Pennsylvania Partners in the Arts Grant

With the funds from the grant our new art teacher, Rachel Yoder, has been able to expand our art program and its reach! A few big and exciting changes are coming this year for Brookeside Montessori students and families. One of the first expansions to our art program is that Mrs. Yoder was able to purchase additional art supplies that students haven’t been able to use yet at Brookeside, including clay and assemblage art projects.

Mrs. Yoder has begun using Artsonia, the World’s Largest Student Art Museum, to keep a digital portfolio of student work throughout the year. The site can also be used for fundraising for Brookeside’s art programming. It’s a free, safe, educational program designed to connect parents and families with their child’s creative activities at school. https://www.artsonia.com/schools/school.asp?id=173567

Mrs. Yoder has developed the Brookeside Travelling Art Show as a way to infuse her background in community arts with the Montessorian principles of stewardship. For four months in the Spring (January- April) students in Kindergarten and Elementary school with be able to experience creating art for the public to view and exhibiting their artwork in the community. Mrs. Yoder has partnered up with four local businesses: Firefly Cafe, ArtFusion, Boyertown Community Library and My Piano Place, to have student’s exhibit their artwork throughout the months of January-April. The final stop of the Brookeside Travelling Art Show will be a school-wide Art Show (preschool-elementary) at the Spring music concert at Morning Star Fellowship in May 2020.

Finally, as part of the grant-funded programming, Mrs. Yoder has organized an end of the year field trip for Kindergarten and Elementary students to The Pennsylvania German Cultural Heritage Center in Kutztown, Pennsylvania. At the heritage center students will learn about Pennsylvania Dutch folk art and hex signs from the knowledgeable staff at the center. They will also spend time in their beautifully restored one-room school house and discuss the similarities of their multi-aged classroom to the one-room school house’s classrooms.

Additional to the grant-funded expansions, Mrs. Yoder has also started Brookeside Art Club, an after school enrichment opportunity for students to enjoy arts and crafts for an hour in a small group setting. Student’s have the opportunity to enjoy art-making with Mrs. Yoder in a laid back setting. There is more freedom during art club to explore the student’s arts and crafts interests.

We are so excited to be expanding our art program and hope that you will come out and support our young artists when they exhibit their work! Please stay tuned for more information.