In response to changes with content and curricula, and to enable future teachers to be successful, the author has created a very basic guide to creating a quality unit. It is simple in nature so as to allow for numerous artworks, perspectives, and styles of teaching to be incorporated within the organization of the unit. These guidelines are most…

Art teacher Linda Popp and artist H. Ed Smith team up to teach about creating sculptural clocks. This lesson shows how a portrait can be created using various media. Students based projects on someone in their lives they have known for a long time. This sculptural problem was part of a series of portrait and self-portrait lessons with a high…

In this article, the author describes murals as visual storytelling. In times before most people could read or write, pictures were used to tell stories and to teach people. Visual storytelling is most often seen in the form of drawing, painting, collage, printmaking, quilts, stained-glass windows, and murals. The concept of visual storytelling…

Designing an eighteen-hole miniature-golf course is not the typical end-of-the-year art project, but at Winfield School it's "par for the course." Students anxiously count the days to the first day of miniature golf, courtesy of the sixth-grade art classes. The design and production of the miniature gold course serves as a great motivator and…

In this article, the author describes the difference between debriefing and critiquing. Critiquing art entails examining the use of the art elements and the principles of design. Describing what one sees as well as how the work is organized is a major part of critiquing. Determining what the piece is communicating and whether the piece is…

Several years ago, Gloria Brinkman developed an assessment tool for use in her art classes that is simple, efficient, and has proven to increase both student learning and student appreciation of the creative process. The format is based on a ten-point handwritten response to three specific prompts entered weekly in a journal. The journals can be…

Students delight in making books. This bookmaking project merges the idea of sketchbooks with artist's books--books made by, and for, the artist in which ideas and memories get formulated and stored for later use or reminiscence. Young art students can be taught to appreciate the important qualities of sketchbooks. For many students, making a…

The statement "Learning Is Both an Active and Reflective Practice" is very relevant to the authors elementary artroom, where students are encouraged to think about what they are making, to experiment with ideas, and to ask questions of themselves. Art students in grades three through five use digital cameras, computers, PowerPoint, and reflective…

In the art lesson described in this article, students explore the arts of architecture, design, painting, and sculpture within four time periods: early colonial (1500-1700), late colonial (1700-1776), the quest for independence (1776-1860), and industrialization and growth (1860-1900). Through class discussion, readings, and slide presentations,…

Developing learning experiences around real-world scenarios engages students in hands-on, authentic learning that promotes skills such as: research methods, collaboration, workplace skills, persistence, information organization and application, and self-reflection practice. The final work, new skills, and knowledge may then be demonstrated to an…

Imagine a place where artistic expression, writing, and the critique process about art become a way to communicate in a child's everyday life. Students learn that there is a balance in the relationship between colors, lines, and objects. Students begin to think critically and reason through real-world situations. As observation and thinking skills…

One art critic called it pure Despite the mixed reviews of Christo and Jeanne-Claude's temporary art installation in New York's Central Park, the public reaction to The Gates was largely positive.The Gates consisted of 7,500 orange PVC frames straddling the park's walkways that varied in widths from 5 1/2 feet to 18 feet. Eight-foot-long ripstop…

Posits that two co-dependent game plans, Finite and Infinite, inform the orientation of contemporary art education as represented by Discipline-Based Art Education (DBAE) and interactive interdisciplinary art education (iiae). Credits James B. Carse's "Finite and Infinite Games: Vision of Life as Play and Possibility" as the premise for this…

Explores issues related to teaching art students critical or alternative practices with new technologies not yet widely available. Cites factors influencing the presence of technology in art education departments. Describes teaching a college course to students with limited experience using devices, such as cell phones, laptop computers, and…

Explores the life of Eloise Richards Payne in order to address becoming a professional teacher around 1800. Describes the type of child interested in becoming an art teacher, the role of art in Payne's early education, where she received ideas about art after schooling, and what she needed to become a teacher. (CMK)