ABSTRACT
The art of portrait painting is the best way to reflect the inner world of human, and it had acquired a large place itself in human history. At the same time, the artist's self-portrait has also a great importance in terms of reflecting the internal emotions, motives, and insights. Portrait aroused curiosity in terms of reflecting the inner feelings via the external appearance for centuries. In portraits made by children, getting to know their own images and describing them through the portraits are extremely important to understand the feelings and emotions of children. In this respect, the purpose of this research is to implement the portrait and self-portrait studies in the Visual Arts lesson and to use it as a means of expression. The study sample consisted of 50 students studying in a primary school in Istanbul. The first week, comments about the art of portraits had been made to the students and the samples of portraits had been shown. Questions about examples of the portraits shown to the students and comment on their impressions had been asked. The second week, making a portrait were asked from the students. As a result of this study, mental state and skills of the students were in the forefront. This study, emphasizes that in terms of its benefits on the paintings of the children and the psychology of art, the portraits and self-portrait had how significant a role in the paint art in the Elementary Art Education.

Keywords: Visual Arts Education, Portrait Painting, Self-Portrait.