Pre-K Art Appreciation Matching Game

I am obsessed with making sure my kids learn about art. I know very little myself, so I do my own research and really enjoy learning about art and artists...and since I will have to teach the information to my kids, it seems to stick with me more than before. We go to museums, read books about art, but there were no real "activities" showing them works of art until last week.

My son is really drawn to impressionist (and post impressionist...hehe) paintings, so the last time we went to the McNay here in San Antonio (confession, we went 3 days in a row), I bought 2 books of Van Gogh art cards, they were less than $2 each!

Then I came home, tore the cards out of the little books, laminated them and was so excited to share them with my preschool age son. He refused to play the matching game and said he did not like the pictures.
Sigh.

My toddler daughter dumped the pictures out of the basket and played with them for a while. I felt a bit better, but had imagined my son and I discussing the colors and items in the paintings. Oh, the ideas I have.....

Then, today, a week or so later, guess what?! My son asked if he could play with the art cards. Perhaps it was because they were in a special basket, or because they are just nice to look at? Who knows what it was, but he was really into the activity and we ended up talking about France and Van Gogh and paint. The cards are great because on the back, the name and date of the painting is listed.

This is a very affordable, easy activity to introduce or review art and artists with your children. It has been really fun and interesting to share art with my children.