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K–12 teaching and learning · from the UNC School of Education

Thanksgiving cornucopia

Students will create a cornucopia using pages from magazines to cut the fruit, vegetables, and nuts to fill the cornucopia.

A lesson plan for grades 3–4 Visual Arts Education

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Learning outcomes

Students will:

  • relate specific symbols to specific holidays.
  • learn that art doesn’t have to be perfect to be good.
  • understand that something can be created using one’s own visions.

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

90 minutes

Materials/resources

  • A large picture of a cornucopia basket run on brown construction paper.
  • Magazines that students can tear out pages (National Geographic work great because the colors are so vivid).
  • scissors
  • glue
  • piece of 9×12 black construction paper to glue basket onto.

Technology resources

None

Pre-activities

  • Discuss secular and religious holidays and holiday symbols.
  • Discuss how Thanksgiving is celebrated as a holiday in in the U.S., and the significance, customs, and symbols of Thanksgiving.
  • Discuss the significance of the cornucopia.
  • Discuss the different kinds of fruits, vegetables and nuts that might go into the cornucopia.

Activities

  1. The teacher will give each student a copy of a cornucopia basket and show them how to cut it out.
  2. The students will position the basket on a black sheet of consturction paper so the students will have something to glue the fruit and vegetables onto.
  3. Give each student an old magazine. Stress to them that they are looking for colors, not fruits and vegetables. Demonstrate by choosing a colored page (maybe red) and ask students what fruits or vegetables are red in color. Have the students actually cut from the page a fruit (apple) or vegetable (tomato, pepper) to put into the basket. Discuss overlapping as they place the fruits and vegetables in the basket.
  4. Point out that it is all right for the page to have writing or even pictures on it so long as the color is correct.
  5. Students will continue to find pages with the necessary color for cutting out the shape of a fruit or vegetable to go into the cornucopia.
  6. Students may cut all the fruits and vegetables first or may glue them into the basket as they cut.

Assessment

The finished cornucopia will determine student’s achievement.

Supplemental information

I show my students an example of a completed project so they can actually see what one looks like.

Comments

I’ve used this project with both 3rd and 4th grade students when discussing the holiday Thanksgiving and its significance to us as Americans.

North Carolina curriculum alignment

Visual Arts Education (2001)

Grade 3

  • Goal 1: The learner will develop critical and creative thinking skills and perceptual awareness necessary for understanding and producing art.
    • Objective 1.02: Apply knowledge and concepts gained across the curriculum as a source of ideas for art.
    • Objective 1.03: Select color both for emotional appeal and realism.

Grade 4

  • Goal 1: The learner will develop critical and creative thinking skills and perceptual awareness necessary for understanding and producing art.
    • Objective 1.02: Create work which approaches a higher level of realism.

  • North Carolina Essential Standards

    • Visual Arts Education (2010)

      • Grade 3

        • 3.V.3 Create art using a variety of tools, media, and processes, safely and appropriately. 3.V.3.1 Understand how a single tool can be manipulated in multiple ways, safely and appropriately. 3.V.3.2 Use a variety of media with refined skills. 3.V.3.3 Create...

      • Grade 4

        • 4.V.3 Create art using a variety of tools, media, and processes, safely and appropriately. 4.V.3.1 Apply a variety of methods of manipulating a single tool, safely and appropriately. 4.V.3.2 Compare characteristics of a variety of media. 4.V.3.3 Create art...