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For Students + Families + Educators

Please contact ASCA Community Arts Program Director Charlie Sears at charles(dot)sears(at)alaska.gov. Stay well, and we are grateful for all that you do! (latest update: 04/23/2025 – Resources are ordered from newest to oldest)

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Student, Families, and Educators
Items of Interest

Opportunities and Events 

  • #CreateConnectCare – a program of Creative Visions, is a year-long mental health and well-being initiative. In partnership with Discovery Education and Innerview, #CreateConnectCare empowers youth ages 11-18 to raise awareness, challenge stigma, connect with others, and promote self-care.
  • Chamber Music Intensive: Summer 2025 – Every summer, ACMF welcomes aspiring musicians for a weeklong chamber music course in Anchorage. The Intensive is open to string and piano students of all levels, and participants study with our outstanding faculty who teach and perform across the United States and abroad.This summer, we are also delighted to accept applications from clarinet students, to study with guest artist Chad Burrow (University of Michigan).This year’s program will be held from July 26 – August 2, 2025 at the University of Alaska Anchorage, Fine Arts Building. Activities include daily rehearsals, coachings, individual lessons, master classes, and performance opportunities.
  • Registration Open for Haines Place-Based Learning & the Arts Institute – AAEC is excited to partner with the Haines Borough School District to hold a Place-Based Learning and the Arts Institute June 1-6, 2025. A team of 3 fabulous Teacher Leaders: Lorrie Heagy (Arts Integration/Music), Laura Davies (Storytelling/Technology/Media Arts), and Misty Holler (Visual Arts/SPED) will guide participants in hands-on, active, engaging, place-based and arts integrated learning in a jam-packed week.
  • 2025 Visiting Teaching Artists – Teaching artists near the beginning of their career are invited to design and lead an original poetry workshop as a part of the Poetry Foundation Library’s workshop series, Forms & Features. Interested applicants are encouraged to submit a proposed workshop on any topic of their choice, as long as it engages poetry in a meaningful way. Visiting Teaching Artists will receive an honorarium of $750 for teaching the workshop.
  • Sitka Fine Arts Summer Camps – Since 1973, Sitka Fine Arts Camp has provided Alaskan youth with the opportunity to develop artistic interests and skills in an intensive artistic experience. Our camp, each year, serves students from over 40 Alaska communities, from throughout the country, and internationally. Students come with all levels of artistic experience and return home with new skills, friends, and memories of their time at camp. Whether you are a musician or a dancer, an actor or a writer or are still discovering your artistic interests, we invite you to explore your artistic passions at Sitka Fine Arts Camp.

Resources Developed in Alaska 

  • Did you know that the Alaska Afterschool Network has a resource for finding Out-of-School-Time programs for children and youth in Alaska? Visit the website to find programs outside the regular school day in your community. Alaska Afterschool Network has also compiled a Summer Activity Guide, including student activities and challenges for children and youth aged 5 – 18. Check out creative opportunities in Culture and Expanding Worldview, and Art & STEM-Based Activities. The Alaska Afterschool Network is a Program of the Alaska Children’s Trust.
     
