School Experiences

Unique and Free Educational Experiences for Schools & Teachers Across the Region

With the Taft Museum of Art, our art experiences promote critical thinking, creativity, and visual literacy skills. We aim to foster the development of the four Cs of 21st-century learning: critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity.

Special Exhibition Experiences

Walk This Way | Every Shoe Tells a Story

March–June 2021

Learn about 200 years of fabulous footwear with a virtual tour of the Taft’s special exhibition, Walk This Way | Footwear from the Stuart Weitzman Collection of Historic Shoes, specifically designed for K-12 students. By studying the details of design and considering when, where, and how these shoes were made, students will uncover stories highlighting moments in history from new movements in art and culture, to labor activism and women’s rights. This experience will encourage students to consider how everyday objects tell stories about their unique moment in time.

K-12 School Students Will Experience:

Drawing from cues that encourage close looking
Engagement in discussion questions to foster critical thinking
Engagement through drawing or writing prompts for further exploration

Walk This Way: Every Shoe Tells a Story is adaptable for every classroom! The Taft’s virtual tour can be shared with your classroom “live” or a digital version is available for independent or asynchronous use.

Curriculum Connections: Social Studies, English Language Arts, Visual Arts

Please note: due to COVID-19 activities are currently virtual only. Learn more here.

Register

Art for All Outreach

Art for All provides a unique arts education experience to students who might have limited access to the arts. The program is designed for teachers whose classroom demographics demonstrate need, defined as greater than 50% of students receiving free/reduced price lunch. For this program, the Taft Museum of Art creates educational programming based on its special exhibitions.

Please note: activities are currently virtual only. Learn more here.

Each Free Program Includes:

A virtual visit to the Taft Museum of Art, where students will tour the Taft and learn more about the Duncanson murals. Each 20-30 minute tour is grade-level specific and led by the Taft Museum of Art’s teaching artist. Live and pre-recorded options are available. This virtual tour focuses on the art and history behind the Taft murals and highlights cross-curricular themes including Cincinnati History, abolitionism, and Black History, landscape painting, and historic architecture.
A virtual school visit by a professional educator to lead an art-making project that coordinates with the virtual tour. Art supply packets will be safely packaged and delivered for distribution.

Costs Covered by the Taft Include:

Virtual tour
Educational materials
All supplies and instruction for an art-making activity

If you would like to participate please contact outreach@taftmuseum.org to determine if your school is eligible.

Artists Reaching Classrooms

The Taft Museum of Art’s Artists Reaching Classrooms program (ARC) is a great way to enrich your curriculum and expand your students’ experience of the arts. All aspects of the program, including buses for field trips, are offered to participating schools free of charge.

ARC immerses high school art students in Cincinnati’s visual arts community and exposes them to careers in the arts. Professional artists visit classrooms to talk with the students about both the creative and practical aspects of a career in art. The program includes opportunities to visit an artist’s studio, such as a painter’s atelier, a glassworks, or a fine arts pressworks.

Students are expected to complete a research project on an object from the Taft Museum of Art’s collection, describe its history and significance, and explain why the artwork has personal appeal. Each classroom receives a set of museum catalogs.

As a final project, students are asked to make artworks in response to the ARC experience and write artists’ statements demonstrating what they have learned. The program culminates in a professionally organized exhibition of selected student artwork.