Unit 3 — Responding
Description
Students demonstrate and apply an understanding of arts philosophies, judgment, and analysis to works of visual art and media arts. They use evaluative tools such as rubrics and critique to help evaluate artwork objectively. Students are exposed to various artists, artistic movements, and diverse cultures, and they interpret and analyze artworks from these contexts. Class discussions address how artists use their social and cultural context in their work. Students develop vocabulary to discuss art and learn to distinguish between personal preference and objective evaluation.
Essential Questions
- How do life experiences influence the way we relate to and respond to art?
- What is the value of engaging in the process of art criticism and analysis?
- How does one determine criteria to evaluate a work of art?
- How do we analyze, react to, and interpret media artworks?
Learning Objectives
- Identify works of art based on personal connections and experiences.
- Describe the aesthetic characteristics within both the natural and constructed world.
- Describe, compare, and categorize visual artworks based on subject matter and expressive properties.
- Categorize and describe works of art by identifying subject matter, details, mood, and formal characteristics.
- Use art vocabulary to explain preferences in selecting and classifying artwork.
- Identify, share, and describe the components and messages in media artwork.
- Identify, share, and describe a variety of media artworks created from different experiences in response to global issues including climate change.
- Share observations, identify the meanings, and determine the purposes of media artworks, considering personal and cultural context.
Supplemental Resources
- Printed images or photographs of artworks by diverse artists and movements for analysis
- Graphic organizers for comparing and contrasting artworks
- Sentence strips for building and practicing art vocabulary
- Posters of famous artworks for classroom discussion and reference
- Highlighters for identifying key features and elements in visual analysis activities
Music - Responding
Media Arts - Responding
Students engage in identifying elements and principles of art, counting and categorizing visual properties, and recognizing shapes and spatial relationships in artwork.
Students observe patterns in natural and constructed environments, investigate materials and their properties, and explore how design solutions work through experimentation with art materials and tools.
Students create art that tells stories about home, school, and community life, compare and contrast artwork from different cultures and time periods, and understand how art reflects societal values and beliefs.
Students discuss and describe artwork using visual arts vocabulary, ask and answer questions about artistic choices, and express ideas and responses through drawing, writing, and oral communication.
Formative Assessments
- Group work and collaborative analysis of artworks
- Question-and-answer discussions about artistic choices and meanings
- Observation of student vocabulary use and reasoning during critique
Summative Assessment
Students complete tasks that include creating works of art inspired by a variety of artists, artistic movements, or cultures that demonstrate and explain an understanding of arts philosophies and analysis. Students compare and contrast artwork from different cultures, genres, and social contexts.
Benchmark Assessment
— not configured —
Alternative Assessment
Students may demonstrate understanding through pointing, gesture, or verbal responses to visual prompts during artwork analysis instead of writing or drawing. Visual supports such as image cards, color samples, or simplified comparison charts may be provided to scaffold vocabulary and concept identification.
IEP (Individualized Education Program)
During discussions and critiques, allow students to respond orally, through pointing, or by gesturing toward artwork features rather than requiring written or lengthy verbal responses. Provide visual supports such as picture-based art vocabulary cards to help students label what they observe in a work of art. When students are asked to compare or describe artworks, offer sentence frames or simplified prompts that break the task into one focused question at a time, and check for understanding frequently before moving to the next concept.
Section 504
Seat students in a location that minimizes distraction during whole-group critique discussions and ensures a clear line of sight to displayed artworks. Allow additional processing time when students are asked to share observations or preferences, and reduce the number of artworks a student is expected to respond to at one time if attention or stamina is a concern.
ELL / MLL
Introduce and reinforce art vocabulary words using visual examples — pairing each term with an image of that quality in an actual artwork helps ground the language in something concrete. Provide simplified discussion prompts and allow students to respond in their home language when needed before transitioning to English, and use realia or close-up image details to support comprehension of subject matter and mood.
At Risk (RTI)
Build on students' personal experiences and familiar visual environments as an entry point into discussing artworks, helping them connect what they already notice in the world around them to what artists make choices about. Reduce the complexity of comparison tasks by starting with two clearly contrasting artworks, and provide structured observation prompts that guide students step by step from describing what they see to beginning to interpret what it might mean.
Gifted & Talented
Encourage students to move beyond describing what they see and begin forming and defending a reasoned opinion about an artwork's mood, purpose, or cultural meaning, using developing art vocabulary with increasing precision. Invite these students to make connections across multiple artworks or artists, exploring how context — such as where or when an artwork was made — shapes its meaning, and support them in posing their own questions for class critique discussion.