Arts
Creative development is an essential part of the Keystone Experience. K-12 arts education makes Keystone School one of the best arts schools in San Antonio.
Creativity stimulates critical thinking
The arts are an educational essential at Keystone School. That’s because imagination and intelligence are linked. As students make aesthetic decisions, they rely on problem solving, experimentation and critical thinking. Research shows that creative activities stimulate the brain in ways that complement academic activities.
Arts Education Across All Grades
We want students to reach not only their academic potential, but their artistic potential too. Throughout their Keystone experience, students explore different modes of artistic expression and expand their creative abilities.
Little School
In our carefully planned learning centers, children can pursue, investigate, and explore activities that kindle their creative interests.
Lower School
Students attend art once a week to learn the art making process and participate in daily group activities that develop their musical skills. Beginning in first grade, students go to the theatre loft each week to prepare a play or musical.
Middle School
Formal study of fine arts is introduced in middle school, building the foundation for artistic pursuits and lifelong arts appreciation. Students have support to take creative risks and express themselves.
Upper School
Fine arts electives and extra-curriculars enhance the high school academic program, and faculty push students to grow creatively as well as intellectually.
Keystone school Arts programs
Art
Lower School students build an appreciation of the art making process and an understanding of vocabulary, concepts, techniques, routines and procedures. Art appreciation and skills will be built upon as the child progresses through school. In Elements of Art and Principles of Design classes, students use different forms of media – drawing, painting, sculpting, printmaking, mixed media and others.
Kindergarten, first and second grade projects are completed in one to two class periods with a lot of guided practice. Students engage in exploration and imaginative play in the art-making process. They build skills through various forms of traditional and non-traditional media.
Third and fourth grade projects are completed between two and six class periods. Students apply their knowledge of available resources, tools, and technologies to create more unique, personalized creations. Students freely elaborate on imaginative ideas, while using a variety of media and artistic processes. Students are given more choice during the creation process and subject matter selection to highlight each individual student’s voice, emerging identity and developing style. Lessons involve more advanced artistic techniques and concepts, core subject themes, art and art history, and the abstract. Peer critique, constructive criticism, and teacher evaluations are introduced to offer ways to improve or offer alternative approaches and/or ideas.
Fifth and sixth grade students take visual art classes, and visual art electives are available for seventh and eighth grade. Seventh graders also can elect Digital Design. Visual art includes 2-D Design, Drawing and 3-D Design courses.
The Middle School art curriculum explores the formal issues of art through the investigation of color theory, composition, and the elements and principles of design. Students assess and compare artworks from different perspectives and cultural contexts. Creatively, they are encouraged to develop their personal vision and technical abilities through experimentation with a wide variety of media.
Upper School art electives are 2-D Design, Drawing, 3-D Design and Digital Media. In Digital Media, students analyze and assess current and emerging creative technologies, while designing and producing two-dimensional and three-dimensional multimedia projects.
Music
Lower School students learn music through group participation and experimentation. Students develop the following skills as they progress from Kindergarten through fourth grade.
- Sing, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music
- Perform on instruments, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music - Xylophones, Tubanos, Ukuleles, Recorders
- Improvise melodies, variations, and accompaniments
- Compose and arrange music within specified guidelines
- Read and notate music
- Listen to, analyze and describe music
- Evaluate music and music performances
- Identify relationships between music and other disciplines including those outside of the arts
- Understand music in relation to history and culture
Field trips can spark a student’s passion for the arts. Second through fourth grade students take field trips to the San Antonio Philharmonic.
Music classes continue for Middle School students in fifth and sixth grades. Encore is a music ensemble available as an elective for seventh and eighth grade.
Upper School students can take Contemporary Voice Studio, Rock Band and Rock Lab electives.
Theater
From Lower through Upper School, our theatre program provides students with a safe, supportive, inclusive and nurturing environment. Students are encouraged to take creative risks and use their critical thinking skills. Theatre helps them develop into poised, confident, resilient, and empathetic leaders. As the students create, work and perform in the classroom, on and off stage, or in the play space, we emphasize “safety first.” Students are reminded to practice physical and emotional safety for themselves and their peers as well as keeping the play space safe while exploring dramatic expression.
