Introduction to Visual Art

Some of the earliest records of humanity exist as markings on rocks and cave walls. Art works throughout history have recorded and interpreted events from various perspectives – cultural, economic, political, gender, and aesthetic, to name just a few. Visual depictions offer many unique viewpoints and serve as “windows” to the past.

However, visual art is not valuable only for the sake of history. Visual art experiences involve artist and viewer in a process of thinking about art, human nature, and the artist’s unique way of expressing his or her understanding.

It is important for students to experience visual art both as artists and as audience. As artists, they can use the processes and materials of visual art to explore their own ideas, feelings, cultural identities, observations, and imaginations. As audience, they can see how other artists have expressed their ideas about the world and their place in the world we all share. In contemporary art (including such forms as painting, printmaking, architecture, sculpture, craft, commercial art, film, video, multimedia, and gallery installations), we see artists’ reflections on the world in our own lifetimes. Through visual art, we come to see and know ourselves.

The Visual Art Strand

The visual art strand provides students with opportunities to:

• develop their perceptual abilities
• learn to use the language, methods, and materials of visual art
• explore their own and other artists’ ideas, feelings, cultural identities, observations, and imaginations through visual art expressions
• examine the role of visual art in cultures and societies, past and present
• explore the role of visual images in their own daily lives.

The curriculum is organized into four required units:

Unit 1: Learning to See
Unit 2: Ideas and Inspirations
Unit 3: Making Sense of Things
Unit 4: The World of Art

The three components of the Arts Education Curriculum (creative/productive, cultural/historical, and critical/responsive) are to be integrated within these units. (Refer to page 3.) Making art works, solving problems, exploring the visual environment, looking at works of art, and learning about the role of artists in cultures and societies can all be undertaken within each unit.

The following describes what teachers will find in the visual art section of the curriculum guide:

• Visual Art Unit Overviews and Sample Topics for Grades 1 to 5: This chart displays the four required units, the corresponding mini-unit themes, and sample topics for Grades 1-5.
• Foundational Objectives: There are eight foundational objectives for Kindergarten to Grade 5. These are broad objectives that are achieved gradually over the Elementary Level. This section includes a description of each foundational objective.
• Kindergarten to Grade 5 Developmental Continuum: This chart shows the scope and sequence of learning for visual art from Kindergarten to Grade 5. The chart displays both foundational and specific learning objectives.
• Instructional Guidelines: Instructional guidelines are general instructions to the teacher. They apply throughout the year.
• Guiding Students in Their Creations: This section is intended to show how a teacher can help students become aware that every creative experience involves problem solving and decision making.
• Planning from the Visual Art Section of the Curriculum Guide: This section is intended to assist teachers in planning art lessons and units or mini-units from the curriculum guide. A template for lesson planning is provided, along with a unit planning checklist.
• Learning Objectives Checklist: This checklist appears at the beginning of each grade and displays the learning objectives for the grade. Objectives selected for the grade’s sample unit are checked.
• Unit Overviews: The unit overviews include a statement about the unit’s purpose, a list of concepts and terminology, a sample topic, a list of suggested resources for the sample topic, and a starter list of suggested activities for use in planning.
  
  There are four unit overviews per grade. Each unit overview includes suggestions for two mini-units. Both mini-units are required; however, the activities provided within the mini-units are suggestions only. The chart on the next page displays the four units, the corresponding mini-units, and the sample topics for Grades 1 to 5.
• Sample Unit: Each grade includes one sample unit. The sample unit is intended to show how a series of lessons can be developed from the suggested ideas in the unit overviews. All sample units are ava ilable on CD-ROM and Saskatchewan Learning website.
• Appendix A: This appendix appears at each grade level and describes introductory activities for the elements of art. The activities should be incorporated throughout the year within the context of the units.

•  Appendix B: This appendix also appears at each grade level and describes introductory drawing activities that can be incorporated throughout the year as the need for them arises.
•  Glossary: A glossary is included at the end of the visual art section. The glossary provides basic definitions of terms. If more information is needed, the teacher should refer to resources on visual art and design listed in Arts Education: A Bibliography for the Elementary Level (2003).

Visual Art Unit Overviews and Sample Topics for Grades 1 to 5

Note: The mini-unit themes listed in this overview are required. The topics listed, however, are samples or examples. Teachers may choose other topics to express the required mini-unit themes. Mini-units in bold-faced type have been developed in the curriculum as sample units with lesson plans using the sample topics listed (available on CD-ROM and Saskatchewan Learning website) .

Foundational Objectives

There are eight broad foundational objectives for the Elementary Level. These objectives are to be developed throughout the Elementary Level and can be achieved through the specific learning objectives. The foundational objectives cover the scope of the visual art program and embody the three components of arts education.

The eight foundational objectives are listed below and are followed by an explanation of each objective.

The students will:

1. Understand the elements of art and develop concepts that lead to an understanding of order in the visual environment.
2. Begin to develop skills that help them depict people and objects accurately.
3. Begin to understand the variety of sources for visual art ideas.
4. Begin to develop own ideas into visual art expressions, using the processes and materials of visual art.
5. Begin to think and talk about own visual art ideas and expressions.
6. Develop understanding of the work of a variety of visual artists.
7. Begin to talk about, interpret, and respond to works of art.
8. Become aware of the visual environment and visual art in the daily life of own community.

1. Understand the elements of art and develop concepts that lead to an understanding of order in the visual environment.

The elements of line, colour, texture, shape, form, and space comprise the basic language of visual art. The elements occur naturally in the environment; all human constructions incorporate the elements. From the time young children make marks with a pencil or crayon, they are using the elements of art. See Appendix A at the end of each grade level for activities related to the elements of art. See the glossary on page 234 for descriptions of the elements.

