on the road.

The first lesson I did with the 3rd graders focused on line and 3d space. We looked at a print by an artist named Meme.

I talked to the students about the use of contour lines in the image, and how these lines outlined the shapes. We then looked at how Meme had made the drawing look 3d. Students identified that things in the front and things got smaller in the background. They also picked up on the change in value from foreground to background.

We then looked at Meme's use of diagonal lines on the road in the drawing. We identified that the road got smaller as the diagonals got closer and closer. We tried to come up with as many words to describe this difference- wide/narrow, thick/thin, fat/skinny, big/small, etc. This was a simple introduction to the basics of perspective.

My original plan was for students to execute their drawing in just black, white, but changed my mind before meeting with my first class. I'm glad I did. The variety of colors in the drawings makes looking at a large group of them more interesting.

Students drew in pencil first, traced everything but the sides of the road, and then added color with crayon. Students could choose the place their character was heading toward and they could style their character how they wanted as well. When they added color, I emphasized pressing harder in the front and lighter as things went back in space.

This lesson took the full hour, plus an additional 10 to 15 minutes of the next meeting time.

The two images above were done with the student's non-writing hand. She gets her cast off in a week. She can totally draw with both hands now!