Montague Township School District
Visual Arts Curriculum Guide
Grade 7
2025-2026
Melissa Neamand
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Description
Grade 7 Media and Visual Arts curriculum is organized around four interconnected artistic processes: Creating, Producing, Responding, and Connecting. Students engage with multiple art movements, diverse artists, and cultural art throughout history to develop technical skills and conceptual understanding. The curriculum balances hands-on creation with critical analysis, requiring students to make and respond to both media and visual artworks. Students learn to use elements and principles of art, develop problem-solving abilities through artistic investigation, and understand how art reflects and shapes society. Throughout the year, students build aesthetic awareness, practice collaborative skills, and make connections between personal experience and artistic expression across cultural and historical contexts.
Big Ideas
- Creativity and innovative thinking are essential life skills developed through exploration, experimentation, and constructive critique.
- Artists integrate various media, techniques and approaches to communicate purpose, meaning and intent to diverse audiences.
- Analysis of artworks through criticism, interpretation and evaluation improves aesthetic understanding and informs artistic choices.
- Artmaking and media creation enable people to investigate culture, make meaning and develop awareness of personal and global experiences.
- Objects, artifacts and artworks communicate and preserve the values, beliefs and social-cultural experiences of individuals and societies.
Essential Questions
- What conditions, attitudes and behaviors support creativity and innovative thinking?
- How do artists work and determine whether their direction is effective?
- What role does persistence play in revising, refining and developing work?
- How do we analyze, interpret and value artworks across media and cultures?
- How does engaging in creating art enrich people's lives and deepen understanding of society and culture?
Music - Connecting
Music - Creating
Music - Performing
Music - Responding
Media Arts - Connecting
Media Arts - Creating
Media Arts - Presenting
Media Arts - Responding
Students apply mathematical thinking and problem-solving strategies when creating and analyzing visual compositions and designs.
Students investigate scientific concepts and natural phenomena as inspiration for creative artworks and media productions.
Students examine how artworks reflect cultural values, historical contexts, and diverse perspectives from various societies and time periods.
Students use written and verbal communication to describe artworks, construct arguments about artistic intent, and articulate personal responses to visual media.
Students explore how art forms communicate meaning across cultures and linguistic boundaries.
Students are assessed across all four units using formative, summative, alternative and benchmark approaches. Formative assessments include group work, projects, discussions, teacher observation, skill testing and peer evaluations. Summative assessments require students to demonstrate learning through transfer tasks and performance tasks that apply skills and knowledge to new situations. Media arts work is evaluated using digital rubrics on a learning management system, while visual arts tasks are assessed using traditional rubrics. Assessment focuses on both the creative process and finished products, with emphasis on how students meet established criteria and demonstrate understanding of artistic intent, cultural context and technical proficiency.
| Unit | Formative | Summative | Benchmark | Alternative |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01Creating | ✓ | ✓ | — | ✓ |
| 02Producing | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 03Responding | ✓ | ✓ | — | ✓ |
| 04Connecting | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Coverage | 4/4 | 4/4 | 2/2 | 4/4 |
| Unit | IEP | 504 | MLL | At-Risk | Gifted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01Creating | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 02Producing | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 03Responding | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 04Connecting | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Coverage | 4/4 | 4/4 | 4/4 | 4/4 | 4/4 |