Curated OER
Twisted Tales
Experience how a story can drastically change when the point of view is altered. Young scholars first read a review of Disney's film Tarzan, focusing on how the point of view in the classic story is important. They then select...
Curated OER
Critical Path
Students widen their understanding of the different points of view surrounding current news topics. They research a current controversy on which public opinion is divided and write a concise commentary on the topic expressing a strong...
Curated OER
Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart: Teaching Through the Novel
Students are introduced to Chinua Achebe's first novel and to his views on the role of the writer in his or her society. It can be used alone or in conjunction with the related lesson Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart.
Curated OER
Where's the Point?: Two-Point Perspective in Texas Bird's-Eye Views
Students investigate how the Texas bird's-eye-view artists used two-point perspective to create their aerial views and consider the directions from which the artists oriented their views. They produce two drawings in tow-point perspective.
Curated OER
A Modest Proposal: Irony Made Understandable with Rock and Roll
Who doesn't love music? Poems and songs will engage your high school class in a discussion about irony. Use songs like "Rockin' in the Free World" or "Born in the U.S.A." to illustrate the ironic point of view. Print the lyrics so...
Digital Public Library of America
Women and the Blues
A 12-piece primary source packet sets the tone for a study of the role women played in the origins, development, and impact of blues music. Legends like Bessie Smith, Gertrude "Ma" Rainey, Mamie Smith, and Ida Cox are featured, as are...
Digital Public Library of America
A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry
A set of 14 primary sources provides background for a study of Lorraine Hansberry's drama, A Raisin in the Sun. Featured are images from stage productions of the play, white supremacy protests, a clip from a television interview, and...
Curated OER
Shaping the View: Composition Basics
Students view images from the Metropolitan Museum of Art web site, and list the objects and figures in the image. They discuss the way their eyes move around the canvas and take note of where their eyes fall, follow and finish. Students...
Curated OER
Framing and Point of View
Students identify three types of camera shots. They discover that how a subject is framed affects the meaning of the photo.
Curated OER
Repeat After Me: Repetition in the Visual Arts
High schoolers explore one of the techniques artists often use to highlight important elements within a painting's composition and to move a viewer's eye around the canvass from highpoint to highpoint.
National Gallery of Canada
Designing Balance
Teach your artists how to incorporate balance into their work through discussion and action. After viewing and discussing several works of art, learners design a balanced image for a T-shirt and follow the step-by-step instructions to...
Curated OER
The Story of an Old Piano
Students read excerpts from The Story of an Old Piano. They choose a personal object and write paragraphs from the object's point of view. Their stories can be bound for the class library.
Curated OER
All the News That's Fit to Blog
Students critique three Web logs, each of which offers first-hand accounts, but reflect different points-of-view, on the war in Iraq; students write a response to one of the entries and analyze what they learned about the war from the...
Curated OER
Shaping the View: Composition Basics
Learners examine the elements of composition in various artworks. They analyze and discuss paintings, explore "The National Gallery of Art" website, identify the shape of compositions in paintings, and draw a diagram.
Curated OER
American Genre Painting in the Nineteenth Century: Teaching Artistic Interpretation as a Tool for Critically Viewing History
Students view a variety of artwork to determine the history and lifestyle of people from New Haven, Connecticut. In groups, they develop their individual hypothesis about why the paintings were created and share them with their group...
Curated OER
For Public Display
Students compare three works of art to understand how juxtaposition can express a point of view. They brainstorm topics of interest to them and their respective communities that could act as a springboard for curating individual exhibits...
Curated OER
Film Festival: Documentaries for Hispanic Heritage Month
In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, the New York Times provides links to five short documentary films depicting Hispanic themes and culture. Learners can click on each embedded link to view the films, then answer each set of related...
Curated OER
Official Statements
Students research the viewpoints of famous Americans, and then write commencement speeches reflecting these viewpoints to be delivered to high school graduates of today.
Curated OER
Shaping the View: Composition Basics
Students are introduced to the concept of composition in visual art. They examine various compositional structures and practice identifying the focus of various pieces of art.
Curated OER
Escher-Esque Tessellations
Middle and high schoolers participate in a seven-part lesson plan creating Escher-Esque tessellations. They demonstrate their knowledge of geometric transformations after viewing a PowerPoint presentation, conducting Internet research,...
Curated OER
The Sundance Kids
Students discuss independent filmmaking industry, focusing on the 2000 Sundance Film Festival. As a class, students develop a storyboard for their own independent film, then write movie reviews from the point of view of a film critic on...
Curated OER
Revolutionary Advertising?
Students explore and examine the 40th anniversary of Ernesto Che Guevara's execution and his image as an international symbol of revolutionary values. They then interpret the iconic Che image from a variety of different points of view....
Curated OER
Advanced Art – Cultural Place-setting Still life
Upper graders view a series of films that depict rituals or celebrations as they occur in different cultural settings. They conduct a cultural investigation about one culture, brainstorm and research objects that have cultural or...
Curated OER
Prepositions
Elementary schoolers view and study ten pictures of the location of a ball adjacent to a box. They decide where the ball is and match it to its appropriate preposition on the right. A good language arts lesson!