Foundations of Art

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This course explores the basic elements of visual design through introductory exercises in drawing, painting, sculpture, and printmaking. Art is presented as a visual language mastered through the development of the student’s perceptual skills and creative problem-solving techniques. Artistic production, art history, and aesthetics will be essential components throughout. Reading, critiquing, presenting, and writing about art and artists are an essential course component. All lessons are defined by technical and formal parameters, however, choice of subject matter is almost always left entirely to the students. This course requires students to create a digital portfolio including images of their projects, written reflections, and process reflections. Foundations of Art has an honors option. (This course is not recommended for 9th graders who struggle with executive functioning skills).

STANDARDS & WEIGHTS

There are many different aspects to a visual art grade. We use the National Core Art Standards to design, teach, and assess our curriculum:

CREATING- conceiving and developing new artistic ideas and work (50%)

PERFORMING/PRESENTING/PRODUCING- Realizing artistic ideas and work through interpretation and presentation (20%)

RESPONDING- Understanding and evaluating how the arts convey meaning (20%)

CONNECTING- Relating artistic ideas and work with personal meaning and external context (10%)

COMPOSING AN ART GRADE

*SUMMATIVE PROJECTS- Think of these as “tests” at the end of each unit.

*DIGITAL PORTFOLIO REFLECTIONS- Students record their artistic growth and learning throughout the entire class. For each project, students post a photograph and written reflection about their artwork onto their digital portfolios (Google Sites).

*CLASS CRITIQUE- The last day of a unit (project deadline) is dedicated to presenting and discussing student projects using the 4-steps of critique process: describing, analyzing, interpreting, and evaluating. We use templates for structuring many peer and self critiques.

*INTERIM PROJECTS - Projects that transition between the formative and summative projects (in the middle).

*FORMATIVE PROJECTS - Introductory projects generally focused on for 1 class as a practice/warm-up and idea generation exercise.

*HABITS OF WORK- This is the behavior/habits category. Students are assessed on preparedness (meeting deadlines and homework completion), engagement (participation), and determination (persistence, effective use of feedback, and ability to self-assess).