Unit 2 — Producing/Presenting
Description
Students demonstrate understanding of how and why art is created by analyzing, interpreting, and conveying meaning through their artistic work using skills, media, and methods developed during creation. Students learn that presenting and sharing artworks, objects, and artifacts influence and shape ideas, beliefs, and experiences. In Visual Arts, students explore how curators and presenters select, preserve, and display artwork, understanding the role of museums and galleries. In Media Arts, students learn how complex unified artworks are constructed through integration of various media and content, requiring a range of skills to solve creative problems. The unit emphasizes the importance of preparing artwork for presentation and understanding various venues for sharing artistic work.
Essential Questions
- How are complex media arts experiences constructed, and at what point is work considered complete?
- How do museums and galleries provide information and in-person experiences about concepts and topics?
- What criteria, methods, and processes are used to select work for preservation or presentation?
- How does refining artwork affect its meaning to the viewer?
Learning Objectives
- Define and analyze the responsibilities of a curator in preserving and presenting artifacts or artwork.
- Prepare and present artwork safely and effectively.
- Discuss how exhibits and museums provide information and in-person experiences.
- Practice combining various academic arts, media forms, and content into unified media artworks.
- Demonstrate understanding of combining a variety of academic and content elements with emphasis on coordinating elements into comprehensive media artwork.
- Create media artworks through integration of multiple contents and forms.
- Develop and enact a variety of roles to practice foundational artistic, design, technical, organizational, and soft skills.
- Examine how tools and design thinking techniques can be used in standard and experimental ways.
- Identify, explain, and compare various presentation forms for distributing media artwork.
Supplemental Resources
- Sticky notes for labeling and annotating displayed artwork.
- Plastic page protectors for protecting and preserving artwork samples.
- Printed images or photographs of museum displays and gallery layouts for reference.
- Chart paper for designing and planning presentation layouts.
Music - Performing
Media Arts - Presenting
Students apply mathematical thinking and measurement concepts when designing and analyzing visual and media artworks, including use of geometric shapes, symmetry, patterns, and spatial reasoning to create compositions.
Students engage in scientific inquiry and design thinking processes when creating media and visual artworks, including observing patterns in nature, planning investigations, and testing solutions to design problems.
Students analyze how artworks reflect community cultural traditions, historical contexts, and diverse perspectives from different time periods and cultures. Students examine the role of art in informing values, beliefs, and social change across societies.
Formative Assessments
- Question and answer discussions about curation, presentation, and preservation practices.
- Student planning documents showing criteria for selecting and displaying work.
- Peer feedback on presentation choices and conservation strategies.
- Classroom discussions comparing different presentation venues and methods.
Summative Assessment
Media Arts: Students demonstrate understanding of combining academic, art, and content to create comprehensive media artwork. Media work assessed using digital rubric on learning management system. Visual Arts: Students develop a plan for displaying and conserving final artworks, considering specific criteria when selecting presentation, portfolio, or collection. Students understand how curation processes preserve artifacts and cultivate appreciation of social and cultural experiences.
Benchmark Assessment
Question and answer, projects, discussion, school-wide displays of art, end of year art show.
Alternative Assessment
Students may demonstrate understanding of curation and presentation through a teacher-guided interview, photograph or video documentation of their artwork display, or a simplified written or oral explanation of their curatorial choices. Visual supports such as labeled diagrams, choice boards, or sentence frames may be provided to help students articulate how they selected, arranged, or preserved their work.
IEP (Individualized Education Program)
Students may benefit from visual models showing examples of curated displays and media artworks at various stages of completion to support understanding of the presentation and curation process. Verbal explanations of planning criteria can be supplemented with graphic organizers or simplified planning templates that reduce the writing demand while still capturing curatorial thinking. Teachers may allow students to explain their presentation choices and conservation decisions orally or through drawing rather than written response, ensuring the focus remains on artistic reasoning rather than output format. Frequent check-ins during planning and creation phases can help students stay on track and build confidence in their decision-making.
Section 504
Students should be provided with extended time when completing planning documents related to curation and media artwork preparation, as well as during any discussion-based assessments. Preferential seating near demonstrations or display examples can support focus during instruction on presentation venues and curator responsibilities. Directions for multi-step processes, such as preparing artwork for display or combining media elements, should be available in written form so students can reference them independently throughout the unit.
ELL / MLL
Visual supports such as photographs of museums, galleries, and curated exhibits can help build background knowledge about presentation venues before key vocabulary is introduced. Terms central to this unit — such as curator, preserve, exhibit, and media artwork — should be introduced with visual cues, bilingual glossaries where available, and examples that connect to students' own cultural experiences with art and artifacts. Teachers should provide simplified verbal directions for planning and creation tasks and check for understanding by asking students to restate their curatorial choices in their own words before they begin.
At Risk (RTI)
Entry points into curation and media artwork creation should connect to students' existing familiarity with sharing and displaying things they care about, helping them access the unit's concepts through personal experience. Planning tasks can be scaffolded by breaking the curatorial decision-making process into smaller, clearly sequenced steps, with teacher or peer support available at each stage. Positive reinforcement during the planning and creation process, along with opportunities to make meaningful choices about how their work is presented, can increase engagement and investment in the unit's outcomes.
Gifted & Talented
Students who demonstrate early mastery of curation and presentation concepts can be invited to explore the role of a curator more deeply by researching how real-world museums or galleries make decisions about what to collect, preserve, and display across different cultures or time periods. In media arts, these students may be challenged to experiment with unconventional or layered combinations of media forms, pushing beyond basic integration to consider how intentional design choices affect an audience's interpretation and experience. Teachers can encourage independent inquiry into how emerging technologies or community-based venues are changing the way art is presented and distributed.