Unit Plan: Title Build Your Own City!

Course Name

Art Education at Polaris

Standards

Length: 10 Weeks
Grade Level

2/3

Grade Level Expectations

1. Observe and Learn to

Comprehend

1. Characteristics and expressive features of art and design are used to identify and discuss works of
art
2. The identification of characteristics and expressive features in works of art and design help to
determine artistic intent

2. Envision and Critique to

Reflect

1. Artists, viewers, and patrons use the language of art to respond to their own art and the art of others
2. Artists, viewers, and patrons make connections among the characteristics, expressive features, and
purposes of art and design

3. Invent and Discover to Create

1. Use familiar symbols to identify and demonstrate characteristics and expressive features of art
and design
2. Demonstrate basic studio skills

4. Relate and Connect to

Transfer

1. Works of art connect individual ideas to make meaning

2. Visual arts respond to human experience by relating art to the community, historical, and cultural
events.

Colorado 21st Century Skills

Critical Thinking and Reasoning: Think Deep,
Think Different
Information Literacy: Untangling the Web
Collaboration: Working Together, Learning
Together
Self-Direction: Owning Your Learning
Invention: Creating Solutions

Creative Process in Visual Art

Studio Thinking
Develop Craft: Learning to use materials, tools and techniques
Engage and Persist: Learning to embrace problems and not give up
Envision: Imagine the possible next steps; see what is not there
Express: Convey an idea, feeling, personal meaning
Observe: Seeing things that otherwise might not be seen
Reflect: think, talk and evaluate your work and the work of others
Stretch and Explore: Reach beyond ones perceived capacities
Understand Art World: Learn about contemporary and past art(ist)

Lesson Titles and Description

Exploring architecture;
- Discover interesting and unique architecture throughout history
- Create your own dream home and sketchbook cover
- Learn how to use a sketchbook like an artist
Printing Architecture: Printmaking with Plexiglas
- Learn printmaking while also experimenting with buildings and its
architecture.
- Print onto paper with markers and Plexiglas
Dioramas: Clay model and plaster building a structure
- Build objects for your diarama
- Turn 2D projects into 3D projects with clay and plaster
City planning: building structures from cardboard and using plaster pieces
- Learn what a city planner does
- Plan our own city based on our own city
Unit: Focusing Lens/Lenses:
Timeless, Transferrable and
Universal (I.E. Beliefs/Values,
Identity, Relationships.
Tension/Conflict, Freedom, Design,
Aesthetic, Patterns, Origins,
Transformation, Change, Influence,
Collaboration, Intention,
Play/Exploration, Synergy/Flow,
Choices, Balance, Inspiration,
System, Structure/Function, Reform)

Unit: Standards
and Grade
Level
Expectations
(Unit must have
all standards;
NOT all GLEs.)

relationships,
design

Lesson Length
one day/60 minutes

Sequence
1

1 days/60 minutes

3 days/180 minutes

3, 4, 5

2 days/120

6, 7

Unit: Prepared
- Make informed critical evaluations of visual and
Graduate
Competencies material culture, information, and technologies
- Analyze, interpret, and make meaning of art and
design critically using oral and written discourse
- Create works of art that articulate more
sophisticated ideas, feelings, emotions, and points of
view about art and design through an expanded use
of media and technologies

(Visual Arts Standard # - Name; GLE #, # and #)

Comprehend
Characteristics and expressive features of art and design are used to identify and discuss works of art.
Reflect
Artists, viewers and patrons make connections among the characteristics, expressive features, and purposes of art and design.
Create
2

Demonstrate basic studio skills

Transfer
Works of art connect individual ideas to make meaning
Unit: Inquiry
Questions
(Engaging-Debatable:
In art, what does it
mean when something
is beautiful? How can
something be so ugly it
is beautiful?) - can pull
from standards

(3-5 questions; at least 2 from each lesson)

Exploring Architecture:
1. How do patterns of visual information guide the creation of works of art?
2. How are characteristics and expressive features of art and design important in art-making?

Printmaking Architecture:
1. How are real-life topics captured in visual images?
2. Why would an artist need to know about variations of sensory qualities used in art?

Dioramas:
1. What are examples of ideas you can observe in familiar works of art?
2. How can your choice in art-making change an idea?

City Planning:
1. What is meant by "intent?"
2. How can art express more than one idea?

Unit Strands

Comprehend/Reflect/Create/Transfer

Unit: Concepts: Timeless, Transferrable and Universal (I.E.

Composition, Patterns, Technique, Rhythm, Paradox, Influence,
Style, Force, Culture, Space/Time/Energy, Line, Law/Rules, Value,
Expressions, Emotions, Tradition, Symbol, Movement, Shape,
Improvisation, Observation)

The artistic process, planning, artist intention, ideation, refinement,

influence, culture, style, shape, form, communication, observation,
technique, proportion, pattern, expression

For each statement you create below align with Standard(s), Prepared Graduate Competencies, and Grade Level Expectations. Refer to
Standards: Inquiry Questions, Relevance and Application and Nature of Statement when writing understandings.
Enduring Understandings: My students will
UNDERSTAND...

Conceptual Guiding Questions

Factual Guiding Questions

3

(Timeless, Transferrable and Universal. Shows a relationship

between two or more concepts.)
My students will understand that shape and form help translate 2dimensional to 3-dimensional.
My students will understand that planning and refinement is an
essential component of creating art.
My students will understand that culture and style influence
artistic intention.
My students will understand artists and designers explore
materials to make art in all its forms.

Have you ever sketched something on

paper before making it?
Why do we plan?
If everyone was asked to draw a dog,
would they all look the same?
Why do artists experiment with
materials?

How do you take a pencil drawing

and turn it into a 3-dimensional
reality?
How do artists plan?
What do you like making art about?
Is there more ways of making the
same things in different materials?
How?

Critical Content: My students will KNOW...

(NOT Timeless, Transferrable and Universal. Factual information in
the unit [topics] that students must know.)

Key Skills: What my students will be able to DO...

(Timeless, Transferrable and Universal. What students will do AND
be able to transfer to new learning experiences as a result of learning
the unit.)
Students will know....
Students will be able to...
How to create a mono-print
translate ideas into visual language
How to create form with plaster
critically observe their environment
How to create structure with class
reflect on their process
How to utilize art materials
engage in the material
How to discuss a work of art using basic art vocabulary
envision the intended outcome
How to move through the process of a critique
stretch and explore with the material
express an idea
Vocabulary
Architect, architecture, mono-print, printmaking, brayer, plexiglas, clay, city planning, plaster, sketchbook, maquette
Literacy Integration

reading/learning about Fort Collins history and other architecture throughout time

Numeracy Integration

multiple sketches, city blocks, number of buildings