Name: Ashley Cox

Class: LTC 8740 Curriculum in Art Education

Assignment: Lesson Plan: Re-Tale the Tale
Date: 4/28/2015
I.

Setting Goals & Expectations

Big Idea: Throughout time and across cultures stories have been passed down
from generation to generation impacting society as it is today. In our class we will
be responding and connection to the usage of stories in the forms of fairy
tales/super heroes/myths/legends to visually tell or re-create our stories.
Key Concepts: With this project I anticipate my students formulating ideas about
what makes up a story. They will focus on why stories based off of mythological
ideas and unrealistic notions create such excitement when reading them.
Students will be asked multiple questions regarding stories that will challenge
their thought process and encourage them on a personal journey of discovering
what stories mean to them through our process of meaningful art making.
Student goals:
Examine fairy tale/super heroes/myths/legend stories
Investigate how this stories affect us today
Identify how we can manipulate these stories to re-create them.
Construct a visual interpretation of your re-created story
Assess the finished product to acknowledge acquired knowledge
Essential Questions:
What makes a good story?
Does a story need to be realistic for you to connect to it?
Why are stories based off of unrealistic ideas more interesting? If you disagree,
why not?
How has story-telling adapted to the 21st century?

II.

Responding and Connecting

Students will begin this project by identifying works of art that use story (i.e. one
of the following: fairy tales/super heroes/myths/legends) as their intent in future
meaning making. Each student will use their iPad to research and investigate these
different works of art related to story and will do a group share at each table.
(Va:Re.7.2.6a) (Va:Re.8.2.6a) (This is a sixth grade lesson therefore they will already
be supplied with this tool to use) From here we will hold a classroom discussion
about how we can connect the stories that we uncovered and do a quick compare
and contrast from those students who uncovered stories from years ago to more
recent story-telling methodologies. (Va:Cn11.16a)

This lesson has been developed to be cross-curricular therefore pairing sources

and information with the English department in my building would be a wise choice. I
wouldnt mind having a guest speaker come in and share a few stories with them. I
believe that exposing the students to professional story tellers will help them keep
an open mind when creating this project.
Some of the artwork that we will be looking at will include the following:
Myths in other Cultures:
http://archive.artsmia.org/world-myths/artbyculture/american.html
The Minneapolis Institute of Arts World Myths & Legends in Art is safe
and credible for the students to explore on the iPad. Using this website the
students are able to find pertinent information regarding their investigation topic
of story. This source is easy to navigate allowing you to see the key concepts of
each piece of artwork, look at the background of the artifact, read the story, and
finally browse through the discussion questions.
African-American Harriet Powers:
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/reform/jb_reform_powers_2.html
This is a good example of how folk art does a good job showcasing
stories. Harriet Powers was an African American woman during the civil war who
used the quilts to tell the story of local historical legends. Eventually some of
these quilts that she shed countless hours of her life creating the held so much
meaning to her would be sold off for a mere five dollars. Powers quilts are now
displayed at the Smithsonian and on their online exhibit space.
Batrice Coron: Stories cut from paper (18:15):
http://www.ted.com/talks/beatrice_coron_stories_cut_from_paper
Batrice Coron is a 21st century artist who discusses her journey to becoming an
artist who uses paper cutting to create meaning through stories. She discusses how
her methods are not created by straight lines but in a spiral fashion to formulate
deeper meaning. Coron is a wonderful 21 st century artist to look at to compare and
contrast to traditional methods of storytelling since she is using unconventional ways
to create her artwork and tell her stories
Super Hero Sources:
http://marvel.com/
http://www.dccomics.com/
These sources can be used to access some of the online content for
researching super hero comics. At my school I have a reading specialist who has
lent me stacks of comics from her classroom before that my students can use as
inspiration and to gather as research for their project.

Real World Story Telling:

http://www.people.com/article/7-year-old-writes-comic-book-girls-insecurities
Listed here is a story that was released April 28 th, 2015 about a seven year old
girl named Moxie who created her own super hero character who felt like her
hairstyle was a personal flaw [therefore] she turned her insecurity into a
superpower.
III.

