School of Criticism Lesson Plan

Teacher: Brielle Romney
Criticism in Schools
Lesson MATERIALS:
Ribbon glue
Magazines paper
Small containers
Scissors
-Bring in magazines, have them decide what is beautiful and ugly and tell why-Prompt: What makes art good or bad?-What is art criticism: explain, interpret, and evaluate artworks by writing or speaking “We can then look at an artwork and use the inherent qualities as a basis for judgment.”
-What is it NOT: expressing random feelings, stating personal preferences-4 styles of art-4 stages of criticism
-Divide class into 4 groups with 1 painting from each genre, they figure out what genre it is and then try to persuade the class to buy it based on the inherent aesthetic qualities they’ve been taught, rest of class guess what art style it is based on selling points of presenters
-Critics:
-Past vs. Present Critics
-Relation to Language Arts
-Activity
– “art criticism containers”
- need a small container (with a completely removable lid), ribbon, scissors, paper, glue, pictures or anything else wanted.- to make: glue a long piece of ribbon on the inside bottom, and bottom of the lid of the container. Cut pieces of paper that will fit into the shape of the container, and glue to either side of the ribbon. Put pictures, poems, notes, ANYTHING on paper glued to the ribbon. It should kind of “fold out” when you open the container
ENDINGNow ½ way to being a critic b/c you know the 4 questions to ask, now just need to learn more art history

STATE STANDARDS
Standard 3The student will choose and evaluate artistic subject matter, themes, symbols, ideas, meanings, and purposes.
Objective 1 Explore possible content in art prints or works of art.
• Select themes or symbols appropriate for describing an idea or personal experience in art.
• Group artists and their works according to style or similar visual characteristics.Objective 2 Discuss, evaluate, and choose symbols, ideas, subject matter, meanings, and purposes for artworks.
• Evaluate a significant work or works in terms of craftsmanship, concepts, objectives, creativity, beauty now, and beauty when it was created.
• Create a work of art portraying an object or animal important to the student.

LANGUAGE ARTS
Standard 7 Comprehension
-Students understand, interpret, and analyze narrative and informational grade level text.
Objective 1 Identify purposes of text.
a. Identify purpose for reading.
b. Identify author’s purpose.
Objective 2 Apply strategies to comprehend text.
• Relate prior knowledge to make connections to text (e.g., text to text, text, to self, text to world).
• Generate questions about text (e.g., factual, inferential, evaluative).
• Form mental pictures to aid understanding of text.
Objective 3Recognize and use features of narrative and informational text.
• Identify characters, setting, sequence of events, problem/resolution.
• Compare and contrast elements of different genres: fairy tales, poems, realistic fiction, fantasy, fables, folk tales, tall tales, biographies, historical fiction, science fiction).
• Identify information from text, headings, subheadings, diagrams, charts, captions, graphs, table of contents, index, and glossary.
Identify different structures in text (e.g., description, problem/solution, compare/contrast, cause/effect, order of importance, time, geographic classification).

Comment by Amanda Morgan
This lesson was so great! I really liked how you girls took quotes and notes from the book! Great idea! If I were to adapt this and make it my own lesson I would try and use more criticism in the lesson. We criticize people all the time and I would want the children to realize what they are doing. I would plan an activity where they were given different pieces of art work or clothing or music and I would have them write down their first impression of it. I would then go into the lesson part bringing in quotes about criticism and how we should and shouldn't judge them. I want them to realize that they can appreciate the piece of art before any criticism comes out of their mouths.Loved the activity as well! It has turned out to be so cute!

Comment by Nichole Mahas
Loved your lesson. I think i would have the art project the students create at the end involve criticism. I would have them create a work of art using a certain medium, and then have them criticize their own art work. They would share the basis for their criticisms with the whole class. With older grades I might even have them criticize each other's work just for the experience of interpreting the meaning of other's works.

Comment by Brittany Crowder
this lesson was really good! i really liked how you showed us magazines we could relate to (bridal magazines, haha) and asked us what we thought was beautiful, and then you critiqued it. i think i could make this lesson my own by bringing in different children's magazines or even different toys and asking them what they think are beautiful or what they think is art.

Comment by Kim Brown
I loved the project for this lesson! It is a creative project that sets up anybody for success. To add to this lesson, I would love to have a discussion on constructive criticism and its importance in reviewing, analyzing, and improving our own work, skills or behavior. I also would like to use Nicole's idea of letting the students have a hand in being their own art critics.

Comment by Brooke Stevenson
I would like to discuss how our perception of beauty has changed throughout history and look at art to go along with that. It would also be interesting to look at how standards for beauty change from culture to culture. Then the students could write about what they learned and make their own art that they believe is beautiful. They could compile these and bind them as a book that they could keep.

Comment by Brett Baldry
I really liked this lesson. I think this would apply very well to kids. I thought it would be fun to use this in a self confidence lesson. I think it would be fun to show kids that it is okay to be different and that different people view different things as being beautiful. We just need to find what our own beautiful is.

