Ready for action?
Resources
Web links
Tangible Resources
paper, pen, art materials
Human Resources
Art teacher (optional)
Preparation
Select a children's book about art, buy or create a story sack around the story; collect art books for reference; prepare art materials for painting; prepare worksheets and the memory game.
Goals, messages & concepts
Specific goals
- To introduce students to the history of modern art, focussing on how photography changed the visual arts.
- To become familiar with art vocabulary.
- To use the Storysack.
- To inspire students to recognise, seek out and create different forms of art.
Specific messages
- You can be an artist yourself.
- You can express yourself through creating art.
- The invention of photography changed the visual arts.
Main terms
- photography
- visual arts
- painting
- medium
- composition
- contrast
Practices & skills
STEM practices
- Asking questions and defining problems
Soft skills
- Empathy
- Teamwork and collaboration
Management skills
-Course of activity
step 1
Introduce the Learning Scenario, explaining that students are going to learn about art movements and photography, and make art for themselves.
step 2
Start with a short discussion about art: What types of art can you describe? What is art? Can anything be art? Who decides what is and is not art? Art can be beautiful and make others feel good, but artists can also use art to make a statement or address situations they don't agree with. What makes art ‘art’?
step 3
Explain about the selected Storysack and start reading the book (Crocodile’s Masterpiece by Max Velthuijs).
step 4
Use a memory game to learn about different art words and develop students’ vocabulary (see resources).
step 5
Begin experimenting with art:
- Working in groups students can recreate famous paintings in the classroom, improvising the poses and using objects they find around them.
- Each group can make a quick sketch of another group’s work, and then develop the sketch further through painting.
step 6
Introduce the history of art in a brief discussion about Modernist art movements (see Resources). Explain that one way in which photography changed visual arts was to liberate art from its ties to realism. Until that point in history, painting was primarily a medium focused on representation. Photography made it quick and easy to capture and reproduce images, so painters began to explore things that painting can do that photography can’t. Painting as an artform changed fundamentally as a result.
step 7
Introduce a research task to complete as homework called ‘Dinner Talk’.
- During dinner, students should interview their parents and siblings about what art is and what it means to them.
- They should ask questions like what is their favorite piece of art or artist and why? Do they have art at home? What makes something an art piece and why? Can everything be art?
- Students should make a note of the answers using the worksheet (see resources) to share with the class.