Visual Arts-Based Themes and Studies
Visual arts-based activities, thematic units or emergent investigations might focus on an artist, style, or medium and also provide a natural means for integrating different dimensions of the curriculum. One of the richest sources of inspiration for teachers is childrens picture books, since children are naturally drawn to the illustrations. Teachers can refer to winners of the Caldecott Medal, an award established in 1938, in particular for examples of childrens books with exceptional artwork.
For example, Eric Carle (and many other picture-book illustrators) works in a distinctive collage style that is easily recognizable to children and inviting for exploration. A teacher we visited with earlier in this book, Ms. Mary, engaged preschool children in reproducing the “Eric Carle effect.” She set up a “finger-painting factory” in the art center, and for several days the children filled 18- by 24-inch sheets of glossy finger-paint paper with every color of finger paint they could possibly manufacture by mixing and combining colors on the paper and using different kinds of toolssuch as brushes, scrapers, and combsto create textural effects. She then cut the dried papers into smaller 6- by 8-inch sheets and the children used them to create a massive “collage file,” sorting and organizing the papers according to the color spectrum (a wonderful activity for visual discrimination as well). This supply of “Eric Carle paper” was used in dozens of ways over time, from reproducing collage illustrations inspired by the characters in Carles books to building a rain forest in the schools hallway, using the papers for tree trunks, leaves, exotic birds and flowers. The appendix to this book includes a selected list of author/illustrators with distinctive styles that could be used to inspire activities for exploring media.
The topics/subjects of picture books are also easy to connect with science, literacy, or math activities. An extensive online resource for preservice and practicing teachers who want to use picture books to design planned explorations around a theme is the Miami University searchable database of picture books, which provides a short annotated summary of each.