The principles of design include emphasis, balance, movement, repetition (pattern), variety, contrast, and unity. Teachers should note that different resources describe the principles of design somewhat differently. Although kindergarten to grade 5 students will not study the principles of design in depth, they should be introduced to concepts that will lead to further study in later years. Repetition (pattern), contrast, and balance are appropriate concepts to introduce at the Elementary Level.

Pattern is created through repetition of shapes, colours, lines, textures, and forms. There are formal patterns (with obvious rhythm, like the pattern on a chessboard) and informal patterns (with no obvious rhythm, like the pattern formed by pebbles on a beach).

Contrast refers to the range of difference between elements. For example, there is a lot of contrast between black and white; there is less contrast between two shades of grey. Artists and designers use contrast to emphasize or de-emphasize images, shapes, and/or textures in their work.

Balance in visual art is achieved through manipulation of “visual weight”. The simplest form of balance is symmetrical balance, where one half of a work is identical to the other. Balance can also be achieved in a less formal manner through placement and emphasis of elements and images.

It is important that teachers encourage students to identify and describe examples of pattern, contrast, and balance in the natural and constructed environments, in art works, and in their own work.

2. Begin to develop skills that help them depict people and objects accurately.

In part, the visual art program is concerned with educating the sense of sight. Although we all take in information through our senses, we do not automatically take in and process all the information that is available to us. Learning to “see” helps students become astute observers of their visual environment and contributes greatly to their ability to draw. Students’ observation of visual detail contributes to their understanding of the whole.

At the Elementary Level, students should be encouraged to recognize subtle differences in the appearance of people, animals, plants, and the various objects evident in their surroundings. An understanding of proportion, perspective, point of view, and spatial relationships is crucial to a student’s developing skills in image-making, both two- and three-dimensional. Appendix B at the end of each grade level suggests age-appropriate activities for developing drawing skills.

3. Begin to understand the variety of sources for visual art ideas.

This is the first of three foundational objectives related to the creative process. This objective focuses on ideas for art works; the next two focus on decision making and reflection.

This foundational objective encourages students to become aware of the fact that ideas come from many sources and that whenever they create something, there is a purpose related to their idea. Purposes will vary. At the Elementary Level, students might depict an event or people from memory, observation, or imagination. They might wish to express feelings, or experiment with art materials or concepts. At the grade 3 level, students should begin to keep a journal of visual art ideas, a practice they will continue throughout their years of studying visual art.

4. Begin to develop own ideas into visual art expressions, using the processes and materials of visual art.

An idea in visual art is simply a starting point. The idea is developed through the process of creating the work. Development of an idea involves decision making about subject matter, the elements of art, composition, materials, and tools. Development often involves experimentation.

This foundational objective is aimed at developing students’ awareness of the many decisions they make, and encouraging them to think more deeply about their decisions. (For further information on creative decision making, see Guiding Students in Their Creations on page 217.)

5. Begin to think and talk about their own visual art ideas and expressions.

Reflection is essential to the creative process. Creating art works is not as simple as having an idea and then executing it. The result may not express the original idea to the student’s satisfaction, and this provides an opportunity to reassess and try again. The student may have learned something that can be applied to the next work, and the original idea may lead to another idea, or a more refined one.

It is important that students learn to reflect on the meaning they communicate through each work, and whether or not that meaning truly portrays their ideas.

6. Develop understanding of the work of a variety of visual artists.

 The arts are expressions of people. Sometimes the expressions are those of an individual; sometimes they are cultural in nature and express the traditions or perspectives of groups of people. An understanding of this can help students see the role of the arts in people’s daily lives, throughout history and in the present.

Students can study the work of artists in a thematic context or through in-depth studies of the work of one artist. The artists studied will depend on the students’ interests and the teacher’s access to art works, reproductions, and other visual images.

7. Begin to talk about, interpret, and respond to works of art.

Generally speaking, people do not know how to approach works of art, especially difficult ones. Viewers tend to make quick judgements without giving a work much thought. This foundational objective encourages students to withhold their judgements, and to give themselves time to observe and interact with a work more fully before coming to any conclusions.

Whenever art works are presented to students, the teacher should guide the students through a process from Responding to Arts Expressions, included on page 45 of this curriculum guide.

8. Become aware of the visual environment and visual art in the daily life of own community.

The visual environment affects people enormously. The visual art strand aims to empower students to interpret and make decisions about visual messages received daily through advertising, public messages, popular culture, and the mass media. Through study of their own visual environment, students become aware of how artists affect and are affected by the visual environment, the influence of visual information in daily life, and the many areas in which people work in the visual arts.

The Visual Art Curriculum and the Viewing and Representing Strand of the English Language Arts Curriculum

While there appears to be similarity in the activities in which students are involved within the representing and viewing strands of English language arts (ELA) curricula and those found within arts education curricula, the purpose and emphasis for each activity is different. For example, as an activity, students may be drawing images, viewing, and discussing art works in both subject areas. The activity appears to be the same; however, the learning objectives and the concepts that are taught within that activity are different.

Representing Example

In both subject areas, for example, students may be creating a visual image to convey an idea. While students might be drawing a picture in both an English language arts class and a visual art class, the objectives, the concepts, and skills learned in each class will be different. In visual art, the objectives might be for students to develop drawing skills, manipulate art materials to achieve specific effects, incorporate visual symbols for personal expression, or work in a particular artistic style from a period of art history. In ELA, the students may also be drawing a visual image, however, the objective might be to teach students how to clarify written text with a visual illustration. Other ELA objectives might include, for example, using appropriate visual aids to enhance spoken and written communication. Another ELA objective may be to choose words, sounds, and images for a particular audience, purpose, and situation. Although the students are drawing a visual image in visual art and English language arts, the learning objectives, skill development, and the concepts discussed are different.

