1 st Grade Painting Unit By Haley Wulfman
Un it Overview The 1st grade tempera painting unit begins by inviting the students to demonstrate their ability to set up, care for, and put away materials—all things they learned in their painting unit the year prior. From here, we move into a series of explorations that challenge students in a variety of ways—to explore foundational concepts about the medium, to problem-solve, and to develop their capacity for flexible thinking. In the final lesson of the unit, students consider how these learnings can be applied to investigate subjects that are personally meaningful to them, demonstrating their mastery of unit objectives. Students are also introduced to works of art by various artists. They examine line through the work of Stuart Davis, and color through the work of Wassily Kandinsky. Artist connections toward the end of the unit are selected based on the lesson theme, and the students’ natural interests.
Enduring Understandings • Artists can use their materials to make meaning. • Artists can examine ideas and the world around them in a painting. • Every artist has their own vision and creative potential. • Artists can solve questions and open-ended prompts with a variety of solutions. Unit O bjectives • Students demonstrate that they can independently gather, care for, and put away materials. • Students will learn that when we paint, we work to fill spaces with areas of color. • Students understand that they can use a variety of lines and shapes in their paintings. • Students understand that choosing a large or small paintbrush will allow them to make a large or small mark, and that different brushes can be used when working on one painting. • Students understand that many colors of paint can be mixed from the primary colors, black, and white. • Students learn that colors of paint can be mixed on a palette before they are used in a painting. • Students develop critique skills; they examine artworks using the See-Think-Wonder routine, and use art vocabulary to describe choices while making art and during share. Essential Q uestions • How do painters care for and maintain painting materials? • How is painting distinct as a form of artmaking? • What can we show with many colors? • How can paint be used to examine our ideas, things we know, or things we imagine? Vocabulary • Brushstroke: marks made with the bristles of a paintbrush • Color M ixing: blending two or more colors together to create a new color • Palette: a place where painters mix their colors before they use them in their painting
As the final experience of the Kindergarten painting unit, students arrive to class to find that the tables have been flipped up and now stand tall, like easels. Each table is covered in brown paper, and features a large, ambiguous black mark. What are we going to do! There is a black mark on every paper. Can we still make a painting now? We read “Beautiful Oops” by Barney Saltzberg, in which mistakes become sparks for creative transformations. Students are then asked to consider how they can work together as a team to transform the black mark on their paper using red, yellow, blue, black, and white. Early on in the 1st grade painting unit, when we read “Not A Box” and consider how we can use our brush to transform a rectangle into something entirely different, we remember this last experience in paint—and the students are excited to revisit a similar challenge.
Lesson 1 M aterials • 1/2” flat bristle long-handle paintbrushes • 18x24” gray or colored paper • small cups of white and black paint • water buckets • 14x18” metal trays • 3x4” slightly moist sponges Lesson Objective(s) • Students demonstrate that they can retrieve, care for, and put away painting materials • Students paint without a prompt, providing the teacher with an opportunity to assess the students’ artistic development and knowledge of the medium Activity When the students arrive to class, images of their final partner paintings from the year prior are up on the board, and they are invited to share memories of their experiences working with paint. I noticed that when you walked in the room, your faces lit up with excitement! What do you hope to do with your paints this year? Then, they are called on to work together as a class to teach their teacher how to set up properly for painting. Once they are set up, they use black and white paint on colored paper. The students do not need any prompt; they are excited and curious to explore the possible ways they can use this material. At the end of the lesson, they are welcome to share their works with their peers. This lesson serves a diagnostic function for the teacher. Assessm ent • What routines do students remember, and what needs to be emphasized? • How do students use paint when invited to work freely? Are they most inclined to make marks, lines, or fill spaces? Do they see the paper as a target for material exploration, or do they naturally see it as a continuous surface—a possible space to create images? • Who is inclined to share their work? Do they point, or do they use relevant language?
Lesson 2 M aterials • 1/2” flat bristle long-handle paintbrushes • 18x24” colored paper (red, yellow, or blue) with large brown collaged rectangle • small cups of white, metallic, black paint • water buckets • 14x18” metal trays • 3x4” slightly moist sponges Lesson Objective(s) • Students will demonstrate that they can wash and dry their brush when they are done using a color of paint, and would like to use another color. • By using limited ‘colors’ of paint, students will focus their attention on producing marks, lines, and shapes. These provide the teacher with insight into the students’ ability and artistic development. • Students will develop their capacity for flexible thinking, and experience ways that they can solve open-ended prompts with a variety of solutions. Activity This lesson is designed to foster flexible and imaginative thinking, and to introduce students to basic skills required for painting, such as ways of using a paintbrush and how to switch between colors of tempera paint. Inspired by the book, “Not A Box,” by Antoinette Portis, students are invited to “see beyond,” using black, white, and metallic paint to reveal the identity of a simple brown rectangle—something that, as the rabbit in the book zealously conveys, is “not a box.” The activity of using marks, lines, and shapes to transform a simple shape is the focus of our artistic play. Assessm ent • Was the student able to keep each paint color clean? • What kinds of marks, lines, and shapes does the student naturally create? • Does the student explore their concept through the production of marks, lines, and shapes?
