Our Twist on Art and Other Subjects

To read about “Our Twist” in general, please click here.

ART

Art can be very expressive of feelings and emotions but that is not always the main purpose of it. We don’t get into a lot of busywork, art history, sculptures, or analysis of famous paintings in our product-line. We want to encourage good, creative imagination but we especially want to focus on the development of physical skills that can be applied in other areas of life.

Peppermint Stick Learning Company Inc. focuses on these aspects of the visual arts:

• Art skills are practical for developing fine motor coordination (which in turn helps with writing and work such as screwing things together, taking out slivers, etc.).
• Art skills are practical to make a teaching tool or visual reminder for better memory of something. (These skills are also helpful to know when designing presentations in other subjects, even as an adult.)
• Art can be a craft that teaches a specific skill such as weaving, mixing colours, making candles.
• Art can be a reflection/expression of worship to God.

Our art curriculum leaves the creative expression part up to the individual student while giving guidance for a variety of skills. It is intended to fit well into a busy home life with a number of children of varying stages. Our art curriculum (printed book format or printable pdf ebook) a resource to be used year after year and is arranged with multi-grade teaching in mind.

We also sell professional artwork which can be used for additional crafts or Bible Memory, in the home or in ministry settings such as Sunday Schools or camps.

A “Mom-to-Mom” comment: If you want motivating and beautiful drawing or painting lessons for your children on a regular basis, you might like to subscribe to the Nature Friend Magazine: https://www.naturefriendmagazine.com/

(Full disclosure: We do not receive any compensation for recommending you to Nature Friend. This link is here because sometimes our audience wants to find curriculum for drawing/painting lessons and we don’t offer much of that in our business. We do though, have a title for drawing lessons that is associated with Nature Friend.)

Click on this link for Joy’s seminar notes for using Art in Christian Ministry (a free pdf download):

Q: How would I schedule “art”?

A: It is a very flexible subject to include in homeschooling. Once-a-week (e.g. during Monday mornings or Friday afternoons) for as long as you want to spend on a particular skill. Our curriculum would be year-long if you did that and is a bit seasonally-arranged. I have sometimes had an art lesson when Daddy is snowblowing our driveway in a winter evening (instead of during the daytime) or gone through most lessons during a summer break.

HOME ECONOMICS

• We sometimes sell recipe books, especially those relating to outdoor life, homesteading, or Mennonite-style of cooking. Titles vary and are not always in-stock. Occasionally we also sell a child’s mop, broom, or similar homemaking items (in-person only).
• We sometimes sell home organization paper stationary items such as bookmarks, stickers, writing papers, blank journals but these are not listed online at present.

If you are looking for something in particular, you are welcome to ask us about it.

Check our “Organizing a Busy Home and School” blog posts for additional ideas too.

Physical (Activity) Education

How you accomplish providing “Phys. Ed” for your children depends on YOUR OWN family’s goals, abilities, and opportunities for where YOU live. You can read more about what WE do in this post here and see any current books we offer for this subject in the Home Economics section.

We like to encourage a physical education that is both fun and practical – skills for work and play!