Comment by Jessica Morgan
great lesson! I really liked when we looked at our paintings and had to categorize them according to the different schools of criticism. I would like to take my class on a field trip to a local museum or art gallery and have them look at the different art works. We could judge each piece according to the different criticisms and then judge them from our own perspectives.

Comment by Natalee Biggs
Great work girls! I loved the art project we did at the end of the lesson. I think it could be applied to any subject. The students could use the containers to show what they have learned at the end of a unit by creating pictures and describing them on the back. Criticism is very prevalent in our everyday lives and it is important that we teach our students not to judge things too quickly. The teacher can help her students by teaching them how to evaluate and then letting them form their own opinions. In history lessons the teacher should show all sides to a conflict and let the students decide what they agree with. The class could have a food criticism day where they try many different foods and write down how they taste, feel, smell, ect. The teacher would lead the class in judging each element. At the end the students would choose their favorite food of the choices and describe why it was their favorite. The students would then write a poem or a paragraph describing the food they chose using creative words and language. The class could also have a discussion about first impressions and how we shouldn’t let them keep us from pursuing new things or meeting new people.

Comment by Nayelli Concha
I learned a lot from this lesson! It was really great!I think that for my lesson I would have a discussion about what criticism is and how we can apply it in our lives. I would also talk to them about positive and negative criticism and what are the consequences of each respective type of criticism. People see things differently and I like to think that every person has their own pair of glasses which have been formed from their own life experiences, family, culture, gender, etc. For a cool activity, I would ask the children to explore their own glasses and make a list, a web or have an assignment about what unique experiences have shaped their own pair of glasses and they way they see things. Along with that, I would have a discussion about how our differences make us unique and special in this world.For another activity I would ask the kids to think about something that they don't like.. It can be food, a person, a game, etc.. and try to get out of their comfort zone and get involve in an activity where they can find as many things as they can about that object, food or person and see if this activity can change they way they think about the object, food or person that they choose.

Comment by Brielle Romney
If I were to teach this lesson again, I would probably take more time on teaching kids the fundamentals and basics of critiquing. I know we went over it, but with more time, it would help the kids to have more of a basis on critiquing, so they can see the importance of it, and the importance of backing up their views with basic fundamentals and viewpoints. i think the kids will really enjoy critiquing, I just want to make sure they do it semi-credentially

Comment by Rachael Haught
I really enjoyed this lesson! I liked when you challenged everyone's opinion about what they believed to be beautiful. I would really like to take the kiddos to a musuem to see what has been a standard of good art past and present

Comment by Karyn Alvey
Great Job girls! I really liked your lesson. The craft at the end was so creative. I want to make a bunch for friends and family. :) I loved it. An idea for an adaption of this lesson could be to include history. While learning about wars/different events, you could talk about the decisions people made and the consequences that resulted. While discussing, you could ask the students what they would do if they were in the situation. Would they do a similar thing or would they do something different? Great job girlies!

Comment by Rachael Haught
I thought the snack was so creative for this activity. I think that I would have the students learn some basics of line, texture, shape, etc in order to have a foundation in art basics. Then I think I would have the students pretend they were art critics based on the things they had learned. I would set up different works from various artists and have them explain what is good art and what is bad. They then have to defend their critiques. I would wrap up the lesson with the idea that different art is not bad art and there are many types or media that can be used to create.I might even have them take their favorite media (paint, paper, play doh, candy) and have them make their own piece of art work and defend why it is good art.

Comment by Ellen Funch
I think a cool tangent of this lesson would be to have each child pick a culture or a people from any country in the world, either their own heritage or a culture they don't know about, and have them research what is beautiful. I would have them make a collage of what their chosen culture saw as beautiful and have them present it to the class. It would be really cool to hear about that many different cultures and how each of them criticize beauty in a different way!

Comment by Mandy Turner
To improve on this lesson plan, I would take more time to cover the different critiquing criteria throughout history. This would go perfectly with teaching world history. As kids were learning about certain times, events, and people, I could place renown pictures from that time and teach the kids why they were so well accepted. Also, maybe connect the criticism skills they have learned to the activity in a bit more practical way.The class could look at food and critique it using all of their senses. They can discuss why the same food prepared different ways can have opposite results. This could lead in to a discussion on any literature the class is reading. Their responses will be better founded now that they have a better basis for critiquing.

Comment by Nancy
This was a great lesson. It would be really fun to teach the kids about criticism of artwork and when it is okay and not okay to criticize. I think that it would be a good idea to have the kids practice being critics and look at different famous pieces because they would probably really enjoy that.

Comment by Tiffany Baum
Well for me I wasn't able to come to class when this lesson was presented, but from reading the lesson plan, I think one thing that I would add or do differently would be would to be that I would give the students a theme, for their containers.