Art Lesson: Personal Poem Collage. Lesson Plan for A Yemeni Community: Photographs from the 1970s by Milton Rogovin

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1 Lesson Plan for A Yemeni Community: Photographs from the 1970s by Milton Rogovin Photographs of Yemeni families taken by Milton Rogovin inspired art and English language arts lessons that explore the heritage and changing culture of America. Step-by-step lessons can be adapted to many uses, and can be a resource for teaching. Art Lesson: Personal poem collage Description: Students describe and assemble collages that are about themselves after viewing Milton Rogovin s images of Yemeni American family life Grade Level: 5 th grade ACTIVITY: Each lesson was designed for a 45-minute class period. The lesson was presented to a 5 th grade class of 25 students, who have art twice a week. The lesson took place over 6 sessions, followed by a visit to the Arab American National Museum to see the Milton Rogovin photography exhibition. Day 1: Discussion of Yemeni Family photos of Milton Rogovin We selected 3 images from the Rogovin web site ( saved them and enlarged and projected them on our new Promethean Board. The enlarged images allowed all students to see and discuss many details. Notes were taken to summarize our discussion after each image. The system saved these images with our comments. Images with notes can be printed out for later use. 1

2 1. *family in living room 2. wedding scene 3. man in factory *Note: Mr. Rogovin does not title his work We discussed these works using the Visual Thinking Strategies technique. This method works well because it guides students through discussions using a questioning strategy that builds on existing knowledge and promotes cooperative learning. For more information on this learnercentered method of looking at and finding meaning in visual art see 2

3 Here is an excerpt of our discussion: 1. family in living room Take a minute to look at this photo. What is going on here? A family is sitting together What do you see that makes you say that? There s a mom and a dad and bunch of kids They look the same What do you see that makes you say they are related, a family? They look like each other What more can we find? I think they look like they don t have much money. What do you see that makes you say that? The way their clothes are The TV is small Their house is neat Everything is old-fashioned What do you see that makes you say everything is old fashioned? The TV, the pictures The TV has an antenna on top You don t see these designs anymore The picture is gray So you re saying the photograph is gray, or black and white and that makes it old fashioned. 2. wedding scene Look for a minute before we comment. What do you see happening? People are throwing money at a girl. It might be a wedding. What do you see that makes you say it might be a wedding? The girl is wearing a bride dress. Because of the veil. Anything else? I think they are rich because people are throwing money. They are throwing money instead of flowers. Earlier we said these pictures are old. Back then one dollar with worth a lot of money. So maybe in their culture instead of flowers or gifts, they give money. Anything else? I think the man who took this picture was lower than the people. 3

4 Linda has a different idea. She thinks the photographer was lower than the people. That gives us a lower perspective or point of view. 3. man in factory What is going on here? I think he is an engineer. What do you see that makes you say that? There are wires in the top of the picture and stuff behind him. He has a Ford sign on him. So you think he is working for Ford. The way he is dressed. It s a factory because he has goggles and gloves. Why does he wear that? So their hands don t get hurt. So he is wearing goggles and gloves for protection. What more can we find? This is old fashioned. What do you say that makes you say that it s old fashioned? It s black and white Day 2 and 3: Intro to Collage theme: I am from/things I like Materials: Paper Plates Paper, *pencils *Art supplies like pencils are kept in old library card files that became available when our library digitized records. We talked about the people we had seen in the photographs and how we could tell something about them by what was in the photographs family members, their work, and celebrations. We can make images that tell something about us, too. Students were told we would focus on the theme I am from by listing their ideas in 3-word phrases on a paper plate. This way of free writing loosens them up. Students were encouraged to picture these ideas in your head, to use adjectives and be very descriptive in their phrase answers to many favorites including: Color, food, drink, toy, relative, place to visit, animal, book, movie, holiday Students were told to think of each phrase as a line in a poem. We created a group poem by taking examples from student ideas and writing them on the board: I am from Screaming cheesy pizza 4

5 Funny crazy cousin Hot sunny Lebanon Students were asked to choose 9 favorite phrases and to group them in 3 stanzas of 3 phrases each. Each poem began with the line I am from for 4 lines, total. Those selected phrases were transferred from the paper plate to a sheet of drawing paper. Students then selected their favorite poem to illustrate as a collage. Day 4: Sketch of collage Collage materials and some posters examples of art made with mixed media were introduced. Areas where materials were layered or built up were pointed out. Students selected one of their 3 phrases to illustrate and sketched out how they would visually represent each word, and planned where the actual words will go. Students were encouraged to fill the whole space. Day 5: Collage begins Materials: Heavy paper stock 14 x 20 School glue ( school glue formula white glue is watery and only useful for gluing paper) Magazine pieces Wall paper scraps Tissue paper Cardboard letters from a rummage sale We went over the #1 rule of collage: Clean up your own mess We talked about many ways to add the words to their collage: Rubber stamps, letters cut from newspapers or magazines, like a ransom note Type on a computer and glue it on, write it yourself and glue it on Use the 3-D letters (may need to get some letters like vowels from other places) Day 6: Collage work continues 5

6 Art Lesson: Personal Poem Collage I am from cold wintery/christmas giving Grandma Jane/silly little sanchze I am from cool skateboards/hot dessert/awesome outerspace I am from brownhaired tall mom/bubbleyroot beer/steamy hot Florida 6

7 Day 7: Museum Visit Students visited the Arab American Museum to see the special exhibition A Yemeni Community: Photographs from the 1970s by Milton Rogovin. Students also visited permanent exhibits Coming to America, Living in America and Making an Impact. Different careers of notable Arab Americans were pointed out. ASSESSMENTS: Did students complete the assignment: Come up with a variety of ideas and phrases using adjectives Did they arrange their choices into a poem with 3 stanzas Did they create a work of art that illustrates one stanza Did their collage fill the page in an interesting way Did students integrate words of their stanza into the collage design STANDARDS AND BENCHMARKS: This project and the museum visit aligned with the Michigan Department of Education s K-12 Curriculum Standards and Content Expectations. For more information, visit their web site at Supports Standards: Arts Education: Visual Arts: Response Strand: R.3 Describe, analyze and understand the arts in historical, contemporary, social, cultural, environmental and/or economic contexts Career and Employability: Standard II: Career planning. All students will acquire information from career awareness activities. English Language Arts: Reading Strand: Word Study, R recognize metaphors, symbols using content-related resources Writing Genre W.GN write poetry based on reading a wide variety of grade-appropriate poetry Speaking, Listening and Viewing Strand: L.RP Respond to multiple text types by discussing, illustrating and/or writing to show understanding Social Studies: History 3 H3.0.2, 4 H3, 6 H1.2.1 Grades Three, Four and Six: Explain how historians use artifacts and primary and secondary sources to explore the past 7

8 Social Studies Civics and Government Grade Five: core democratic values of patriotism and rights and responsibilities of citizenship World Languages Diversity: Identify diverse languages and cultures throughout the world TEACHER COMMENTS River Oaks Elementary is one of 19 elementary schools in Dearborn Public Schools with a diverse population of 300 students. Some students are first or second generation immigrants from various middle- eastern countries, and eastern European countries. The VTS discussion method is used throughout the Dearborn Public Schools art department and it is also a part of River Oaks School Improvement plan to help build language skills. For more information see our school s web page Teacher Contact: Wendy Sample River Oaks Elementary Ann Arbor Trail Dearborn Heights, MI