Art Teacher Resume

If you’re a passionate educator looking to guide students towards their full creative potential, you’re a great fit for an art teacher position.

But there’s one problem: first you need to showcase your art teacher skills in a well-written resume to ensure your job application gets noticed by schools.

Need a quick refresher on how to write an excellent teacher resume? Watch this video to understand what the resume writing process for teachers is like:

To build on the advice from our video, here are three tips to write an art teacher resume that’s sure to catch any principal’s attention:

Highlight art teacher resume skills

As an art teacher, you spend most of your time creating lesson plans and instructing students in the classroom – from art theory to how to use materials and techniques in visual art.

To show your qualifications, your resume should highlight your skills related to leading a classroom and nurturing student creativity.

In your resume skills section, emphasize key soft skills that are required to work closely with students of all ages. For example:

• Patience
• Creativity
• Empathy
• Communication skills
• Cultural competence
• Mediation
• Conflict management
• Adaptability
• Organizational skills
• Time management skills
• Active listening
• Interpersonal skills
• Leadership skills
• Problem-solving skills
• Collaboration

But soft skills alone don’t make a good art teacher. To prove to schools you’re a well-rounded candidate who can keep up with the demands of a classroom, include a mix of hard and soft skills on your resume.

Here’s a list of some key art teacher hard skills to highlight in your resume:

• Project management skills
• Understanding of art principles (theory, materials, and techniques)
• Teaching and instruction for individuals and groups
• Progress reporting and assessment
• Lesson planning
• Google Drive and Microsoft Office (Word, Outlook, and PowerPoint)
• Course management system software (Blackboard and Desire2Learn)
• Photo, image, and design editing software (Adobe Systems Illustrator, InDesign, and Photoshop)

Tailor your art teacher resume to the job post

One of the best ways to show schools you’re the perfect art teacher for them is to address their needs specifically with your resume.

Take a look at the job posting for the position you want and take note of any specific skills or qualities they’re looking for. Then, address these skills in your resume. For example, this could be anything from interdisciplinary teaching to creative lesson planning.

Here are a few other ways to tailor your art teacher resume to the job listing:

• Open with a strong resume summary to sum up your art teacher qualifications and focus on how your skills and experience can directly benefit the school or institution.
• Modify your bullet points to highlight key skills that are required in the job ad. For example, if technology integration is mentioned in the posting, emphasize computer literacy skills and familiarity with educational software in your resume skills section.
• Optimize your resume for search engines by including art teacher resume keywords, such as “Curriculum planning,” or “K-12 education.”
• Finally, list relevant credentials and teaching certifications in the education section so the hiring manager can easily see that you meet their requirements.

Format your resume properly

Most schools have a lot of applicants without enough resources to go through each candidate properly.

To stand out, your resume needs to be formatted to communicate your qualifications as quickly and directly as possible.

With that in mind, stick to a one-page resume, unless you have 10+ years of experience as an art teacher. For most candidates, this is enough space to highlight your relevant experience and skills. If you need extra space for your relevant artwork, include a link to your portfolio at the top of your resume.

Here are a few more tips for formatting your art teacher resume properly:

• Include relevant information only and cut out past jobs with skills that aren’t transferable to an art teacher job. For example, listing a tutoring job under your work experience would be beneficial but you can leave out your bartending experience.
• Choose an appropriate resume font and set your font size to 10–12 points
• Depending on how much space you need, set your resume margins to ½”–1” on each side
• For your resume bullet points, focus on your accomplishments rather than describing your duties. If possible, use hard numbers to make your achievements sound more impactful.

Here’s an example of what that looks like in practice:

“Instructed fine arts to 40+ students of K-8 in core areas such as drawing, painting, commercial design, printmaking, aesthetics, art history, and art appreciation.”