Art Educators of New Jersey
Exploring Eric Carle’s Painted Collage
Where does inspiration come from? Where do writers get their ideas? What about visual artists? A PowerPoint and a video introduce middle schoolers to children's author and illustrator Eric Carle and how he found inspiration in the work...
Curated OER
Life Skill Communication
Students use digital camera to document the needs for daily living. In this life skills and visual arts lesson, students create class books that include photographs of everyday objects that they use in their home, school and...
Curated OER
African Ceramic Mask Making
Students investigate a variety of African mask types, design several masks, and create an example of an African ceramic mask in this 5th grade through High School Art lesson. The lesson can take anywhere from 6 lessons to 16 lessons.
Curated OER
Getting to Know You
Students participate in tactile and visual exploration. In this tactile and visual exploration lesson, students listen to John Archambault's, Grandmother's Garden, and sing the song, "Friends Are Like Flowers." They participate in ice...
Curated OER
Childhood Lost: Child Labor in the United States, 1830-1930
Working in groups, middle and high schoolers describe and discuss photographs depicting working conditions experienced by child laborers in the 19th century. They then write a persuasive paragraph supporting an amendment to regulate the...
J. Paul Getty Trust
Exhibiting Common Threads
Artists working in different media often explore the same themes—to model how these same themes weave their way through different forms of artistic expression, scholars analyze images by Dorothea Lange, identifying key themes in her...
PBS
Production
Class members investigate the different roles associated with video production. Then, they create a crash course booklet that details what they have learned about the different roles: video production, scouting locations and set up,...
Curated OER
About Life: The Photographs of Dorothea Lange Going to the Promised Land
To better understand the migrant experience during the Great Depression, pupils analyze two primary resources: photographs by Dorothea Lange and a U.S. Map that shows the Dust Bowl. They compare and contrast Lange's images to Steinbeck's...
Curated OER
Creating an Original Opera
This may be a lot to ask of a high schooler, but then again, who knows? Pupils work in groups to explore, write, and then perform an original opera. They view versions of The Magic Flute and La Traviata, then compose a plot, characters,...
Curated OER
Evaluating Information on Food Labels
What kinds of foods include corn? Corn syrup? Start by viewing a clip of Food Inc. with your middle or high schoolers. Then, study a list of corn-derived ingredients, encouraging your class to see how many food products contain corn. A...
Curated OER
Telling Our Own Stories
Explore online profiles and social media with your middle and high school classes. Use blogs to inspire your class to craft a well-written, thoughtful response to a prompt you give. A few example prompts are given.
Curated OER
Name That Tune
Integrating technology and music can be a snap with lessons like this one! Kids in a junior high band class took to the Internet to download and practice playing their instrument with a computer generated back up band. They practice...
Curated OER
Let's Meet Famours Painters!
Students demonstrate an understanding of art terms and concepts by analyzing and interpreting visual art forms that are paintings from world cultures. They practice art criticism after working on vocabulary.
Curated OER
Life size figures - Moveable Murals
Learners create life-size human figures and decorate them in a collage style with torn colored pieces of pictures from magazines. They display them around the school, creating life-size murals.
Curated OER
Breaking the Chains: Rising Out of Circumstances
Study history through photographs. In this visual arts and history activity, students learn to analyze photographs to discover details about life during the Civil War era. Students write journal entries as if they are the...
Curated OER
Portrait of Nadine Dumas
Students explore a portrait and then create their own portrait as a gift. In this bust art lesson, students use model techniques to create a three dimensional bust portrait. Students analyze the elements of the design...
Curated OER
Editorial Cartoon Lesson Plan
Students consider the role of editorial cartoons on American politics. In this editorial cartoons lesson, students discover the history of the cartoons in America, analyze some cartoons, and then draw their own cartoons that make social...
Curated OER
Creating a Personal Symbol
Middle schoolers inquire about visual arts by creating an artistic etching. In this symbolism activity, students identify the work of Keith Haring by researching the web and analyzing images. Middle schoolers utilize linoleum or wood to...
Curated OER
Soliloquy Performances
Students investigate soliloquies. In this performing arts lesson, students discuss figurative language within soliloquies and then perform a soliloquy to the rest of the class.
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Descriptive Drawings - Pen and Ink - Art with Text
Students create a pen and ink drawing using words to determine values choosing a work with high emotional content and incorporating words that describe the picture's content placing words together tighter, made bolder, etc. to achieve...
Curated OER
Picture This: Bookmaking as a Visual Experience
Students examine artwork to view how artists use objects, symbols and elements of art to tell life stories. They create personal journals while learning the art of bookmaking using a variety of creative materials.
Curated OER
Haring Art Truck
Young scholars are introduced to the work of Keith Haring and graffiti art in general. They work together to design and paint a car imitating Keith Haring's style.
Curated OER
Arm and Face Casts - body art
Students study African masks. They also study African American Art and look for its influence in Modern Art. They research and design their own culture.
Curated OER
Where journalism meets art
Students pick out the different techniques in photographs taken. In this photographs lesson plan, students critique patterns, shadows, reflections, and more in the photographs.