For example, during a unit on humanism, the students in her class are assigned to sculpt Michelangelo's David. But first, they are shown pictures of the Apuan Alps, the source of Michelangelo's finest marble.

"You would hurt yourself if you skied down this mountain," McVearry tells her students, because while the mountains look snow-covered, they are actually marble.

Then McVearry locates the Alps on a world map and explains the distance from Washington D.C. to Italy.

Next, she takes her students outside and stands them under a basketball hoop.

"Imagine a sculpture four feet taller than this hoop," McVearry says. That's the size of the David sculpture. The young sculptors are barely the height of the figure's knee.

The children study history, discussing the Renaissance and how work of the period differed from religious artwork.

And of course, they learn about art itself, like how frescoes are made or what different movements created.

While sculpting, they examine the David sculpture's pose. McVearry explains the style is called "contraposto" because it looks as if the figure is shifting his weight.