Viewing Example

As another example, students in both subject areas may be viewing and responding to a book illustration. The activity appears to be the same, however, in visual art the students may be studying different styles of book illustrations, learning about a specific artist, or comparing the illustrations to other styles in fine art or popular culture. In ELA, students might be viewing the illustration to determine how the image enriches the text of the story. Other ELA objectives might include determining the usefulness of visual information for particular purpose(s) using criteria, or using various visual texts to find information.

Although students may be drawing or viewing in both ELA and visual art, the concepts, understandings, and skill development will be different for each area of study. Each subject area will use distinct strategies or processes to achieve its specific objectives. For example, the LAPS (listen, ask, picture, summarize) strategy in ELA is intended to support achievement of specific listening objectives. The learning objectives and, therefore, the criteria for assessment would also be different. In visual art, the visual composition or drawing skills may be the focus of assessment, and in ELA the appropriateness of the visual aids that the students selected for a specific audience may be the focus of assessment. It is essential, therefore, that teachers select appropriate learning objectives from each area of study when planning such activities.

Kindergarten to Grade 5 Developmental Continuum

The chart on the following pages displays the scope and sequence of learnings from Kindergarten to Grade 5. It includes broad foundational objectives for the Elementary Level with grade-specific learning objectives. This chart represents the required content for visual art.

Instructional Guidelines for Teaching Visual Art at the Elementary Level

The following guidelines are general instructions to the teacher for visual art instruction throughout the year.

1. Use visual images throughout the year to illustrate concepts and to help students understand the visual environment.

These images should include art works or reproductions of art works, visual images from the community (e.g., signs, billboards, buildings, designed objects), and images from the media (e.g., advertisements, videos, films, and book illustrations). All Saskatchewan schools have been provided with a copy of Saskatchewan Art Works, which includes text and slides. In addition, several good reproduction kits are listed in the Arts Education: A Bibliography for the Elementary Level (2003).

To make the best use of these images, the teacher will:

• look for art works or images with subject matter that will be of interest to the students
• use images from the students’ own community
• include Saskatchewan artists so students learn that the arts are a part of their own times and place
• include the art of First Nation and Métis artists so students learn about the past and present contributions of the First Nation and Métis peoples of Canada
• use a wide variety of art forms and styles throughout the year
• use a process from Responding to Arts Expressions (see page 45) to guide the students’ experiences with art works and other images.

 2. Introduce the students to a variety of materials.

 The exact materials used depend on what is available in the school, but it is important to provide experiences with as many media as possible during the elementary years. As creating is a decision-making process, it is important that students are eventually able to make decisions about which materials will best solve the particular problem they have set for themselves. Be sure that materials are both two- and three-dimensional.

 Some of the materials and media that are appropriate for Elementary Level students are:

• pencil
• crayons, markers, pastels
• paint (to be used with a variety of applicators such as brushes, fingers, sponges, and sticks)
• collage – using a variety of cut and torn papers, fabrics, found materials
• clay
• simple methods of printmaking
• construction using cardboard and found objects
• papier maché.

3. Establish practices in the classroom to encourage ongoing, spontaneous image making.

Perhaps one of the best ways of doing this is to provide a supply of scrap paper that students can use independently. Beginning in Grade 3, encourage students to keep a visual art journal. They can draw in their journal, or perhaps glue in images from magazines. They can ask questions in their journal using visual images. They can draw their dreams, events that have meaning to them, people, or made-up stories. The idea is to get students used to expressing themselves in and responding to visual language. When teaching other subject areas, give students the option of using visual language rather than written language to record personal thoughts.

By the time students are in Grade 4 or 5, many of them want to draw realistically. Students often try to draw realistically from memory, and then become frustrated with the results. Point out to them that artists who draw very realistically use models, photographs, and often real objects. They do “studies” to learn to draw something they will need in an art work. Encourage students to do the same. If, for example, a student is trying to draw a horse, encourage the students to study pictures of horses; do “studies” of the head, the legs, and the body. Encourage the student to use observation rather than memory if they want to draw realistically.

Appendix B at the end of each grade level contains ideas for helping students learn to draw.

4. Guide the students in their art making.

The process of creating is often misunderstood. Teachers are afraid to guide the students too much in case they stifle creativity. However, the creative process is really a problem-solving process, and teachers should guide students through their creative problem solving. In many cases, this is simply a matter of asking the individual student thought provoking questions, and encouraging him or her to consider various solutions to problems encountered during visual art experiences.

This curriculum provides a model for guiding students through creative problem solving (see the following section entitled Guiding Students in Their Creations).

5. Provide time for individual reflection and group discussion about the students’ visual art expressions and the processes they used when creating them.

Reflection is essential in order for students to see the relevance of arts activities and to develop a personal commitment to their arts explorations. Reflection time can be used in a variety of ways: 

• one-on-one discussion with a student
• journal writing
• small group discussions
• large group discussions.

6. Explore the elements of visual art within meaningful contexts.

It is essential for students to learn the language of visual art; however, this language has little relevance to students if it is taught in isolation rather than within a meaningful context.

Appendix A at the end of the each grade level provides introductory activities for the elements of art. Teachers are encouraged to turn to Appendix A whenever they see the opportunity for students to learn about the elements within a unit of study.

Not all students have the same knowledge of the elements. Refer to Appendix A at various grade levels if the necessity arises.

7. Have each student keep a portfolio of his or her work.

The portfolio is a way of establishing with students that their work in visual art is valuable; that they can be discerning in their decision making about what to keep and what to discard; and that they are progressing in their learning about art.

It is important that the maintenance of a portfolio be connected to various aspects of the creative process (i.e., exploration of ideas, decision making about methods and materials, and reflection). Students need not keep only their finished projects. They can also keep their experiments and the evidence of their exploration of ideas (e.g., sketches, webs, or notes and comments).

