The poems of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson are the focus of a unit that asks readers to consider how an artist's life and changes in society influences his or her work. After careful study of Whitman's and Dickinson's perspectives on...

Have you ever listened to a song that had a deeper political meaning to it? Every examined a work of art with layers of meaning? Pupils analyze the drawings of Arthur Szyk. They research the deeper meaning of several artistic cartoons...

Middle and high school learners engage in enameling and apply design elements. They study the history and tradition of Cloisonne. The history of traditional Chinese Cloisonne dates back over 700 years, with the most beautiful, artistic...

Here is a rare example of an art lesson plan which can be used K - 12. Learners view prints of Pop artists. They discuss Pop artists such as Andy Warhol, and Peter Max. They cut tie shapes out of oak tag, and design ties in Pop art...

Shapes in art, shapes in stories, shapes in the environment, shapes all around. A multi-part activity that includes looking at the artist Paul Klee's work, reading books about shapes, taking a walk in the neighborhood and identifying...

Young artists of many ages apply yarn painting techniques in combining their ideas and their art. After viewing actual examples of yarn paintings created by the Huichol people, learners choose an important scene from their own lives...

Middle schoolers study a commercial art form and explore its historic and social meaning. They apply linear color to a shape, bending and forming the lines in much the same way a sign artist would form glass tubing. They design their own...

Older artists create 2-dimensional surfaces with paint, then use these paintings as the components of a 3-dimensional sculpture. They assemble a free-standing sculpture that may be viewed from any angle by using wire to create the shape....

Students investigate how artists create a story that provides a message or provokes emotions in a single image. The ways in which the composition of a painting contributes to telling the story or conveying the message is examined in this...

Students explore and analyze how the human face is proportioned and explore ways artists use mathematics to make art. They demonstrate the basic face proportions by creating a reference sketch and illustrating visual clues to communicate...

Students create "assemblage boxes" displaying representations of themselves and the importance they see in their own lives. This middle school level lesson emphasizes the art of American artist Sarah Goodridge who has success in the...

Young scholars discuss Scholastic Art Magazine issue on 'Artists Today' . They participate in a class discussion & watch a demonstration on the use of 'found objects' and ordinary materials (i.e. paper towels, leaves) to create...

The cut-up technique invented by surrealist artist Tristan Tzara is the focus for today. Young artists examine the technique and analyze its use in relation to expressing and viewing the world. They then use a newspaper to create a...

Music, art, and poetry coalesce in a single exhibition, and in a single lesson. Critical thinkers analyze the Fluxus art movement as it's seen in the work of Paul Chan's 7 Lights. They consider the use of poetry and music in his...

Students examine a piece of art to find objects and symbols used by the artist. In this visual art lesson, students look at Jaun Quick-to-See Smith's, "Trade Canoe for Don Quixote." They look for symbols and items that show the artists...

Students investigate shapes in art. In this visual arts lesson, students examine the ancient Panamanian "Plaque" and identify the geometric shapes in the art piece. Students combine basic shapes to make an artistic picture of their own.

Being a good artist means being able to critique your own work. Here young painters will take a short quiz on color schemes in acrylic painting and then reflect on their use of color in a recently completed piece. A great worksheet for...

What does it mean to rebuild and recover after a major event? Your class will explore this theme while they discuss and discover the events surrounding September 11. They will also look at other examples and then create art pieces that...

Students compare and contrast various forms of artistic expression associated with specific groups of people, geographic regions, or time periods, specifically art of Andean cultures, and create art works using procedures borrowed from...

Explore the life and painting style of African-American artist Horace Pippin by looking carefully at its parts, then create a "secret number" painting for a classroom counting book.

Mathematicians utilize artwork to help illustrate the major ideas of transformations and tessellations. They visually identify transformations including reflections, rotations, and translations. They discuss how artists have used...

Artists of all ages construct a three-dimensional form and fill it with rice to make gentle, percussive sounds. They discover that Native South American tribesmen would harvest dead branches from cactus plants, fill them with small...

Young artists of all ages create texture using dried slabs of pourable acrylic paint. They experiment with texture by turning a liquid into a solid and finally into a 3-D work of art. This lesson plan uses easy-to-find materials, and the...

Elementary, middle, and high schoolers design canvas folding screens; much like the ones that are so prevalent in Asian homes. Be warned that this art lesson requires a lot of materials, so it will be expensive to implement. However, the...