Our School
"At New Color Arts Academy, we believe every child holds a masterpiece within—our mission is to help them bring it to life."
Our classes are based on prerequisites , or background knowledge that the student already posed.
Our classes are grouped by students of similar ages and artistic levels, but we also encourage a mixed age learning settings that the older or professional students can share their knowledge and experience with the younger ones and vice versa.
Please check our list of classes by clicking on the "classes" button above or scroll on the menu. If you wish to print out the registration forms. Please download and print the pdfs forms below.
Our Mission
"Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up." -- PABLO PICASSO
Are Parents Good Partners in Their Children’s Artwork?
Doodling is a natural instinct for children. From the moment a child can hold a pen and scribble, parents can provide a space for them to draw—a corner with a table, chairs, blank paper, crayons, colored pencils—so the child has a place to create freely whenever they feel like it, without interference or restrictions.
When your child brings you their drawing, all you need to do is play the role of an appreciative audience. Praise them by saying things like, “Your lines are so smooth and powerful,” “The characters are vivid and interesting,” “You’re so brave, so focused, that’s wonderful!” and give them genuine applause. Never try to act as a teacher by offering criticism or corrections. Doing so can undermine the child’s confidence, making them hesitant to create boldly and focus solely on their own observations and imagination. They may start worrying that their parents will pick apart their work, making them afraid to draw. Wise parents leave the role of correction to teachers and focus only on encouraging and praising their children. This approach not only makes children happy but also boosts their confidence in drawing and nurtures the habit of actively seeking advice from their teachers.
Art education for children differs greatly from other subjects. In most subjects, knowledge is externally added—you have to teach children to read, sing, etc., or they won’t learn. But proper art education is internally driven. Even if you don’t draw for them, children will naturally want to doodle. The teacher’s role is to draw out what’s inside the child, helping them express their thoughts and observations boldly and confidently. A professional art teacher knows how to guide children step by step according to their age: young children are more subjective, imaginative, and focused on the fun of the process rather than the result. As they grow into upper elementary grades, they enter a more objective phase, becoming more observant and starting to care about making their work look “real.” At this stage, training observation skills becomes important. By the time they reach middle school, they can begin exploring light, shadow, and three-dimensional form, which allows them to naturally create vivid, moving works and show passion and perseverance in art. In contrast, if you try to teach young children about light and form too early, they won’t understand, may resort to rote memorization, and their work will look stiff—or they might just give up, saying it’s too hard.
Therefore, adults who don’t understand children’s psychology and development should not instruct children in drawing. Teaching them how to draw a “flower” or an “elephant” in a formulaic way leads to lifeless, mechanical drawings and can kill the child’s interest in creating.
Also, avoid giving children coloring books or simplified drawings and cartoons to copy. Coloring books are like candy—kids love them, and many preschool materials include them—but they have no educational value and can negatively impact a child’s “main course” of imaginative, self-directed drawing. Children who use coloring books or copy cartoons see too many adult-made images, and over time they lose the courage to express their own feelings and ideas. They miss out on the most precious traits of childhood: the boldness to draw and the bravery to express themselves. These traits are the foundation of lifelong confidence and key to unlocking potential.
If a child says they can’t draw and asks their parents for help, what should you do? If this happens during the preschool years, it usually means the child has been influenced by older kids or adults and has lost confidence. Encourage them to draw freely—however they like, it’s fine. If this happens during elementary school, you can take them to observe what they want to draw or discuss it together.
If they still say they can’t draw, tell them: “That’s too hard for someone your age. Wait until you’re a bit older and look at it more carefully, and you’ll figure it out.” Avoid teaching them older children’s or adults’ drawing techniques, and don’t draw in front of them. If they insist you draw with them, match their level—if they’re drawing circles, you draw circles; if they’re drawing “tadpole people,” don’t teach them how to draw a body that’s proportionally bigger than the head. Otherwise, you’ll see your child lose confidence and frequently ask you to draw things for them, leading to frustration. They will imprint the idea that “drawing is hard” and lose the opportunity to freely express their talent and creativity. When this channel for independent thinking and self-confidence is open, all their other learning abilities improve. This is art education’s greatest gift to humanity—and it’s also the educational goal of New Color Arts Academy.