The teacher can use the portfolio as an assessment tool. For example, the student might be asked to select three pieces from his or her portfolio: one idea, one piece that was not so successful, and one piece with which he or she is satisfied. The selections can then be discussed in a conference with the teacher. The portfolio can also be discussed in three-way meetings with student, parent(s)/caregiver, and teacher.

Guiding Students in Their Creations

The focus in this curriculum is on the development and expression of ideas, rather than on “one shot” activities that emphasize only the final product. Visual art, including the student’s art work, has meaning beyond the final product. The process of creating is the means by which students explore and learn. Art making, therefore, must be seen as a creative problem-solving process.

There may be times when a teacher wants the students to practise a skill or technique (e.g., cleaning a brush or using a printmaking roller), but meaningful art projects are far more than opportunities to practise skills and techniques. Whenever students apply knowledge, use techniques, express ideas, or solve design problems, they need to engage in creative problem solving.

It is important that the teacher guide students through the steps below, keeping in mind that they do not exclude strategies such as field trips, brainstorming, research, journal writing, or watching videos at any point in the process. It must also be noted that the process of creating is an organic one that takes shape as it progresses. The steps described below are spiralling rather than linear and do not necessarily occur in order. Encourage students to work at their own pace and to make as many of their own decisions as possible throughout the process.

Guide individual students through the following steps:

1. Define the problem to be solved.

Have the student state what he or she is trying to do, or articulate the idea to be developed; for example, “I want to do a picture of my dog.” Remember, even though all students are working in the same unit, these are usually individual problems. Each student or each group of students defines the problem in a unique way.

2. Make a plan.

The student might say, “I need a piece of paper and brown and white paint and a brush.”

3. Begin working.

4. Stop and reflect on how the plan is working .

Upon reflection, the student might decide, “The white and brown paint are running together. The dog’s legs won’t fit on the page. It doesn’t look like my dog.”

5. Propose solutions through guided discussions.

The student might propose solutions such as the following:

I could bring a picture of my dog to look at.

• It doesn’t matter that it doesn’t look like my dog so I could just keep going.
• I could wait until the brown paint is dry before I use the white paint.
• I could use a bigger piece of paper.
• I could lay the paper flat so the paint doesn’t run.
• I could leave the legs off and make the dog lying down.
• I could turn it into a rabbit because it looks more like a rabbit.

6. Go back to the original intention.

The teacher can ask, “Do you want to change your intention, or do you want to stick with your original idea?” Both are valid. The student may or may not reply by saying, “I still want to do a picture of my dog.”

 7. Make a decision about which proposed solutions are most appropriate for the situation.

 There are many solutions to the problem; a student might decide, for example:

 I can’t wait for the brown paint to dry because I don’t have enough time.

• I can’t get a picture of my dog so I’ll find a magazine photograph of a dog that looks like mine.
• I will lay the paper flat so the paint doesn’t run and I will use a bigger piece.

8. Try the solutions. 

9. Repeat steps four to seven if necessary.

Through teacher and student interaction during the process, the student learns that:

• he or she will be making decisions when engaging in creative activities
• there is no one answer to a problem
• even though all the students in the class might start out doing the same activity, their individual problem solving may lead to unique explorations
• the teacher is a collaborator in problem solving, rather than someone who has all the answers.

The teacher’s role is to:  

• guide students through the steps
• engage the students in discussions while they are working
• provide the materials needed for the students to try out their solutions
• allow the students several tries at solving art problems, rather than giving each student one piece of paper, and the same sized brush
• de-emphasize the product as the reason for engaging in art activities so that the students do not feel like they have “failed” if their chosen solutions do not work
• emphasize the problem-solving aspects of an activity
• keep cumulative records on student progress, rather than looking at one final product for evaluation purposes.

Planning from the Visual Art Section of the Curriculum Guide

The Curriculum Structure

The visual art section of the curriculum encourages teachers to plan their art programs in units – that is, in a series of connected lessons. For many elementary teachers, this is a change from past classroom practice in arts education.

The curriculum outlines four required units. Each unit is presented in two mini-units which are simply shorter units. The mini-unit topics have been designed so that during the elementary years students experience a varied range of contexts for their learning in visual art.

The time allotment for visual art is 50 minutes per week. It follows, then, that roughly three to five weeks could be spent on each mini-unit. However, it is not required that the two mini-units be given equal time.

The activities provided for each mini-unit are intended to be a starter list only. As teachers become more experienced in using the guide, they will certainly want to add other activities or adapt the ones provided for different topics. The activities are listed in three categories: introductory, main, and concluding activities. These three categories have the following purposes:

Introductory Activities

• to engage the students’ interest and attention
• to provide a context for learning
• to introduce skills or materials needed for the activities that follow

Main Activities

•  to explore a theme or topic toward achieving the selected objectives

Concluding Activities

• to give the students opportunities to reflect upon their experiences
• to explore possible extensions to the unit, or to provide a bridge into a new unit of study.

Planning Lessons and Units

A sample planning form for a visual art lesson can be found on page 221. Remember that lessons can include research, discussion, or reflection as visual art experiences. Students need not, indeed should not, be expected to complete a visual art product in every art period.

The following are steps to consider when planning visual art units.

Step One

Familiarize yourself with the information provided for your grade. Become familiar with the scope of learning objectives. Study the four unit overviews. Become familiar with the units and mini-units. Read the sample unit for your grade. This provides a model for unit planning. Read the sample units for other grades to get a sense of how other units and themes or topics are addressed.

Step Two

Select a unit. Most teachers begin with Unit 1: Learning to See; however, the units may be taught in any order. Choose a mini-unit theme and topic. You may use the topic suggested in the guide, or select one of more relevance to your students and community.

