NARRATIVE NECKLACES
Learning Description
This lesson will give students an opportunity to tell a personal narrative through collage art. The narrative collage will incorporate images, colors, symbols and text to help describe each element of the story. Students will then use their narrative collage art to write their personal narratives. Students will be using several modern masters as inspiration, such as Michel Basquiat, Karen Michels and Robert Rauschenberg.
Learning Targets
"I Can" Statements
“I Can…”
- I can tell a personal narrative using symbolism through the artform of collage.
- I can tell a personal narrative through writing that includes the elements of a story and meets grade level criteria.
Essential Questions
- How can a visual art lesson based on art history become a teaching tool for language arts?
- How can we tell a story through art?
Georgia Standards
Curriculum Standards
Kindergarten:
ELAGSEKW3 Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to narrate a single event or several loosely linked events, tell about the events in the order in which they occurred, and provide a reaction to what happened.
Grade 1:
ELAGSE1W3 Write narratives in which they recount two or more appropriately sequenced events, include some details regarding what happened, use temporal words to signal event order, and provide some sense of closure.
Arts Standards
Kindergarten:
VAK.CR.1 Engage in the creative process to generate and visualize ideas by using subject matter and symbols to communicate meaning.
VAK.CR.2 Create works of art based on selected themes.
VAK.CR.3 Understand and apply media, techniques, and processes of two-dimensional art.
VAK.CN.2 Integrate information from other disciplines to enhance the understanding and production of works of art.
Grade 1:
VA1.CR.1 Engage in the creative process to generate and visualize ideas by using subject matter and symbols to communicate meaning.
VA1.CR.2 Create works of art based on selected themes.
VA1.CR.3 Understand and apply media, techniques, and processes of two-dimensional art.
VA1.CN.2 Integrate information from other disciplines to enhance the understanding and production of works of art.
South Carolina Standards
Curriculum Standards
Kindergarten:
ELA.K.C.3.1 Use a combination of drawing, dictating, and writing to narrate a single event or linked events in a logical order.
Grade 1:
ELA.1.C.3.1 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences. When writing: a. detail events in a logical order using temporal words to signal event order (e.g., before, after); b. include details that describe actions, thoughts, and feelings; and c. provide a sense of ending.
Arts Standards
Anchor Standard 1: I can use the elements and principles of art to create artwork.
Anchor Standard 2: I can use different materials, techniques, and processes to make art.
Anchor Standard 7: I can relate visual arts ideas to other arts disciplines, content areas, and careers.
Key Vocabulary
Content Vocabulary
- Narrative - A story or account of events, experiences, or the like, whether true or fictitious
- Character - A person, animal, or being that plays a role in the narrative of a story
- Plot - A sequence of events that make up the main story in a narrative
Arts Vocabulary
- Art history - The academic discipline that studies the development of painting and sculptural arts; humanistic discipline, humanities, liberal arts; studies intended to provide general knowledge and intellectual skills
- Elements of Art - The elements of art are a commonly used group of aspects of a work of art used in teaching and analysis, in combination with the principles of art.
- Color - An art element with 3 properties: hue, value and intensity; a response to reflected light
- Texture - Texture is the quality of a surface or the way any work of art is represented
- Negative space - The space around and between the subject matter
- Necklace - An ornament worn around the neck.
- Collage - An artistic composition of materials and objects pasted over a surface, often with unifying lines and color
Materials
- Small cardboard tiles with a hole cut out for stringing (several per student)
- Magazines
- Scissors
- Glue
- Oil pastels
- Modge podge sealant
- Paint brushes or sponges to apply modge podge
- Raffia/string/yarn
- Miscellaneous collaging materials like various types of paper and stickers
Instructional Design
Opening/Activating Strategy
- Project an example of a collage artwork, such as a collage by Karen Michel. Ask students to work collaboratively to engage in the See, Think, Wonder Artful Thinking Routine.
- First, students will identify what they see in the image. Emphasize that they should make objective observations about the image (i.e. physical features, colors, textures, etc.).
- Next, ask students to identify what they think about the image. Emphasize that students should be creating inferences using visual evidence from the image.
- Finally, ask students what they wonder about the image.
- Facilitate a class-wide discussion around students’ observations, inferences, and questions.
- Explain to students that this is an example of collage art. Ask students if any of them has made or knows about collage. Explain that a collage is an artistic work made by combining and pasting materials and images over a surface.
Work Session
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- Show students examples of collage art by Basquiat, Michel and Rauschenberg (see links in “Additional Resources”).
- Ask students to compare and contrast the collages. Students should notice how different the artists’ styles are even though they are using the same artform of collage.
- Tell students that they will be making a collage that tells a story.
- Have students brainstorm a personal narrative experience. Provide a prompt, if appropriate, for your students, such as, “my first day of school”. Students will need to establish the main plot points–what happened in the beginning, middle, and end.
- Facilitate a discussion around how pictures, such as illustrations, give us information.
- Draw or project symbols on the board such as a peace sign, a heart, a smiley face, a stop sign, etc. Ask students to tell you what each means. Then, explain that these are all images/symbols that communicate meaning.
- Explain to students that they will be using cardboard tiles and magazine images to represent the beginning, middle, and end of their stories. Each tile will represent something different–one tile for the beginning, one tile for the middle, one tile for the end, etc.
- Have students brainstorm with a partner how they could represent each of their plot points using visuals.
- Pass out cardboard tiles that will function as pendants on their necklaces. Have students write their names on their tiles.
- Students will be given magazines and will cut out images and symbols that represent each part of their narratives.
- Students will glue these images onto their tiles.
- Tell students that negative space in art is the area around the subject matter, or the “empty space”. Students will look at the negative space in their work and fill it with color, textured papers, or text, so that no cardboard is showing.
- Students will complete their collaged pieces by adding a touch of oil pastel to the edges, giving the pieces a border, and seal with a modge podge (or watered down glue mixture).
- Students will then string their completed pieces onto yarn or raffia, creating a wearable piece of artwork. Remind students to think about sequencing as they choose the order in which they string their collage tiles.
- Show students examples of collage art by Basquiat, Michel and Rauschenberg (see links in “Additional Resources”).
- Optional: Allow students to add additional decorative elements, such as pony beads, wooden beads, or buttons to give their necklaces more character.
- Once students have completed their necklaces, each student will write their narrative in paragraph form. Narrative writing should meet the grade level standards criteria.
Closing Reflection
Allow students to share their personal narratives with each other, using their necklaces as part of their presentation.
Assessments
Formative
Teachers will assess students’ understanding of the content throughout the lesson by observing students’ participation in the activator, discussion of collage as an artform, discussion of the purpose of illustration and the parts of a plot, artmaking process, and conferencing with students during the writing process.
Summative
CHECKLIST
- Students can tell a personal narrative using symbolism through the artform of collage.
- Students can tell a personal narrative through writing that includes the elements of a story and meets grade level criteria.
DIFFERENTIATION
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Acceleration:
Remediation:
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ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
*This integrated lesson provides differentiated ideas and activities for educators that are aligned to a sampling of standards. Standards referenced at the time of publishing may differ based on each state’s adoption of new standards.
Ideas contributed by: Debi West, Drew Brown, and Katy Betts. Technology by: Ramsey Ray.
Revised and copyright: July 2024 @ ArtsNOW