  • The Alaska Arts Education Consortium (AAEC) offers Art Bytes — short and sweet online arts professional development sessions. Check out the webpage at https://akartsed.org/educators/art-bytes/ to learn more, and visit past Art Byte recordings at https://akartsed.org/news/category/art-bytes/.
  • Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center in Alaska—We invite teachers, students, parents and lifelong learners to explore Alaska Native cultures, museum objects, communities, videos and educational resources shared here. Learn about the peoples of this northern world from elders, culture-bearers, scholars and artists. https://learninglab.si.edu/org/sasc-ak   
  • Project Articulate – This website provides art lesson plans for teachers. All lessons have been developed and time-tested by the specialists at the Art Center in the Fairbanks, Alaska public schools. Although developed for a specific grade, all lessons are easily adaptable to other levels. Please keep in mind that these lesson plans are designed to be taught with an ‘Art Kit’ and may not be easily usable without the visuals in the kit. Developed by the Fairbanks North Star Borough School District and the Alaska Arts Education Consortium. http://www.projectarticulate.com/ 
  • Baby Raven Reads – Sealaska Heritage sponsors Baby Raven Reads, an award-winning program that promotes early-literacy, language development and school readiness for Alaska Native families with children up to age 5. Baby Raven Reads improves early literacy skills by translating cultural strengths into home literacy practices. Baby Raven Reads provides family literacy events, training for care providers, and professional development for early childhood educators. Included on the Baby Raven Reads page are lesson plans, audio resources, and information about purchasing books in the series! https://sealaskaheritage.org/institute/education/education-programs/baby-raven-reads 
  • Kodiak Arts Council | Arts Integrated Lesson Plans – We believe in the power of arts integration and it’s ability to instill a love of learning in students through core subjects. Our plans have been developed by our teaching artists over the years as well as classroom teachers in our Munartet cohort. Some of them are written for a range of ages while others are for specific grades. All of the plans align with the Alaska state standards and are easily modifiable. Please enjoy our FREE curated list of plans and presentations. https://www.kodiakarts.org/lesson-plans-notvisi
  • My Fishing Dance – This digital dance unit was designed with remote Alaskan students in mind. “My Fishing Dance” is ​a 21st century resource for exploring, learning, creating, and sharing ​culturally-responsive arts-based content. Digital resources and video tutorials provide rich content, tailored to the unique needs, interests, and culture of the region. This unit of study is created by Leslie Kimiko Ward, a movement-based teaching artist with a passion for leveraging her creative skills to bridge resource gaps in education. https://myfishingdance.weebly.com/ 
  • Museum From Home: Alaska museums and cultural centers offer a rich diversity of online learning opportunities, activities, and experiences that you can explore right from your home! Visit Museums Alaska’s website at https://museumsalaska.org/Museum-From-Home 

Nationally Developed Resources

  • The National Endowment for the Arts | Back to School with Arts Education As families and educators ready children to go back to school, the National Endowment for the Arts recognizes the important role of arts education in educating, engaging, and empowering youth. The NEA also understands that families and schools are dealing with uncertainties and the residual disruption from the previous year. Arts education can help to address these challenges by supporting the social and emotional learning needs of students, helping them to succeed both in and out of school. To visit the NEA’s site including resources, articles and more highlighting the role of the arts in children’s and families’ lives, go to https://www.arts.gov/back-school-arts-education. 
  • The Journal of Folklore and Education releases “Creative Texts | Creative Traditions”Creative Texts | Creative Traditions features case studies, lesson plans, and research that use folklore’s values of context, candor, use, imagination, and love to help students to craft text with authentic purpose and consequences. The strategies offer readers opportunities to consider how the merely personal can contain the universal, how to make genuine connections, how to work toward equity, or how to strengthen social bonds. To read Volume 8: 2021 of the Journal of Folklore and Education, visit the website at https://jfepublications.org/journal/vol-8/.
  • Carnegie Hall’s, Weill Institute offers online resources for students, families and educators! Visit the Education page at https://www.carnegiehall.org/Education to explore live streams, activities, videos, lesson plans, and resources for young musicians.  Learn with Carnegie Hall: Watch episodes from this weekly series of live streams—drawn from programs spearheaded by WMI and Ensemble Connect—that showcases the power of music to enrich, inspire, and connect. Resources for Families: Explore activities and videos for children of all ages that encourage musical learning, discovery, and play. Resources for Music Educators: Expand your lesson plans, experience education in action with workshop videos, and develop your teaching skills with tips from top educators. Resources for Young Musicians: Create original music across genres, hear insights from professional musicians, collaborate with peers, learn how to conquer stage fright, and more. 
  • Save the Music Foundation | Music Education Resources – Save The Music is committed to sharing high quality educational resources with music teachers and schools. This site includes websites and free online platforms that are especially tailored for long distance education and engagement. https://www.savethemusic.org/grants/teacher-resources/
  • VSA International | Resources – VSA, the international organization on arts and disability, was founded more than 35 years ago by Ambassador Jean Kennedy Smith to provide arts and education opportunities for people with disabilities and increase access to the arts for all. The VSA website includes many helpful resources in support of access to arts education for all, including lesson plans and planning, articles, tips and programs https://vsainternational.wordpress.com/