Upper School stages entirely student- run productions.
Recent performances include:
- Pippin
- Grease
- The Crucible
- The Diviners
- Twelfth Night
- Hamlet
In 1-4 grade students attend theatre classes year-round, once a week. In theatre arts the students and teacher work together to create a safe space for physical, vocal, emotional, and imaginative expression. Students are introduced and practice the elements of drama, including but not limited to, script analysis, dialogue, monologues and scenes, music and songs, choreography, characters, setting, stage directions, blocking, stage areas, body positions, memorization, rehearsal, and performance as well as audience etiquette. The student learns and practices these elements through various exercises and creative dramatics as well as fully mounted theatre productions.
5th -6th grade students continue the exploration of expression and practice the elements of drama they learned in lower school, which is the foundation for all theatre experiences. In 5th and 6th grade, students are challenged to make bold and appropriate choices for their characters based on the information they glean from the script. Students are also challenged to prepare duets or group scenes, working with a partner(s). Students also practice improvisation and theatre games and exercises that build confidence, poise, vocal expression, and communication. Students are also encouraged to take healthy and appropriate risks with their theatre work.
The middle school theatre production is an extra-curricular activity for 5th-8th grade students. The performances are in February of each year.
7th -8Th grade students have two creative offerings. In 8th grade students have an opportunity to take Film class and create a fully realized short film. Students in previous classes have won awards and honorable mentions from the 90 Second Newbery Film Festival. Films are presented at school at the end of the semester and students have an opportunity to attend the film festival in May.
In 7th – 8th grade, students may select the KEYS Theatre Elective. The class offers various possibilities for original derived performances. From scenes, and monologues to original one-act plays as well as Broadway Revues and improvisation performances. KEYS performs for their peers at the end of the Spring semester.
The middle school theatre production is an extra-curricular activity for 5th-8th grade students. The performances are in February of each year.
Upper School electives are Theatre Appreciation, Modern Acting, Film & Animation, and Film Acting/Film Studies. In Theatre Appreciation, beginning with a reading and analysis of a seminal work of dramatic literature, students learn about the playwright and the history of the play and segue to preparing and performing scenes and monologues and working in groups to create a design concept for the play.
Modern Acting students learn the basics of acting in the theater by developing the tools needed in every actor’s toolkit: mind, body, voice, and imagination. They will write and perform original monologues and scenes, and works from 20th century dramatists.
Film Studies provides an in-depth study of great films from the silent era to today, to enhance students’ appreciation of the art form.
Creative Writing
Creative writing is offered as an Upper School elective. Keystone’s literary magazine regularly wins regional and national awards.
Budding Artists Flourish Here
Apply Now
If you want a big public school, religious private school, or traditional prep school atmosphere, there are school options for you. If you want to equip your child to succeed at their highest levels in college and in life – and your child is eager to learn and willing to work – you have a home at Keystone.
The Arts in Community Life
The arts bring our school community together. Students present theatre productions, music performances, art exhibits and more. From children’s concerts on Grandparents/Friend Day to class plays for families and friends to full theatre productions by high schoolers, we celebrate the creativity of our students.
The arts enliven student life at Keystone. Students pursue creative endeavors to flex their skills and develop their voice among friends. An unique outlet for self expression is Stone Soul. The campus cabaret holds open mic nights for students to perform their own poetry, music and spoken word in a supportive and non-competitive environment.
Find out about upcoming events for the Keystone community :
Fine Arts Faculty
Anthony Ciaravino
Head of Fine Arts Department
Tiffany Cristo
Music Teacher
Tiffany Cristo
Music Teacher
Megan Letos
Digital Media Teacher
Megan Letos
Digital Media Teacher
Gypsy Pantoja
Lower & Middle School Theatre Arts Teacher
Gypsy Pantoja
Lower & Middle School Theatre Arts Teacher
Joshua Welker
Art Teacher
Joshua Welker
Art Teacher
