Teaching Kids Art Through Picture Books

How in the world do you get your kids excited about learning? I know a secret to doing this! I got interested in history when I started reading aloud to my kids when I was teaching them. What was the difference between reading paragraphs from a textbook and reading real stories from picture and chapter books? Quite simply, reading stories aloud. People and their stories are captivating when told in a well written book. Suddenly, history came to life with the fascinating, wonderful, and terrible adventures of people throughout the ages. I was hooked. When teaching my kids at home, I could see the benefits of reading aloud because of the way my own children were soaking up and remembering the stories--and often begging for more time reading.

Reading aloud can integrate so well with several areas of learning at once, even when you aren’t consciously trying to teach anything beyond enjoying a good story. Language arts is all about reading, writing, talking, and listening. Think of how you...