do some acrylic painting on canvases. So variety of things. Some of my favorites are, I [00:04:00] love the collage, collage projects. I just love that decoupage glue.
You can bring so many different things, types of papers and stuff together in a project. So I really enjoy those. Those are a lot of fun. I also really love watercolor pencils, watercolor crayons, where you can draw it on just like you're coloring, and then adding the water gives it... it just brings a whole new dynamic into that art project by making it look like you painted it. So I love that.
Gena: I have some watercolor pencils, but I've never tried them yet. So now
I know. I need to do that. All right, so you said your boxes are only available during the school year. Is that right?
Sarah Harmeling: Our subscription from September through May. So we have a school year subscription, and then you get one box per month. In addition to that, we do have individual purchase art boxes at any [00:05:00] time, and those are just our... We pick and choose our past artists that are available. You-- We usually have 10 or 12 other boxes that are available. But with our subscription, then you're gonna get that sequential, not repeating art mediums through the school year. And also with the subscription, we always start in our early Renaissance or Renaissance artists and then progress up through a modern artist. So you
Gena: Okay
Sarah Harmeling: picture of art history through the school year, if you do the subscription.
So there's some advantages to that.
Gena: What ages are these best for?
Sarah Harmeling: We don't recommend it for younger than first grade. And even that first grader, age-appropriate fine motor and attention span is probably very important to get this started. But, a lot of those kids, if they really love art, will just take off with it. And we have all the way up through high schoolers that use the box. The [00:06:00] thing I would say with high schoolers is it's an elective and it's an introduction. So it would be a fun art course for a lot of high schoolers. But if you're looking at building drawing skills or painting skills, it's a little different from some of the other programs in that it's more centered on that art history. So they're gonna draw. The older students really are gonna see a lot of connections between their other studies in history, science, worldview with what they're learning in the art boxes and about those artists.
Gena: That's really neat. And I talk a lot about fine arts and getting a fine arts credit, and I could see that your boxes could be used as a basis for that. Did you say they're a different artist every month and a different style maybe? So they could take that, do the project, and then do some reading or research about the style or the artist to fill out a full, either half credit or even full credit for fine arts.
Sarah Harmeling: Yes, [00:07:00] definitely. That's what I usually tell parents that are asking me about high school. If you want to make it a half credit, then I would say you do the boxes and you add some research beyond that, about that artist. In the box you're gonna learn some biographical information about that artist, technique information. We're always gonna look at two works of art, often more. But looking at those works of art very closely and studying them. And then anything interesting about it. So sometimes, depending on the artist, there may be just other interesting stories about that artist. We even touch on sometimes if a work of art was stolen. Was it recovered? Is it still a mystery? Is it still out there somewhere?
Gena: Interesting
Sarah Harmeling: that kids really enjoy and they're just interesting to everybody. So we try and hit those high-interest subjects about those artists as well.
Gena: And did you say that everything that's necessary for the project is in the box?[00:08:00]
Sarah Harmeling: That's correct. So you get four pages of lesson content about an artist, two prints of their work on real durable paper so students can be studying those as you go through it, and then instructions step by step and all of the art supplies you needed. And we do have options for up to four students per box.
So you can get just one box, but if you're working with multiple students, you can get multiple sets of the art supplies.
Gena: okay, without having to or-order four full boxes. That's nice. Now I didn't ask you this ahead of time. Do you happen to remember who the artists are for this coming school year, for 2026, '27? Okay.
Sarah Harmeling: In fact, I can show you, I can show you projects.
Gena: Oh, I'd lo- yes please.
Sarah Harmeling: Okay. All right. Although I don't think I have all of them
Gena: That's okay
Sarah Harmeling: We're gonna start the year with Sandro Botticelli, Alessandro Botticelli. So he was a [00:09:00] early Renaissance artist, great master of art, and we're going
This project is acrylic painting, and we're just taking themes from his work to ... He had a lot of angels in a lot
Work, lot of different religious works. So we're gonna pull those themes and create a acrylic painting on some poster board.
Then El Greco. This is a fun one. This is a tissue, bleeding tissue paper art collage.
Gena: Oh, wow
Sarah Harmeling: So this is ... It's so much fun to do. It's a little messy. But you got everything in there in the box, so it's just a matter of making the time, making a little space to get it done.
Then we're progressing through history through to Diego Velazquez. This is the project. We're doing, we're adding some perspective in with it, with this one. So we're gonna teach the students a little bit about one-point perspective, and then they're going to create with colors, and they're [00:10:00] modeling their project after one of his works of art.
And that's often what we do. It's either a creation of a famous work of art or pulling themes from that artist's work. So sometimes it's not a direct duplication.
John James Audubon, of course a very famous American artist, and we're doing a fun bird watercolor picture for him. So He was a naturalist and an artist.
Pissarro. We're gonna do a little canvas with acrylic, little acrylic landscape for him. And then I have Munch, Edvard Munch, who is ... And this is an oil pastel, so again, a different, a new art medium. That's obviously a painting that probably many people know, and they'll just learn to appreciate him, learning about him as an artist [00:11:00] as well.
