• A reproduction of the work of art your class will view on their museum visit for Lesson 2. Choose a work of art that you think your students will respond to.
Grades K–2: Students at this age respond to artworks depicting subjects that are familiar to them, such as animals, family, and people engaged in everyday activities. For example, Gerard ter Borch's A Maid Milking a Cow in a Barn.
Grades 3–5: Students at this age find representational works of art easier to understand than abstract ones. For example, Claude-Joseph Vernet's A Storm on a Mediterranean Coast.
• Reproductions of other works by the same artist that are also on view in the museum you will visit (if available).
• Large chart with columns, each labeled with elements of art
Grades K–2: List only three elements—color, shape, and line.
Grades 3–5: List six elements—composition, line, shape/form, space, color, and texture.
• drawing paper and pencils
• Short activity: Protecting Art for Future Generations |
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Preparation
• Make an appointment to take your class to your local art museum. Information about how to do so is often available on the museum's Web site, or by calling its education department.
Request a school visit to the Getty Museum on this Web site: Planning a School Visit.
• Select one work of art in the museum's collection for the focus of these three lessons. You should confirm that the work of art will be on view for your visit. The museum's education department should be able to do this for you. Acquire a slide, transparency, or poster of the focus work to display in your classroom. If you are coming to the Getty Museum, you can print out color copies from the pages on this Web site: Art.
Research the work of art you will view and the artist who created it. Information about works of art and artists in the Getty Museum are available on this Web site: Art.
1. In your classroom, display a reproduction of the artwork you have chosen to focus on. Ask students for their reactions to the image. Tell them they can say whatever comes to mind and can also ask questions. As students bring up points, categorize their responses for them and introduce vocabulary about the elements of art into the discussion.
For example, "Shawn mentioned the color yellow. Color is one of the elements of art that we will explore in this lesson. Can you point out some other colors you see in the painting?" Or, "Veronica mentioned a cow that is part of the subject of the painting. The subject is what the painting is about. We'll talk more about the subject later." Spend about 5 to 10 minutes on this discussion.
2. Display a chart with columns for each element of art to be discussed in step 3. Review the definition of each element listed. Pass out paper and drawing materials.
3. Grades K–2:
Practice drawing different types of shapes and lines with your students. Draw on the chart in front of the class while students draw at their desks. Discuss the resemblance of different types of lines and shapes to things in the world (zigzag lines for water or lightning, circles for cookies or the sun, etc.). Casually include one or two examples from the focus artwork as a segue into the next step. For example, if working with the Ter Borch painting, you can say, "a rectangle is like a window" and draw a rectangle on the chart under "shape" to demonstrate.
Grades 3–5:
Using the reproduction of your focus work as the model, practice drawing different elements with your students. Extract shapes, lines, and textures from the work and draw them as a class. You should draw on the chart in the appropriate column while students draw on their papers. Label your drawings using appropriate terms. For example, "horizontal line," "cylinder," etc. You can discuss how repeated shapes or lines make patterns; how artists use line and color to convey the illusion of depth; and the concepts of negative and positive space, light, and shadow.
4. Ask students to locate examples of each element of art in the focus work. Follow each response with a request for visual evidence (have students approach the reproduction and point out the element of art) and a detailed description of the element (in the Vernet: jagged lines of the waves, triangular sail, dark colors in the sky). Record each example of an element that the students point out in the appropriate column on the chart.
5. Ask students what they think the subject of the artwork is. Ask for visual evidence and list responses on a board for the class to see.
After different subjects have been listed on the board, tell the students what the title of the work of art is and discuss how close their ideas about the subject were to the artist's ideas. Why are they similar or different?
6. Next, introduce the concepts of an original work of art and a reproduction. Ask students some questions that can only be answered by seeing the original work of art. Make it clear to the students that when looking at a reproduction, they can only speculate about certain aspects of the original work of art. The aim of this exercise is to illustrate that reproductions are not substitutes for the original artwork. Questions might include:
• How big is the original work of art? (After students guess, you can draw an outline to scale on the chalkboard.)
• Do you think the surface of this work is smooth or rough?
• If looking at a sculpture: What does the back of the sculpture look like?
7. If possible, show students reproductions of other works by the same artist that are also on view in the museum you will visit. Ask students what is similar in the various artworks. Summarize their observations to introduce the idea of an artist's style. Write down student responses on the board. Optional: You can weave biographical and historical information about the artist into this informal discussion.
8. Tell students that they will go to the museum to see the original work of art. Ask the students to define what a museum is. Record responses and save for Lesson 3.
9. Ask students questions to begin a discussion about the various functions of a museum, such as: collecting, conservation, and education. For example:
• What does it mean to collect something? What do you collect?
• Where do you keep your collection? How do you protect it?
• Why do you think the museum collects works of art? How do you think the museum protects its collection?
• Why do you think a museum wants to teach people about art?
10. Help students recognize that museums want to protect works of art for the future. The Getty Museum's pre-visit activity Protecting Art for Future Generations will help students understand why we ask them not to touch works of art in a museum.
After doing this activity with your class, stress the following two points:
a. Works of art can be damaged when well-meaning people point at them with a finger, pencil, or map and accidentally touch the surface. Students' bracelets, pocketbooks, or backpacks can accidentally scratch the surface of works of art. This is why we ask them not to get too close, not to point things at works of art, and to leave backpacks on the bus or at the coat check.
b. When security guards in a museum warn a visitor about getting too close to a work of art, they are doing their job to help preserve the art so that future generations can enjoy it. |
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| A Maid Milking a Cow in a Barn, Gerard ter Borch, 1652–1654 |
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Visual Arts Content Standards for California Public Schools
Kindergarten
1.0 Artistic Perception
Develop Perceptual Skills and Visual Arts Vocabulary
1.1 Recognize and describe simple patterns found in the environment and works of art.
Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.3 Identify the elements of art (line, color, shape/form, texture, value, space) in the environment and in works of art, emphasizing line, color, and shape/form.
4.0 Aesthetic Valuing
Derive Meaning
4.2 Describe what is seen (including both literal and expressive content) in selected works of art.
Grade 1
1.0 Artistic Perception
Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.3 Identify the elements of art in objects in nature, in the environment, and in works of art, emphasizing line, color, shape/form, and texture.
Grade 2
1.0 Artistic Perception
Develop Perceptual Skills and Visual Arts Vocabulary
1.1 Perceive and describe repetition and balance in nature, in the environment, and in works of art
Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.3 Identify the elements of art in objects in nature, the environment, and works of art, emphasizing line, color, shape/form, texture, and space.
Grade 3
1.0 Artistic Perception
Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.5 Identify and describe elements of art in works of art, emphasizing line, color, shape/form, texture, space, and value.
Grade 4
1.0 Artistic Perception
Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.5 Describe and analyze the elements of art (color, shape/form, line, texture, space and value), emphasizing form, as they are used in works of art and found in the environment.
Grade 5
1.0 Artistic Perception
Analyze Art Elements and Principles of Design
1.3 Use their knowledge of all the elements of art to describe similarities and differences in works of art and in the environment.
3.0 Historical and Cultural Context
Role and Development of the Visual Arts
3.1 Describe how local and national art galleries and museums contribute to the conservation of art.
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