Art Appreciation Lesson and Handout

Objective: To engage students in thinking and discussion using art.

Student Development:

• Thinking
  
• Analysis
  
• Communicating thoughts, feelings and opinions
  
• Learning to appreciate art. (It might not be something you want to put on your wall, however can you see why it has value?)
  
• Fostering open mindedness
  

In November last year I wrote about art appreciation and Chicago's Concordia University art lessons. At the time I was using the art lessons with a weekly group of grade sevens I taught during the school's weekly "English Corner".  Since the art appreciation lessons were so well received with the grade sevens I decided to introduce the lessons to my grade eight class in the second term of the school year.  I selected several pieces from the Concordia lessons and had them printed on card stock to use as handouts, which would then be put on the wall as a collection of pieces we had looked at.  Each lesson started with a brief introduction of the piece where I would give the title, artist's name and the date it was created.  Then, showing the piece on a projector and providing one printed on card stock, students were asked to fill in the attached handout and start to analyze the piece.  I encouraged students to get up and walk around the room, viewing the piece from different angles.  The handout provided prompts to guide student's thinking.  At the bottom of the handout I asked students to consider their feelings when they look at the piece and why they think it was created.  After about 25mins I would provide students with biographical and historical information about the artist and the piece.  To conclude the lesson we would have a class discussion about the piece, discussing points from the handout and exploring thoughts and opinions of the peice.

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Art Appreciation Handout
File Size:	44 kb
File Type:	pdf

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