It's very interesting to dive into some of these artists' stories to see why they painted the way they did. There's really, there's a number of stories with each work of art.
Gena: Yeah
Sarah Harmeling: I feel like. There's the artist's story, the story of the painting itself, and the story of why
Gena: that
Sarah Harmeling: artist chose to paint that matter.
And then we're ending the year with Norman Rockwell, so another very famous, well-loved
Gena: Yes
Sarah Harmeling: American artist. This is the collage using a lot of deca- decoupage glue and different papers and things to create that. And that's how we end the year. So progressing through history, big picture of art history during that time, lots of different artists and media.
Gena: And I think you told me that you have sets, like you rotate through them each year. Is that right? How many different sets do you have?[00:12:00]
Sarah Harmeling: Yeah, that's correct. We have a four-year cycle, so you can go through Homeschool Art Box for four years and not have any repeats of artists and all different projects. But we will have oil pastel, probably each, some of those, well-loved art mediums will be repeated year after year, but not, within the same year.
And each year, again, we start with that Renaissance or pre-Renaissance artist cycling up to a modern artist, so you get that big picture of art history, and then pick and choosing different artists each year.
Gena: I certainly want to do it myself. It looks really fun.
Sarah Harmeling: We do have a lot of moms and grandmas or
Gena: Oh
Sarah Harmeling: grandfathers that do it along with their students,
Gena: great
Sarah Harmeling: It's a fun way I found that grandparents maybe can get involved too. Art is good for everybody.
Gena: So,
Sarah Harmeling: no matter what your age, it is so good for us to get [00:13:00] creative, get our mind doing something else getting involved in a work of art
Gena: I could see that this would be good for a, a co-op project too. B- they could get one box a month and then spend the whole month just using that same watercolor or the pastels and do other projects that they find, but at least it could be on the basis of the Homeschool Art Box. If they're meeting every week. If they meet once a month, it's perfect. Or, how long do you think each project takes?
Sarah Harmeling: It does take, like we do have some co-ops that use our materials, and they usually schedule two to three sessions
Gena: Okay.
Sarah Harmeling: to work through it.
Gena: All right
Sarah Harmeling: So, I always tell co-ops, you want some time to talk about the artist. Each of our artist lessons is split up into several different articles.
So can talk through and teach your students one or two a day, and then maybe [00:14:00] come back the next week, you're gonna review those and learn a little bit more. So it's very easy to divide up into several sessions.
Gena: Yeah. Okay
Sarah Harmeling: And, our projects also can be split up over several sessions. So it does take a few hou- and of course, the, sometimes the bigger the group, the longer it
Gena: Yeah.
Sarah Harmeling: Of course, there's always those students that are done lickety-split too.
Gena: That's the thing about art. Some people spend so much time trying to get it just the way they want it to, which is neat.
Sarah Harmeling: Definitely better with a little smaller group. You don't want too big of an art class, no matter what you're doing.
Gena: Or maybe if there's several teachers or other parents in there to help, and also depending on how old the students are.
Sarah Harmeling: Yes, that makes a big
Gena: If they're a middle schooler, I bet they would be a little bit more focused
Okay[00:15:00]
Sarah Harmeling: Yes. Yeah, middle schoolers is what I primarily taught in our co-op also. And yeah, the, so just going through, you can usually go through step by step at the beginning of the project, and then you're walking them through still helping at each step 'cause they're not always listening perfectly either.
Gena: Yes, that's true.
Sarah Harmeling: But it works.
Gena: Is there anything else you wanted to share about Homeschool Art Box or anything else?
Sarah Harmeling: I guess I would, I want parents to understand that it really is designed with them in mind, that it's as an art teacher, as a homeschool parent and then teaching art in the co-op, I really saw that it was hard for people to implement art at home. It was a little overwhelming. They didn't--
Gena: If
Sarah Harmeling: they had something to go with, maybe they didn't have the art materials right there.
So it, art was pushed to the side. it wasn't... They had good intentions, but it wasn't ever really [00:16:00] done. So I really designed these boxes thinking of that teacher. I wanted to make it simple as I could for parents to bring art into the homeschool. So that's really my goal with this. And so everything is in that box. It's an open-and-go box. You can really just open that box and get started. You don't have to prep anything ahead of time. You don't need to read the lesson ahead of time. Just read it with your kids and get started on the art project. That's the main thing. That's my goal.
Gena: So much fun. I'm going to have an accompanying blog post that goes with this podcast episode, and I will get some photos of some of the things that Sarah's shared with us today, and for sure, all the links that you need to order your own Homeschool Art Boxes for this coming school year. Thank you so much for joining us today and talking about making fine arts easy in your homeschool.
Sarah Harmeling: Thank you so much for having me, Gena. It's been a pleasure.
Gena: [00:17:00] Bye-bye
Sarah Harmeling: Bye
Find links to all resources mentioned in this episode here: https://musicinourhomeschool.com/homeschool-art-box/
