Lesson Plans

Inquiry lesson about color

This lesson is designed to prepare students for a museum visit and the practice of looking at art critically with special attention to color choices.

A lesson plan for Grades 3–5 Visual Arts Education, Information Skills and English Language Arts

by Betsy Ray

Lesson contents

• Learning outcomes
• Teacher planning
• Pre-activities
• Activities
• Assessment
• Supplemental information
• North Carolina curriculum alignment

About the author

This lesson was creted by Betsy Ray, a fifth grade teacher at Hope Valley Elementary School in Durham.

Learning outcomes

Students will:

• become aware of the color choices artists make in their work
• practice the science process skills of predicting, observing, inferring, and interpreting
• recognize the ways in which being a critical viewer of art is similar to being a critical reader and/or writer as well as being a scientist

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

2 days

Materials/resources

• writing journals
• teacher-prepared poster or chart about aspects of color

Technology resources

• computer
• internet access
• overhead projection system

Pre-activities

Students should already have knowledge about colors and how they are used within art.

Students should be familiar with science vocabulary such as: observe, classify, communicate, infer, predict, interpret, and experiment.

Students should be familiar with the process of recording data and writing entries in a science journal.

Activities

Lesson Summary. As a whole class, students will view at least two pieces of art, one black and white lithograph and one oil painting (suggested artist: Grant Wood) in order to compare and contrast color choices by the artist in a science journal entry.

Day One

1. The teacher will introduce the lesson by discussing the various concepts of colors and how they give our world definition and vivacity. The teacher will guide the discussion so that the students become aware of how colors are used in different pieces of art.
2. The teacher will then give a short overview of the lesson and what the final outcome/product will be (a journal entry comparing/contrasting/commenting on the two pieces of art).
3. Also prior to the first viewing, the teacher should introduce the concept that skills in one subject area can be used in other areas. For example, the teacher might engage students in thinking about their own behaviors and thoughts when reading a book: look at the cover and title...predict what is inside...read part of it...what's going to happen next...oh, no...that's not how I expected it to end OR I knew that was how it would happen! By asking leading questions, the teacher should use this opportunity to make the connections between reading a book and “reading” a piece of art explicit.
4. Before seeing the first piece of art, students should set up their notebooks for recording data by creating a table with three sections:
   • predictions (of what colors they think the artist(s) might use)
   • outcomes (the actual colors that the artist(s) used)
   • changes (that the student would make if he/she had been the artist).
5. Students should also be presented with the following questions for class discussion or for journal entries:
   • How is writing a story like creating a work of art?
   • A painter chooses colors. What does the writer choose?
   • What kinds of stories do you like best? Why?
   • What makes a story good?
   • Do you like stories that are short and easy like a Berenstein Bears book? Or do you like the ones like Hatchet by Gary Paulsen? Why? Do you like different books on different days?
   • What's similar about reading it and doing a science experiment?
   • What's similar about scientists and artists?
6. The students will view the lithograph first (using the overhead projection system and the Internet sites and/or attachments for the artwork) and will independently predict what colors they think would be appropriate for the scene. In this particular activity, the expectation is that students should be able to justify their rationales for certain colors, not that these colors completely reflect reality.
7. These predictions will be shared on a voluntary basis with the entire class. These predictions should be fully explained so students become aware of how they made connections and assumptions based on their prior knowledge and experiences.
8. The students will then view the painting and observe whether their predictions were accurate or not. These observations should be entered into the chart that was created at the beginning of the lesson.
9. Finally, students should note any colors that they would have chosen to include and/or change if they had been the artist.
10. If time allows, the teacher can show other similar pieces of artwork.

Day 2:

1. The teacher should review yesterday's lesson and how the table was used to record data about predictions, outcomes and conclusions/opinions.
2. Students will write a reflective journal entry based on the previous day's activity.
3. A prompt that includes expectations within it should be written in a place where all students can view it. The following is an example of possible prompt:
   

   "You will write a reflective journal entry on the lesson from yesterday. The entry should include an opening, a paragraph(s) comparing and contrasting the uses of color, and a summary or closing analysis."

   Possible sentence prompts:

   • "My predictions were that the artist would choose...color...because..."
   • "When I looked at the painting, I observed that the artist actually chose...colors."
   • "I believe that if I was creating the painting I would use...colors...because..."

Assessment

Students should know the teacher standards ahead of time. The focus of this lesson is on color choices within pieces of art and science process skills. Therefore, the assessment focus is on the transferring of color choice data into narrative writing.

This assessment piece is based on the prompt included in the lesson plan above.

The definition of an opening paragraph is that it includes a general outline of what was done in class the day before.

The paragraph(s) that compare/contrast the uses of color should accurately reflect the information recorded in the table.

The final summary paragraph should include any comments that the student wants to make about the experiment. How would he/she change the experiment to make it better for next year? Which parts would he/she keep or not keep and why?

The teacher should be looking at the journal entry to see that:

1. there is a completed table
2. an introductory paragraph
3. the compare/contrast writing accurately reflects the information from the table
4. the last paragraph has valid and coherent comments about the lesson

Supplemental information

In order to move through this lesson more easily, the teacher will need a certain level comfort in using the overhead projection system.

The credit/bibliography information for the two lithographs is provided in a separate attachment for teachers to use as references.

Attachments:

• Stone City
• Grant Wood - July
• Grant Wood - January
• Grant Wood - label

Related websites

Grant Wood landscape paintings from the
Grant Wood Exhibit-- http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA98/haven/wood/gallery4.html

Other landscapes can be found at many art museum sites.
Some NC museum sites are:

The Ackland Museum, Chapel Hill
http://www.unc.edu/depts/ackland/

The NC Museum of Art, Raleigh
http://www.ncartmuseum.org

The Reynolda House, Winston-Salem
http://www.reynoldahouse.org

The Mint Museum, Charlotte
http://www.mintmuseum.org

Comments

The fifth graders who work through this lesson will be touring the NC Museum of Art in Raleigh and then returning to school to produce their own art and writing about it. Other lessons about museum visits and post-visit activities can be accessed through the LEARN NC lesson plan database.

This lesson plan was created in a LEARN NC workshop held in Chapel Hill. This workshop was funded by the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics for the purpose of giving teachers the time, energy, and resources to create lesson plans. Using the Ackland Museum in Chapel Hill was an inspiration for helping us to incorporate the elements of arts education into our series of lessons.