Creating
Students will use their sketchbook to further their investigation about what kind of
story they would like to tell; whether their story is fairy tale, super hero, myth, or
legend based. VA:Cr2.1.6a (Demonstrate openness in trying new ideas, materials,
methods, and approaches in making works of art and design) VA:Cr1.1.6a (Combine
concepts collaboratively to generate innovative ideas of creating art VA:Cr1.2.6a
(Formulate an artistic investigation of personally relevant content for creating art)
From here they will pick out the most important parts of their stories and decide
whether they want to tell their own personal story or re-create a previously written
one. Depending on whether they want to tell their own personal story or re-create a
previously written one their artistic journey is going to vary.
We will begin by sketching in our sketchbooks our main characters and
reoccurring objects of our story. Our goal is to create our stories in the form of a
spiral where in the middle will be our very beginning and then spiraling outward will
be the duration of the story they are creating. Therefore we will be implementing the
visual art standards of creating by combining concepts collaborately to generate
innovative ideas for creating art by using this spiral technique for creating our story.
(VA:Cr1.1.6a) They will be given the freedom of choice as to what medium they
would like to use depending on their subject matter and what they want their final
project to look like.

IV.

Assessment
Formative and summative assessment will both be used to check in for the
students understanding of the assignment. As students are working I plan on setting
aside time to sit with each student to discuss their artwork and talk through the
process that they plan on using. The discussion between myself and the artist will be
used as a form of assessing their thought process and potential actions for the
project it will also be a way to do some preventative problem solving with issues that
they may encounter.
As they are working on their project they will be filling out a rubric that I have
created to assess their overall knowledge that has been accumulated over the
duration of the project. At the end of the project we will be combining our rubrics to
see the progress that we have made collectively as a class. (Please refer to my
rubric creation at the end of the lesson for further understanding)
Using my assessment as a form of ongoing assessment has been proven to be
beneficial for a variety of reasons. According to Chapter 29 Seven Practices for

Effective Learning written by Jay McTighe and Ken OConnor out of the book
Kaleidoscope: Contemporary and classic readings in education: they state that
ongoing assessments and continual adjustments on the part of both teacher and
student as the means to achieve maximum performance. The authors later go on to
state that well-designed ongoing assessment has the ability to provide the kind of
specific, personalized, and timely information needed to guide both the learning and
teaching (Ryan 174).
V.

Presenting
Students will present their creations to the class by the use of a gallery walk. The
will receive verbal feedback from their peers. Students will also be asked to write an
artist statement, about a paragraph or so, describing what their artwork is loosely
based off of, their ideas generated, and how they have connected stories into their
own lives. With the written portion and on their rubric I will provide written feedback
about their art project. We will display our projects in the display case outside of my
room with the potential of displaying somewhere within the community. I believe that
incorporating the community with your art class is highly important and brings
legitimacy and advocacy to your art room like you wouldnt believe.

VI.

Teacher Reflection
Through the lesson students will learn the skills to interpret stories and their
meanings. As artist students they will learn the importance of stories in our culture
and the need to keep them alive for future generations to come. When using the
iPads they will further their understanding that iPads are tools for research and
investigation, not just a social media device. Students will be making connections to
previous cultures and peers which in turn allows them the opportunity to empathize
with one another which as a middle school student can be really hard to do.
(Because clearly everything should always be about you when youre in middle
school, duh.) Overall, this art experience will be relevant and meaningful to
students in the 21st century through the use of iPads, meaningful art making, and
their ability to adapt their stories to suit their needs and the needs of their project.

Resources (Books/Articles)
Egan, K. (1989). Teaching as story telling: An alternative approach to teaching and
Curriculum in the elementary school. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Pennebaker, J., & Seagal, J. (n.d.). Forming A Story: The Health Benefits Of Narrative.
Journal of Clinical Psychology, 1243-1254.
Pink, D. (2006). A whole new mind: Why right-brainers will rule the future. New York:
Riverhead Books.
Ryan, K. (2010). Kaleidoscope: Contemporary and classic readings in education (12th
ed.). Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth Cengage Learning.
Thomas, D., & Brown, J. (2011). A new culture of learning: Cultivating the imagination
for a World of constant change. Lexington, Ky.

Resources (Online Images)

Myths in other Cultures:
http://archive.artsmia.org/world-myths/artbyculture/american.html
Folk Art:
http://www.nyfolklore.org/tradarts/tales.html
http://www.nyfolklore.org/pubs/nyfq/xx-4/country.html
African-American Harriet Powers:
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/reform/jb_reform_powers_2.html
Folk life & Folk Art Education Resource Guide
https://library.usu.edu/folklo/edresources/verbal.html