Reflection and Perspective

So, for this lesson with my fourth and fifth graders, I decided it was time for some higher order thinking skills....the great part is, in art class, I rarely have to prompt the kids to use these skills... it naturally happens when looking at art.
To begin, we took a look at a photo of the Washington Monument.

Using this photo as inspiration, we discussed the monument...when it was built, who designed it, how big it was, why it looked like two different colors of white were used....
Then we discussed the reflecting pool in front of the monument and how reflecting pools show up time and time again in front of important memorials or monuments. Without hesitation, the students quickly figured out that there are two meanings of the word, "reflection." Using those HIGHER ORDER THINKING SKILLS that were hear so much about in education, they analyzed and evaluated the meaning of the word, "reflection" and hypothesized that the artist may have used a refelcting pool in the design not just for the literal meaning of "creating a mirror image" of the monument, but also as a tool of "looking back, thinking about and remembering" why George Washington was important to our country. Wow.

 

 

The students also used persepctive to draw things the way they appear to the eye, making the trees "appear" to get smaller the farther away the are, and the reflecting "appear" to become more narrow as it nears the horizon.

 

But hey, perspective is another lesson all together...