Step Three

Outline a sequence of lessons. At this point, be brief – a sentence or two describing each lesson. Refer to the Starter Lists of Activities in the guide, or develop your own activities. Lessons are probably 25-minute lessons (two per week) or 50-minute lessons (one per week), although teachers could plan for any combination totalling 50 minutes per week.

Step Four

Plan the lessons in detail. You may wish to use the sample planning form on page 221. The following are important aspects of lesson planning: 

• Select appropriate learning objectives for each lesson. A checklist is provided at the beginning of each grade. Remember that some learning objectives may need to be taught only once during the year, while others may need to be taught and/or reinforced several times, depending on the students’ progress and the nature of the objective. For example, in Grade 1, “understand size comparisons” may be the focus of only one or two lessons, while “view art works with curiosity” may be the focus of several lessons. Some learning objectives will, in all likelihood, be selected for all four units. Be sure to include Common Essential Learnings objectives. A checklist is provided.

• Select resources to which you have access and that apply to the theme of your mini-unit. Check the Saskatchewan Art Works kit, which was provided to each school, for any reproductions that may fit in your mini-unit.

• Determine the means of assessing achievement of the objectives. Remember to plan for ongoing assessment rather than for assessment only at the end of a mini-unit. Sample assessment forms are included in this curriculum guide.

• Outline procedures for each lesson in the mini-unit. Be as detailed as you feel you need to be.

Step Five

Refer to the Sample Checklist for Planning a Visual Art Mini-unit (page 220). This checklist is a means of ensuring that Core Curriculum Components and Initiatives are included in every unit. It also acts as a reminder of the importance of including a variety of teaching strategies in visual art.

Sample Checklist for Planning
a Visual Art Mini-unit

Teachers should check most of the following for each mini-unit:

• Have I chosen a topic that unifies the lessons in the mini-unit?
• Have I set appropriate learning objectives, including learning objectives that address the Common Essential Learnings?
• Have I mapped out a series of lessons within a mini-unit?
• Have I included introductory activities from Appendix A (elements of art) and/or Appendix B (drawing), if needed?
• Have I included opportunities for the students to explore and to express themselves through visual art language and materials?
• Have I included activities that develop the Common Essential Learnings objectives?
• Have I included opportunities for the students to research ideas and topics?
• Have I included opportunities for both individual and group work?
• Have I included opportunities for discussion?
• Have I included opportunities for student reflection on their own work?
• Have I included art works, reproductions, or images from magazines, photographs, children’s book illustrations, or other sources?
• Have I included appropriate art works from Saskatchewan Art Works?
• Have I considered all three components (creative/productive, cultural/historical, and critical/responsive)?
• Have I included First Nation and Métis content, either specifically or as examples of general concepts?
• Have I tried to make the activities relevant to the students and their communities?
• Have I made plans to assess the extent to which students have achieved the learning objectives during the mini-unit?
• Have I considered both process and product in the selection of my assessment strategies?

Other:

Sample Planning Form for a Visual Art Lesson

Grade 3 Visual Art

Learning Objectives Checklist

The students will:

Grade 3 Unit Overviews

Unit 1: Learning to See

Time: 6-8 weeks

Educating the sense of sight is an important part of the visual art curriculum. Just as teachers provide experiences to empower students through written and spoken language, so teachers should provide students with experiences to help them interpret visual information and express themselves using the language of visual art. Students need to be encouraged to observe details in their surroundings, to explore the relationships between objects and their environment, and to search for meaning in visual images. The unit focuses on developing the students’ perceptual abilities and awareness of the environment.

Mini-unit: The Natural Environment

Sample Topic: Turtles

Suggested Resources

• Reference books, pictures, and charts on turtles
• Stories and legends about turtles
• A live turtle in the classroom
• “How Turtle Set the Animals Free” in Kou-Skelowh/We Are the People: A Trilogy of Okanagan Legends by Okanagan Tribal Council
• “The Earth on Turtle’s Back” in Keepers of the Earth by M. Caduto and J. Bruchac

Starter List of Activities  

Introductory Activities

The natural environment provides a wealth of visual information for students to explore. Encourage students to continuously add to their repertoire of images, lines, colours, textures, shapes, forms, and patterns by observing and noting the natural environment’s ever-changing variety.

Study turtles. Find out why they have shells, where they live, how many different kinds there are, and whether they live naturally in Saskatchewan.

Have the students make a list of what they would like to find out about turtles. Design individual or group projects, or set up a learning centre for students to find out what they want to know.

Main Activities

Read stories and legends about turtles such as the traditional Okanagan legend “How Turtle Set the Animals Free”. Have the students write their own stories about a turtle. Have the students draw their stories. Examine the detailed markings on different kinds of turtles from around the world.

Have each student select a turtle to make. Make papier maché turtles. Try to get parents to help with this project. When the turtles are dry, have students paint them, attending to detail on all sides of the turtle.

The students could do one very large turtle instead of the individual turtles. Make the turtle the class mascot and give him or her, a name.

If you have access to clay and a kiln, the students could make clay turtles. A resource person experienced in working with clay would be of great help.

Concluding Activities

Set up a turtle display. Have the students make display tags with their turtles’ names (either scientific or “pet” names), their own names (the artist), and the materials used.

Small papier maché turtles can be hung from the ceiling. If you hang them, have students note how the forms look from the various angles (i.e., point of view).

Mini-unit: Signs and Symbols

Sample Topic: Giving Directions With Symbols

Suggested Resources

• Maps
• Example of a three-dimensional map Instructions for putting things together (Lego, for example)
• Music scores
• Example of a non-traditional music score
• Cassette recorder

Starter List of Activities

Introductory Activities

People use visual images to communicate ideas and convey meaning. Help students develop an awareness of visual information by interpreting and creating signs and symbols.

