Elementary Folk Art and Australian Aboriginal Dot Art/ Pointillism Unit
In my elementary placement, I taught grades 3-5. This unit was for my 3rd graders. I was very fortunate to be with them from the start of the school year until almost Halloween.
I chose to combine two mini-units into one project. The first part was centered around folk art, specifically watercolor, and I used a local watercolor artist to show the students what it’s all about. Local art is very important to me, and being in my hometown, I wanted to showcase some of the local art scene that I’ve been apart of for many years. I used images from the Folk Art Guild and talked to the students about these key characteristics of folk art:
Daily life/ In the home
Any Media
Cultural
I talked the students through a slideshow presentation, found here, and then we did some guided practice with watercolors. I made a video of myself practicing these techniques. After we went through each technique, I played the video on repeat for the students while I circulated the room.
This is a student example of our guided practice. They loved the masking tape technique.
After our guided practice, we brainstormed for our watercolor paintings. These were also going to double as the covers for their sketchbook journals, so they were pretty important. We talked about the things that make us who we are. Our favorite foods, favorite parts of our walks home, our pets, a sport we play or love to watch, etc. and I showed my example of a watercolor painting of my mule, Dolly. Some of their watercolor paintings are below:
Once we had our watercolor paintings done, it was time for step 2!
I shifted their focus to Aboriginal Dot Art and Pointillism. I combined the two into one lesson, and showed them a slideshow presentation with information about both, which you can find here.
Our guided practice page for this step looked like this:
This is my example. The students had to practice at least 1 dot art and at least 1 pointillism on the shapes they chose. I also asked them to label which technique they used.
After guided practice, the students were then tasked with (drumroll: they didn’t know this ahead of time) adding onto their watercolor paintings with tempera paint, Q-tips, and a bunch of knowledge of Pointillism and Aboriginal dot art!
