Lead Teacher: Madison

Other Teacher(s): Sydney, Sophie, Bethany                                                 

Date: 10/25/21

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Lesson Idea and Relevance: What are you going to teach and why is this lesson of importance to your students? How is it relevant to students of this age and background?  

 

    This lesson is meant to develop visual thinking when examining an environment. One of the most amazing parts of nature is the array of colors it presents. This lesson exercises thinking of changing colors and why certain things are certain colors. Students will have an interactive experience with exploring the environment around them. They will use a variety of materials of varying colors to put into a rainbow form. 

                                          

Essential Understanding (s): What are the “big ideas”? What specific understandings about 

them are desired?

 

    The “big idea” behind this project is Nature. The theme or key concept of the project is to explore art making through recycling various materials while exploring their environment. Students will be collecting different materials from the immediate environment around them and they will be creating a collage out of the materials they find. Each student will be given a cardboard cutout of a rainbow and use those found materials to create a “nature rainbow.” The intention of this project is to show students that art can be created out of anything, including natural material, as well as how to think about creating collage artwork. Another important theme is for students to make personal connections with their surrounding environment, and to possibly take a sustainable view on art production.

 

Essential Question (s): 

What provocative questions will foster inquiry, understanding, and transfer of learning? 

• What is your favorite season? Why?

• What are your favorite colors?

• Do you know what the word sustainable means?

• Do you know the benefits of sustainable artwork?

 

Outcomes: Students will know…

 

    Students will be able to make deeper observations of the colors within their environment, and how they can collect them! Students will also be able to see that they can make artwork using all kinds of natural materilas that they collected from outside. By encouraging them to dig into their environment, we can also teach them about sustainability! Students will overall know the benefits behind making environmental artworks and how to make one at home if they would like to do so. 

 

Student Reflective Activity: Through what authentic performance task(s) will students demonstrate the desired understandings? How will students reflect upon and self-assess their learning?

 

         - Once they are complete we plan on hanging their rainbows up for them to see! We can then ask them leading questions like “what do you like best about your piece?” or “what was your favorite part?” to help them assess what they learned!

 

Assessment Instrument (s): By what criteria will “performances of understanding” be judged?

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         - Understanding will be judged by students’ ability to create a rainbow, filled in with different materials that they themselves had chosen, and be able to talk about why they picked certain items for their particular piece of art. 

 

Pre-assessment: How will you help the students know where the unit is going and what is expected? Help the teacher know where the students are coming from (prior knowledge, interests)?

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         - Before the demonstration, the teacher will ask leading questions about how students feel about their relationship with the outdoors and nature, as well as their familiarity with collage artwork. This will help gauge initial interest and might bring up previous experiences of students that would help them find personal meaning in this project. The teacher's example will show the students what their work might look like, just as an initial guide. We will draw from the experience of the previous two lesson plans, and what topics held the students’ interest in the past.

 

Motivation: How will you hook all students and hold their interest?

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         - We will hook the students' interests by prompting them with motivating questions and showing them various techniques on how to complete this lesson. We will also motivate them by showing them an in-class demo as well as a few different teacher-made examples so that they can see what the final product of this lesson will be. Another way we will hook all the students' attention is by involving some personal aesthetics of theirs into their own project, so that they can “make it their own”.

• Have you ever made a nature collage before?

• What do you want to include in your nature rainbow?

• How many different colors can you see/collect from the outside environment around you?

• Have you ever heard of reduce, reuse, and recycle?

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Ideation: How will you equip students, help them experience the key ideas, and explore the issues to generate ideas for their artwork?

         -We will offer them a loose framework for arranging their rainbows, but the techniques, discoveries, and observations they use in this lesson will be applicable to their daily lives at home, and this might open the possibility for art opportunities outside of the classroom. At the beginning of class, the lead teacher will show the steps the students will walk through to complete this lesson, and in the demo, students will be shown different techniques on how to glue together their nature rainbows. Students will also be asked the following ideation questions during the demo to help them through the process.

• Do you think smaller or bigger pieces are easier to glue to the cardboard?

• How do you want to arrange the different materials you collected from outside in your nature rainbow?

• How can you cut/tear up the materials you found outside to make them stick?

• How do you want to glue on the materials you found?

     

 

Procedures: How is the lesson organized to maximize initial and sustained engagement as well as effective learning? Provide opportunities to rethink and revise their understandings and work? Allow students to evaluate their work and its implications? Include literacy and numeracy?

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1. We will first introduce and go over the project and then the leading teacher will do a short demo of how to glue on the different materials each student will be collecting outside. (12:30- 12:40PM) Motivating questions: Have you ever made a nature collage before? What do you want to include in your nature rainbow? How many different colors can you see/collect from the outside environment around you? Have you ever heard of reduce, reuse, and recycle? Have you ever made a nature artwork before?

2. After the main introduction of the project, we will then take the students outside into the courtyard so that each student can collect the different materials and colors they want to include in their nature rainbow. (12:40-1:00PM)

3. After collecting the materials from outside, students will then be handed cardboard cut out of a rainbow in which they will be able to fill in the different segments of the rainbow with the materials they collected from outside.(1:00-1:05 PM) Ideation: Do you think smaller or bigger pieces are easier to glue to the cardboard?How do you want to arrange the different materials you collected from outside in your nature rainbow?How can you cut/tear up the materials you found outside to make them stick?How do you want to glue on the materials you found?

4. Students will have time to glue and paint the background of their nature rainbow pieces (if they want), which will last a majority of the class. (1:05- 1:50PM)

5. After they have all finished their pieces we will then either hang all the rainbows up for everyone to see or just do a gallery walk so that everyone can see the different works of art each student created.(1:50-2:00 PM)

6. Students and teachers will then clean up the studio space after the lesson is complete 

 

Materials, Resources, Safety: 

• Cardboard 

• Elmer's glue

• Paint 

• Paintbrushes 

• Water 

• Hot glue gun (only if needed, with teacher’s assistance)

• Materials collected from outside

• Scissors 

 

Accommodations/Differentiation: (Resources and/or Process, Products and/or Performance)? 

 

      If some students are more interested in painting the background portion of this project they are also more than welcome to fully focus on that aspect.