Have the students list all the ways they can think of that directions, instructions, or messages are given with symbols or a combination of symbols and words (e.g., maps, music notation, Lego building instructions). A code can tell what the instructions mean. Look at a road map or a city map. Look at the “key”.

Set up a learning centre where students find things by looking at a map; for example, find three parks, find three schools, find a gravel road.

Look at sheet music. Invite a musician to explain very generally to students how he or she knows what notes to play, when to play very loudly, when to play quickly or slowly, and when to be silent.

Main Activities

Have the students draw or construct a three-dimensional community. Use symbols in a key to explain what is in the community (e.g., parks, schools). A three-dimensional map could be made with plasticine, clay, and/or found objects.

Have the students pretend they are going to build an amusement park using a key to explain the symbols. Have them write or tell a story about the park.

Ask the students to find five or six objects that make sounds they like. Create a symbol for each sound. For example, 00 X 4 could represent two rocks being hit together four times. Have the students write their own “soundscore” with a key to explain the symbols. Have students perform their soundscores, individually or in small groups.

Concluding Activities

Ask the students if they can think of any other examples of pictures giving directions. If anyone has a Lego set (the Lego castle, for example) that can be brought to school, get the whole class to work on building it by following the instructions. Three or four students at a time can work on the various steps.

Display the students’ projects. Put the soundscores in a binder. Tape the scores and display the binder with a cassette recorder in a listening centre.

Unit 2: Ideas and Inspirations

Time: 6-8 weeks

Ideas for arts expressions come from many different sources such as the imagination, the environment, other art works, and personal experiences. In this unit, grade 3 students learn about the various ways that an artist gets an idea and makes that idea personally meaningful. Students use memory and their own observations as starting points for arts expressions. Although the students focus on memory and observation in this unit, ideas for expressions need not be limited to these two sources in other units during the year.

Mini-unit: Memory

Sample Topic: Dreams

Suggested Resources

• Stories about dreams such as:
• Ben’s Dream by Chris Van Allsburg
• Barn Dance by Bill Martin Jr. and John Archambault
• A Candle for Christmas by Jean Speare
• The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
• Wynken, Blynken and Nod illustrated by Ron Berg
• Art works and children’s book illustrations such as Close Your Eyes by K. Banks or Imagine a Night by S. Thomson
• Saskatchewan Art Works slide #46
• Examples of puppets
• Picture books on set design
• A set designer (perhaps a high school student from the drama club)

Starter List of Activities  

Introductory Activities

This mini-unit is based on the idea that students can draw on their memories and personal experiences as ideas for arts expressions. Help students to learn that sometimes it is necessary to turn to direct observation for more information in order to make their expressions more effective.

Read stories and poems about dreams. Ask the students if they can remember the best dream they have ever had. The worst nightmare. Have them write short paragraphs describing their best and worst dreams.

Have the students come up with words to describe good and bad dreams. Keep a group list for each. The lists can include specific images (e.g., a teddy bear, candy, a mean dog), or adjectives (e.g., jagged, black, shiny, beautiful). Encourage the students to think about the elements of art – colour, line, texture, shape, form, and space.

In children’s books, look at art works or illustrations that are based on dreams. Can you tell they are about dreams? Are they “realistic” – could they be real? How did the artist make the work look dream-like? (There is no one answer to these questions). Encourage students to compare and contrast.

Main Activities

Have students create two paintings or drawings – one of a good dream they have had, and one of a bad dream. Have them list things they can remember from the dreams such as images, colours, and sounds. Have them select media that they think will allow them to best recreate the dreams. Media choices might include paint, crayon, oil pastel, chalk, or collage. Ask them questions like, “What kind of colours will you use to make that dream look the way you have described it in your list? What kinds of lines and shapes?”

Have students create and illustrate a dream in picture book form. Again, have the students pay careful attention to the choices they make to help the illustrations represent or enhance the story. Have students create a puppet based on a character or creature in one of their dreams. Have the students list characteristics. Think about how the puppet can be made and decorated to make those characteristics evident.

Have each student make a model puppet theatre for their puppet out of a cardboard box. Have the students pretend they are set designers. How can they decorate the “set” (i.e., the inside of the box) so that the feeling and details of the dream are evident? Refer students to their lists of details about the dream. Invite a set designer to the classroom.

Some students may want to continue and write a puppet play about their dream.

Concluding Activities

Display the students’ good dream and bad dream paintings/drawings and discuss as a group common themes in the dreams. Are any of the themes similar to themes they have found in children’s books about dreams? How have the students used the elements of art to represent the subject matter of the dreams? This discussion need not be complicated. A student might state, for example, that another student has used a lot of yellow to show a happy dream. (The teacher wants to emphasize here that even young students make choices in the creation of their art works.)

Have the students present their illustrated “dream” books to another classroom of students.

Have the students display their puppet theatre models and puppets. Again, discuss the choices students have made in representing their dreams.

Mini-unit: Observation

Sample Topic: Spacecrafts

Suggested Resources

• Reference books on space, planets, and stars
• Books, poems, and songs, about space travel such as The Three Astronauts by U Eco
• Reference books, charts, pictures, and models of various spacecraft
• Information on Pioneer and Voyager spacecrafts, and space shuttles
• Pictures of spacesuits

Starter List of Activities

Introductory Activities

This mini-unit is based on the idea that students and artists can get ideas for arts expressions from things they observe around them. Help students to learn that skill at drawing and three-dimensional image making grows when the student incorporates accurate observations.

Study the earth’s solar system and planets. Look at photographs. Make models of the solar system to hang from the ceiling. Create a newly discovered solar system and design its planets. Make a model.

Read books, stories, poems about space travel.

