AN ART teacher from Bolton has come up with a crafty way of making sure her pupils and other young people around the world can continue to learn while schools are closed to the majority of pupils.

Sarah Crowther, who teaches at Bolton School has been helping art teachers across the globe during the Covid-19 crisis through her The Arty Teacher website.

The Bolton News:

The website provides art lesson plans, units of work and worksheets ­— all of which can be downloaded ­— for teachers. And since the closure of schools to all but children of key workers, she has been creating printable packs and work that can be easily emailed to students.

Sarah said: “When schools closed, I had two things on my mind. Providing lessons for my own classes and providing lessons for art teachers who had put faith in my website.

“It was clear from social media that art teachers were finding the thought of teaching from home incredibly stressful. I was determined to make it a little bit easier for them.”

The website was set up in April 2018 so Sarah could share her passion for art with other like minded people across the world, especially other teachers. Through creating The Arty Teacher website she has been able to work with high profile artists such as Cristina Troufa, Sarah Graham and Cas Holmes.

Now, because of the current coronavirus pandemic, the website has a page dedicated to home learning “which puts everything an art teacher needs all in one place”.

Blog posts with stage by stage instructions sit alongside videos and work that can be completed on iPads. Suggestions for how to create virtual gallery tours and how to use Google Arts and Culture all take a little bit of the stress away from teachers.

Sarah said: “I was isolated early as my daughter had a cough, which turned out not to be Covid-19 but it meant I had to hit the ground running with online learning. The feedback from art teachers has been incredible. I’ve had messages of thanks from all over the globe.

Betsy Haskins, an art teacher for Florida said: “Thank you for sharing such awesome ideas, you inspire me! Teaching online now and it’s a big learning curve.”

Ana Luiza, art teacher based in Brazil, said: “Teaching art online has been very hard and more demanding than face-to face art classes."

“I’ve been feeling overwhelmed and like an apprentice regarding technology. A big ‘thank you’ and a request: keep up the awesome work.

“ You’ve been helping all art teachers in this fragile world.”

To find out more visit https://theartyteacher.com/