Baltimore's Child Baltimore's Child
Looking for some artistic inspiration for your child? Here’s a sampling of programs to introduce the arts or give your budding artist a deep-dive into his or her passion.
Each year, the Baltimore School for the Art’s audition-only TWIGS program offers free classes in dance, vocal and instrumental music, stage production and design, theatre, visual arts, and visual storytelling to City residents (grades 2-8), with auditions held every spring.
Maryland Institute College of Art’s Young People’s Studios offers school-year classes on Saturdays for elementary through high school students and a vibrant selection of summer camps, each taught by artists and arts educators. Towson University’s Community Art Center offers visual arts classes, workshops and summer programs for children and teens, while the Creative Alliance hosts family events and programs for kids and teens throughout the year.
The art museums have regular, drop-in family art events for hands-on fun. Check out the calendars at the Baltimore Museum of Art, American Visionary Art Museum and Walters Art Museum.
Garrison Forest School’s Creative Co-op program is unique among area schools with classes, weekend workshops, power tools, laser cutters and state-of-the-art facilities.
Budding filmmakers from kindergarten through 12th grade may submit their short films to Gilman School’s Daniel A. Citron Film Festival, a juried, student-run festival held each March. Open to any Maryland student in public or independent schools, Also held each spring, the Friends School Film Festival is the oldest student-run festival in the region and is open to any filmmaker 13 years and older from Maryland schools.
Baltimore boasts far too many dance programs and studios to mention, but there are plenty of places for your budding ballerina (or lover of tap, jazz, modern, hip-hop, etc.) to dance, from the Mid Atlantic Youth Ballet and Columbia’s Classical Ballet Theatre of Maryland to The Dance School at Bryn Mawr, which offers afternoon dance classes in ballet, tap and jazz for children age three through 8th grade.
Goucher College’s Arts on Stage professional children’s theater is the perfect place to instill the theater bug, while numerous community theater productions have roles for children and teens. Check out Chesapeake Shakespeare Company School’s Out Shakespeare program of daylong kids’ programs corresponding with the school calendar of days off and spring break. If improv is more up your kid’s alley, the Baltimore Improv Group hosts kids and teens workshops.
The family concert series at the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra has inspired generations of musicians and arts lovers. Young singers audition and perform with Peabody’s Children’s Chorus, the Children’s Chorus of Maryland & School of Music and Baltimore Children’s Choir, while wanna-be rock musicians can learn power chords at School of Rock Baltimore.