Main Activities

Study pictures of spaceships – rockets, space shuttles, the American Pioneer and Voyager spaceships. Draw the students’ attention to actual details. Make lists of everything the students can see. What makes the space shuttle look different from the Voyager crafts? Why are they different? Learn how these spacecrafts work, as understanding them allows students to make sense of the visual details. Make charts or posters. Do research projects.

Make clay or papier maché replicas of a spacecraft. Have the students work from a photograph, incorporating details to make their replica(s) more authentic. This could be an individual or group project.

Have the students imagine that they are astronauts being sent to explore the planets of a newly discovered solar system. Have the students design and make a spacecraft out of a furniture or appliance box or other found materials. They should pay attention to detail. Look at the pictures of spacecrafts they have collected. What details can they use in their design?

Have the students draw their voyages into space. Encourage them to think about point of view. Are they inside the spacecraft looking out through a window? Are they viewing their own spacecraft from the outside? Remind students to pay attention to visual details. Have them include as many details as possible from their studies of spacecrafts to enhance their depictions of their spacecrafts.

Create story drawings, either as “TV scrolls” (use a cardboard box for the TV), or in boxes like comic strips. Students can use “balloons” like those in comic strips to make the characters talk if they wish.

Concluding Activities

Have students design a spacesuit to go with the spacecraft they created.

Encourage students to tell their space travel stories to other students. Set a cardboard box TV up in the room somewhere so students can view each other’s scrolls.

Have students name the new planets they have discovered. Have them draw the creatures and plants they saw on other planets. Have them pretend they are photographers and newspaper reporters. Draw “photographs” of the new planets. Write articles for a science magazine telling of their discoveries. Put together the magazine with stories and photographs.

Unit 3: Making Sense of Things

Time: 6-8 weeks

The previous unit encouraged students to explore where ideas for arts expressions come from, and to make decisions about ideas for their own expressions. This unit deals with how arts expressions can be best ordered to suit the original idea.

All art works have their own sense of order and composition. All artists make decisions about how to compose their ideas, whether they work formally or rely on random occurrences. This unit encourages students to look at order in its many forms in the environment, and to explore the many possibilities for order in moving from idea to arts expression. The unit focuses on the decisions an artist makes when moving from ideas to expression.

Mini-unit: A Sense of Order

Sample Topic: Designs in Clothing

Suggested Resources

• Books about designs in clothing such as Joseph Had a Little Overcoat by S. Jaback, book and video
• Fabrics, clothing, and objects that contain pattern
• Saskatchewan Art Works slides # 25, 26, and 30
• Examples of the use of contrast in art works, advertisements, and wallpaper samples
• Saskatchewan Art Works slides # 26, 30, and 35
• Neckties with various patterns
• Samples of traditional clothing
• Métis Dances (kit), Saskatchewan Education
• Inuit, Métis and Indian Art (slide kit), Saskatchewan Education, Northern Division

Starter List of Activities

Introductory Activities (Pattern)

Review formal and informal pattern.

Create patterns by repeating lines, colours, shapes, textures, and forms.

Create patterns using simple print-making techniques.

Introductory Activities (Contrast)

Review contrast. Discuss visual opposites such as light and dark, straight and curved, black and white.

Create patterns and art works experimenting with visual opposites.

Discuss the effects of using more or less contrast.

Have students cut out several shapes of black, white, and grey construction paper. Make patterns combining different colours of shapes. Put white, for example, next to different shades of grey, then next to black. Put grey next to black. What happens? Have students do a black and white painting or print using a repeated pattern. Display and discuss. Is there a lot of contrast? Do another using two shades of grey. Which work has more contrast?

Have the students bring clothing or fabrics to school that make use of pattern and contrast (either more or less) in the design.

Main Activities

Have the students work in pairs; one lies on a large piece of brown paper while the other traces the contour of the other student’s body. Then they switch. The students now design clothing on the outline of themselves:

• Create a T-shirt pattern and paint it onto the body outline.
• Create a T-shirt pattern and stamp it on using block-printing techniques.
• Cut out fabric and glue it onto the paper outline.
• Create a “costume” for themselves and paint it onto the outline (a pirate costume, for example), focusing on pattern and contrast.

The figures can be displayed on a long wall or hung from the ceiling.

Ask students to bring neckties to school. Look at the designs. Create a necktie design on paper.

Study the traditional clothing of one or more groups. Look at patterns in the clothing designs. Find out about special meanings different parts of the outfit might have. Find out what the designs mean. Set up a display. If appropriate, have the students make for themselves some part of the traditional outfit being studied. For example, if the Métis culture were being studied, students could make L’Assumption sashes. See Métis Dances for information on how to make a L’Assumption sash.

Concluding Activities

Hold a cultural event in the classroom. Invite parents. Learn a traditional dance. Cook traditional food. If students have made parts of the traditional outfit, they could wear them to the event.

Have the students design and decorate own T-shirt using fabric ink or fabric markers. (Inexpensive plain white cotton T-shirts work well.)

Display the T-shirts, or have students wear them to a special event.

Mini-unit: A Sense of Purpose

Sample Topic: Houses

Suggested Resources

• Pictures of houses in Canada and elsewhere
• Pictures that illustrate different kinds of decoration on houses
• Saskatchewan Art Works slides #42 and 44
• Information on Canadian architects
• Canadian Art: Building a Heritage by MacGregor, Hall, Bennet and Calvert (for information on architecture)
• The Tipi (poster), Saskatchewan Indian Cultural Centre
• The Art of Nehiyawak by Ken Hodgins (for pictures of tipi art designs)

Starter List of Activities

Introductory Activities

This mini-unit encourages students to think about why artists make particular choices when organizing constructions, art works, and other visual expressions. Help students understand that many decisions are made based on the artist’s purpose for creating the work.