Lesson 3 M aterials • 1/2” flat bristle long-handle paintbrushes • 18x24” white paper • small cups of black paint • water buckets • 14x18” metal trays • 3x4” slightly moist sponges Lesson Objective(s) • Students understand that they can use their brush to create varying types of lines. • Through examining artwork using the See-Think-Wonder routine, students develop visual thinking skills. Vocabulary • Brushstroke: marks made with the bristles of a paintbrush Activity In this lesson, we begin by looking at the painting, Report From Rockport, by Stuart Davis. Using the See-Think-Wonder routine, students examine the painting, and create a list of the various types of lines they notice (zig-zag, curvy, dotted, etc.). Students consider other types of lines they can create, but that might not be found in Davis’ painting. They are then invited to use black paint and a brush to create many different kinds of lines on a large piece of white paper. Class concludes with a kinesthetic game, where students are invited to share a line from their art piece, and then use their body to walk in the style of that line, from their spot in the classroom to the door to line up. Assessm ent • Do paintings reflect a variety of line types?
S tu art D avi s, Report From Rockport, 1940
Lesson 4 M aterials • thin and wide flat bristle long-handle paintbrushes • 18x24” colored paper (red, yellow, blue) with large brown collaged rectangle • cups of red, yellow, blue, and white tempera paint • water buckets • 14x18” metal trays • 3x4” slightly moist sponges Lesson Objective(s) • Students will learn that, as distinguished from drawing, when we paint, we are concerned with creating mass and solid space. • Students understand that many colors of paint can be mixed from red, yellow, blue and white. • Students will learn that there are different sizes of paintbrushes, and make deliberate choices when choosing which size of brush to use. • By examining artwork using the See-Think-Wonder routine, students develop visual thinking skills. Vocabulary • Color Mixing: blending two or more colors together to create a new color • Palette: a place where painters mix their colors before they use them in their painting Activity In this lesson, students are introduced to four new colors they’ll have available during the unit – red, yellow, blue, and white. They are invited to consider what might happen if, for example, a yellow puddle of paint were to bump into a blue puddle. When students arrive to class, they first examine Yellow-Red-Blue by Wassily Kandinsky using the See-Think-Wonder routine. They’ll notice that there are many colors in the painting. Then, I’ll tell them: “You’ve noticed there are many, many colors in this painting, but Kandinsky named his painting, ‘Yellow-Red-Blue.’ This seems like a silly title for a painting with so many colors. What might he have been trying to tell us?” We read the book, Mouse Paint, by Ellen Stoll Walsh. Then, we pull out our paintings from last class, and students are invited to fill spaces around their lines with color, noticing what happens when two colors meet. At the end of class, during the wrap-up, we note how they’ve created new colors, and used these colors to create solid spaces. This is painting. This lesson usually takes place over two or three classes. On the second day, after noticing some of the colors that were mixed, I demonstrate how to use a palette, and we discuss its function. Later during the class (or on the third day), I hold up two different size paintbrushes and ask, “How are these brushes different from one another? How might their brushstrokes look different?” A student is selected to demonstrate creating the same mark with each paintbrush, and we notice how the two marks are different. Then, we recall how there were some spots in their paintings that were hard to fill with the brush they used last time. They consider: As you go back into your painting, how could having two different sized brushes help you today? Assessment • • •
How many different colors do students create? Do students make careful choices about brush size? Do students fill spaces with color?
W assily K a nd insky, Yellow-Red-Blue, 1925
Lesson 5 M aterials • thin and wide flat bristle long-handle paintbrushes • 18x24” white paper • cups of red, yellow, blue, black and white tempera paint • water buckets • 14x18” metal trays • 3x4” slightly moist sponges Lesson Objective(s) • Students demonstrate that they can independently gather, care for, and put away materials. • Students fill spaces with areas of color. • Students use a variety of lines and shapes in their paintings. • Students choose a large or small paintbrush when intending to make a large or small mark, and use two different brush sizes when working on one painting. • Students mix many colors of paint from red, yellow, blue, black, and white, and mix colors on a palette before they are used in a painting. • Students demonstrate critique skills; they examine artworks using the See-Think-Wonder routine, and use art vocabulary to describe choices while making art and during share. Activity Students create paintings sparked by questions that invite them to examine things they’re interested in, know about, or imagine. The theme for these artworks varies based on the students’ interests, experiences, or what they’re learning in the classroom. The questions and visualization sequence help students think deeply about their idea, and how they can use what they know about paint to express and explore it. Spark questions for the lesson might include: • What do you do when it rains? • What pet do you have or wish for? • Where do you play with your friend, indoors or outdoors? • Where might bugs or birds go to rest? See examples below. Assessm ent • Does the student choose either a large or small brush, depending on the type of mark they’re trying to make? • Does their work show spaces filled with color? • Does the student mix colors together on their palette before using applying in their painting?
Spark Question: Where might a bird or a bug go to rest? This lesson was inspired by the class’s multiple experiences in the school garden. They enjoyed digging down underground to plant seeds, and had taken time to notice the kinds of creatures that came to spend time in the garden.
Artist Conn ection: Lawrence Lebduska’s paintings of animals in environments
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Spark Question: What happens outside when it rains? A particularly rainy series of days inspired this spark question.
Artist Conn ection: various paintings depicting ways of showing weather
El Greco, View of Toledo
Vincent Van Gogh, Starry Night
Gustave Caillebotte, Paris Street in the Rain
Spark Question: How might we show our family members all together in one painting? This lesson supported a classroom unit on family.
Artist Conn ection: Two paintings of people together (partial body, full body)
Thomas Gainsborough
Pablo Picasso