4th Grade Lesson Plan

Our assignment this week is to make a lesson plan for fourth grade and explain why it is age appropriate.  According to the USOE Rainbow Chart under the Refine/Contribute column, fourth graders are able to take simple shapes and make a pattern out of them covering the whole page.  My lesson plan involves such a thing.  It is called the Zillij Pattern (from Crayola.com) and is made by drawing a simple shape in the center of the paper and going out from that using other shapes.  This is an age appropriate activity because although it is made only with crayons and a pencil, it is challenging enough for the students and it can also be tied into a Social Studies lesson (the Zillij Pattern is used in Muslim Mosques' stained windows).  It is also a good thing for this age group because the student does not need to know about complex shapes and it allows for a lot of freedom in creating this.  Color, shapes, patterns, and even size can all be determined by the student.

Art or craft?

When you think of art, what do you think of?  Do you think of a painting, a drawing, a sketch?  Or do you think of a "Welcome" sign on a front door, a cute decorative pumpkin, or even a wooden Easter bunny?  Well, the difference is the style of how they were made as well as the obvious end results.  According Dictionary.com, Art is defined as: "the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance."  In Art Emphasis, art uses variety, repetition, emphasis, and domination-subordination in the pieces.  In other words, art uses principles and specific techniques to create things that are visually appealing.  On the other hand, a craft is defined as "making objects in a skilled way".  There is no set technique or style to make a craft correctly.  In my opinion, crafts usually take less skill and don't require an extensive background knowledge.  They are generally more hands on and have a 3D shape.  A lot of art is something that is in a frame and therefore cannot be picked up or felt.  

In today's classrooms, I believe more crafts are being done than actual art.  There are less techniques taught and there is more "paste and glue" type activities.

What Motivates Me

As a student, what motivates me to learn is, first, a caring and energetic teacher.  My first grade teacher was that type of teacher.  She always had fun lessons and genuinely cared about each of us.  It didn't matter what we were learning, she always made it fun and entertaining.
Another thing that motivates me to learn was the fact that I wanted to be a better person and increase my knowledge.  When I was in Elementary School, I wanted to be able to come home and tell my parents, "Look what I learned in school today!".  I always wanted my parents to be proud of me and I didn't want to let them down.
The last thing that motivates me to learn is to be able to teach what I have learned to others.  I want to be able to master the materials as best as I can so I can eventually teach it to students.  I believe teaching is a wonderful thing that is almost like a "calling" in life.  To me, those that are excellent teachers are also excellent motivators.

Van Gogh Painting

This assignment was created by oil pastels and a watercolor wash.  We were supposed to visualize what it looked like outside our window and draw that with oil pastels.  This is how mine came out:

Prints

This assignment was pretty fun to do.  We were to pick an image from our visual culture-anything we wanted.  I chose to do an iPod speaker dock.  We were to then use cross hatching and dots as well as indents in the styrofoam to create our visual image.  I don't think I quite got the concept of cross hatching, but this is how it turned out.

Color Wheel

This assignment was supposed to give us practice mixing colors and putting them in order according to a color wheel.  We were to note the primary colors as well as the complimentary, warm, and cool colors.  This is how mine turned out.

Teaching Artist Statements

Artist statements can be hard to teach to children.  An artist statement basically tells what the artist was thinking or feeling as well as explaining the piece of art at the same time.  Some of the questions that might be answered in an artists statement is:

• Why do you like to make art?
• What subjects do you prefer? Why?
• What processes and techniques do you use? Why?
• How is your work different from others?
• What do you see in your artwork?
• What do other people say they see?
• What are your goals and aspirations as an artist?
• Who or what inspires you?

(Nita Leland, Writing An Artist's Statement, 2000)


These statements are generally found near the piece when it is hanging in an exhibit.  Teaching children about artist statements can be a tricky thing to do without having them actually doing it, so I think the best way to teach an artist's statement is to actually have the students' write one.

Contour Drawings

For this assignment, we were to use a viewfinder and draw what we see.  This is what I saw.

Food party!

This assignment was probably my favorite assignment we have done all year!  We were to eat something and use watercolors to paint the textures, colors, and taste.  If you can tell what each square is, you will win a prize.

Chinese Paintings

For this assignment, we did Chinese bamboo paintings with rice paper.  Mine did not turn out as professional as some of the other ones, but this is as good as it got!  We were also supposed to make a stamp using our initials and put it on the painting.

Collographs

For this assignment, we were to create a bug and do 3 collographs out of crayons and 1 out of paint.  The crayon rubbings were pretty cool because you could do any color you wanted.  The paint one turned out awesome because it was metallic.  This is how my metallic one turned out: