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Virtual Field Trips

Bring the resources of world-class art museums into the classroom with these websites that link directly to the curriculum.
  • The Art Institute of Chicago
    The museum's extensive online resources include superb lesson plans, related book titles, maps, and glossaries related to exhibitions and items in the permanent collection. Extensive resource sections, such as the museum's "Cleopatra: A Multimedia Guide to Ancient Art," are also accessible from this page and include fully bilingual English and Spanish text, video clips, time lines, and lesson plans for grades 4–12 in five subject areas.
  • Denver Art Museum
    Designed for students in grades 2–5, the Wacky Kids site focuses on world art and culture. It offers a range of hands-on craft projects based on items in the museum's collection. The site also includes links to other museum artifacts and related book titles.
  • J. Paul Getty Museum
    The Los Angeles museum's site includes extensive image banks and excellent, interdisciplinary lesson plans, including the fascinating resource section entitled "Art & Science: A Curriculum for K–12 Teachers."
  • Metropolitan Museum of Art
    New York's biggest treasure house provides online teacher resources that cover subjects such as ancient Egypt, Indian carpets, and Byzantine life and art, with ideas for art, math, science, language-arts, and social-studies curricular links. The site also includes an online archive with thousands of highlights from the collection.
  • The Minneapolis Institute of Art and Walker Art Center
    ArtsConnectEd, a joint project organized by Minneapolis' two world-class art museums, offers a wealth of ideas on integrating art into the curriculum. There's a searchable art gallery and a playground of activities just for kids. The "For Your Classroom" section contains the Teacher's Guide to ArtsConnectEd, a useful document that maps out the site and explains how to fully take advantage of its offerings. At the bottom of each page of the guide are "Instant Inspirations," one- or two-sentence ideas for activities, such as imagining what two works of art would say to each other at a party.
  • National Gallery of Art
    The museum's online teacher resources include a wealth of art-focused lessons packed with interactive student activities, printable worksheets, glossaries, biographies, and other related resources.

"Virtual Field Trips." Booklist's Quick Tips for Schools and Libraries. ALA, Dec. 2011. Web. 7 Dec. 2011.