Collect photographs or magazine pictures of houses. Look for shapes and patterns in the pictures.

Go for a walk to look at houses. Are they all the same? What is the same about them? If they are different, what makes them look different? Look for shapes and patterns. Look at materials. Look for examples of what people do to make their houses unique (e.g., colour, pattern, materials).

Main Activities

Look at pictures of various kinds of houses (e.g., wooden, brick, log, tent, mobile home, apartment). Ask students why they are different (e.g., climate, materials at hand, number of people). Talk about who designed the different houses. Introduce the word “architect”.

Talk about decoration in the pictures. Find examples. Some houses are more decorated than others. Why? (Economics, climate, fashion, way of life, and maintenance are a few possibilities).

Have students design a home for a particular climate.

Make up an imaginary planet. Decide on the conditions there. Design a home for that planet.

Have students draw their own homes, including all the detail they can remember.

Have them build models of homes out of various materials, depending on the kind of home they select. Look at the relationship between the environment and the kinds of materials available. Students can simulate real materials using cardboard boxes, fabric, or wood scraps. Have them think about decoration. For example, do they want to add a lot of decoration as in gingerbread-style homes?

Study the construction and decoration of tipis. Have students find out where tipis were used and which Nations used them. Where are tipis used today? Have students research the various styles of tipis and the purposes of these styles. Find out the symbolic meanings of the structural poles and decorations. Invite a parent, grandparent, or Elder to help with this.

Investigate other historical homes such as mud huts, brush huts, long houses, and pueblos.

Concluding Activities

Have a “home show” where the students display the house and models they constructed.

Have the class put together a booklet on homes.

Unit 4: The World of Art

Time: 6-8 weeks

This unit is designed to help students develop an awareness that visual art in its many forms is a part of the life in their own community.

People who work with visual images include painters, quilters, ceramic artists, beadwork artists, sculptors, sign painters, and people who arrange displays in store windows. These people and others like them live in all communities. By studying them and the work they do, students can begin to understand the role visual images play in daily life, and the many ways visual images reflect and define culture. The unit focuses on the students’ understanding of the role of visual art in various cultures, time periods, and their own homes and community.

Mini-unit: Visual Images and Daily Life

Sample Topic: Art in Public Places

Suggested Resources

• Photographs or post cards of famous statues (Check with parents. They might have travel photos of Mount Rushmore, Notre Dame Cathedral windows, or others from a variety of locations)
• Websites with images of famous statues or landmarks
• Saskatchewan Art Works slides #3 and 23
• Photos of stained glass windows
• Reference material on stained glass windows

Starter List of Activities  

Introductory Activities

This mini-unit encourages students to become aware of the connections between visual art and daily life. They learn that many artists choose their subject matter from what they see around them. Help students to see that visual art is present in their own community.

Go for a walk around town. Look for examples of original art works (e.g., outdoor sculptures, totem poles, art in banks, community hall, Band hall, friendship centre, churches, and/or library). Use a process for viewing such as one included in this curriculum guide on page 45.

Look at pictures in books of famous art works in public places (the Mount Rushmore carvings, for example).

Main Activities

If the community has a publicly owned piece of sculpture, visit it. Find out who made it, why, and from where it came. Some examples include: Billy the Buffalo in Swift Current, the art of First Nation and Métis artists in Mistasinihk Place in La Ronge, steel sculpture in front of the Centre of the Arts in Regina, Bill Epp’s sculpture of Gabriel Dumont in Saskatoon.

Have students construct a sculpture for their school (a large papier maché animal, for example).

If there is a church with stained glass windows in their community, visit it. Do any of the windows tell a story? Find out who made them. Are there people in the community who do stained glass work? Students can make stained glass windows for their school by cutting shapes from pieces of construction paper, then gluing coloured pieces of tissue paper over the spaces.

Make buildings out of cardboard boxes and include stained glass windows. Have students decide what kind of building they are making and decide on appropriate windows. (For example, a library might have story characters in the stained glass.)

Concluding Activities

Display the students’ art works in the school or other public places. Try to arrange a display with a bank, town hall, or other prominent building in the community.

Mini-unit: Artist Study

At each grade, students should experience a mini-unit or unit of study that uses the work of an artist as its focal point. The artist selected depends on what resource material to which the teacher has access. The teacher could select a local artist, an artist from the Saskatchewan Art Works Kit, any other Saskatchewan or Canadian artist, or an artist that has art historical significance (Picasso, for example). The teacher is to choose an artist whose work will be of interest to the students, or students choose from a selection presented by the teacher.

Remember that, although resources at hand might be limited, this unit should include research. Consult with your school library staff. The class and/or teacher can write to art galleries for information and order books on interlibrary loan. Some art galleries have slides that can be sent out on loan to teachers and inexpensive exhibition catalogues that can be purchased. Many artists and art galleries have Internet websites with images and biographical information. Periodicals such as Canadian Art are also sources of biographical information and colour reproductions.

The following is a suggested way that an artist study unit or mini-unit can be conducted. This suggestion uses the work of contemporary Saskatchewan artist Ruth Cuthand – in particular, her “dress” painting series. Any artist of interest to the students could be substituted for the artist suggested here. The Grade 3 Sample Unit (available on CD-ROM and Saskatchewan Learning website). illustrates how the teacher can introduce an artist from the students’ own community.

Sample Topic: Ruth Cuthand

Suggested Resources

• Information on treaties.
• Refer to Secondary Level Native Studies curriculum guides
• Refer to Office of the Treaty Commissioner website at www.otc.ca
• Books, exhibition catalogues, periodical articles, and Internet information about Ruth Cuthand
• Reproductions of Ruth Cuthand’s work, especially her “dress” painting series
• Saskatchewan Art W