Unfortunately, very few people actually benefit from this approach. Many parents mistakenly believe that learning to draw means learning to make pictures look realistic. They ignore the child’s age and developmental stage, teaching them how to draw things externally or buying books for them to copy. A few children may manage to copy well, but that only develops imitation skills—not imagination, creativity, intuition, or emotional depth.
Therefore, finding a teacher who understands children, knows how to guide them according to their mental and emotional development, respects their freedom of expression, and offers appreciation and encouragement allows parents to confidently play the role of an admirer. New Color Arts Academy provides such teachers for children and parents. With more praise and encouragement, over three to five years, a child’s sense of aesthetics, creativity, emotional depth, and character will blossom, leaving parents amazed. This kind of lasting impact is not something short-sighted parents can achieve, but it’s an experience and understanding that loving, forward-thinking parents will cherish.
The Harmonious Development of Emotion and Reason
– A Brief Talk on the 15-Minute Classroom Critique
Children’s art education and the process of creating student artwork are an interweaving of emotional and rational thinking—a process of finding balance. Drawing is a comprehensive form of education, involving emotion and reason, mind and hands, explanation and sharing, art and technology, as well as intellectual and non-intellectual factors. Experienced art teachers often guide students to transform the emotional process of creation into a more rational one, helping them analyze their work. This is especially true in children’s art education. For example, when students become so immersed in creating their characters that they can’t stop, the teacher often needs to call a pause—asking students to put down their pencils, step back, and look at their work from a distance to refresh their perspective. Adding discussion at this point is even better. Once students have observed and thought about their work, they can then return to continue creating. This creates a healthy and productive cycle.
If a child only keeps their head down drawing, without developing habits of observation and reflection, it’s like “pulling the cart without looking at the road.” Raising one’s head to look ahead—knowing how to observe and reflect—is a habit that requires training. That’s why classroom critique is like “looking at the road,” and it has become an essential and central part of New Color’s classes. While it may seem like the 15-minute sharing and discussion take time away from actual drawing, through regular practice, students learn to explain their work, gain insights from group discussion, and understand how to proceed to the next stage, enrich content, and apply techniques. We turn individual creativity into collective sharing, comprehensive observation, and mutual support. So, don’t you think these 15 minutes are actually too short? In American art schools, this kind of sharing is called a presentation, and nearly every creative process includes it. Midterm and final presentations often take up multiple class sessions and allow students to learn from one another. When combined with projects, they even count as exams. This is part of the curriculum—not a waste of time!
We now also invite parents to join these precious 15 minutes because cultivating the habits of observation, reflection, and synthesis requires active parental participation and cooperation. It’s clear that in children’s art education, students whose parents actively engage with the teaching process tend to progress faster and show greater improvement in both content and technique compared to those whose parents are less involved. This is a crucial factor that can’t be ignored—and it’s exactly why New Color emphasizes the importance of parental involvement in classroom critique!
Of course, as the creators of their artwork, children don’t just need parents as spectators—they need parents who understand, appreciate, and connect with their art. These little artists pour their hearts into their work, proclaiming to the world that drawing is what they love most. They use their brushes to create wonderful pieces, but without an audience, without applause, without their dearest family members there to appreciate and understand their art, whom are they telling their stories to? If they share and you don’t understand, if you look but don’t appreciate, isn’t that a pity?
All of this highlights the importance of parental participation in the 15-minute classroom critique. Over time, parents not only gain an understanding of the creative process and become good observers but also join in as participants in discussions and sharing. Their own art appreciation skills improve as well. Picasso once said that children are born as natural artists. When you learn to appreciate a child’s artwork, you also learn to appreciate a master’s work—and visiting a museum will no longer feel overwhelming or foreign. I have personally witnessed the improvement in art appreciation among parents who actively participate in New Color’s critiques over the past few years, and I’m truly amazed and impressed! (I won’t name names here.)
At New Color, students learn to express themselves, critique their own and their classmates’ work, improve their theoretical understanding of art, and apply their skills in practice (drawing). Ultimately, this raises their own artistic abilities, bringing countless benefits without a downside. Critique is one of the most effective tools in art education. The key issue is that some teachers skip it out of convenience, and some don’t know how to conduct critiques at all—misleading parents into thinking skipping critiques is normal or even preferable. But critique, as a method to train students in observation, thinking, and communication, has become a signature feature of New Color’s classrooms. It benefits both students and parents, and our teachers are committed to upholding it—not cutting corners—because it’s one of New Color’s core competitive strengths.