Van Gogh’s Starry Night – Helping students describe what they see…
January 1st, 2008
Every semester I seem to fail at my goal of getting students to describe an image. So, I thought I would try to tackle the problem head-on. I want them to recognize that describing what you see helps you see more and see better and helps you to understand the possible meanings in a work of art. It’s hard to do, but an important skill I think. Here’s my attempt. I’m open to suggestions!
January 2nd, 2008 at 10:33 pm
I struggle with the same idea – I am so familiar with many of the works that I don’t allow enough time in lecture for the student’s to “look” This semester I am putting into my note a “picture inventory” – kind of like the ones a shrink might use in intake. Also I have had some success asking my students to think about works of art in the same way they think about music, who’s been sampled, what fashion is the artist hawking…etc
Thanks for the great blog
January 3rd, 2008 at 7:31 am
Prof Glo, I would love to see an example of the “picture inventory” you mention.
January 6th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
Beth, I really appreciated your vid. I am about to introduce art appreciation/history concepts to my high schoolers. They are urban kids who could really care less about this stuff. BUT, it’s important to me AND it is also part of my State standards to include this information. My art program is very traditional. I was side tracked initially with doing some mini projects (which turned into MAJOR projects), but I’ll be getting on with teaching them the basics of drawing and painting. Art history will be a part of every week’s instruction as a separate piece of my curriculum. I’d like to teach them about describing what they see and then reinforce the concept with either some daily 10-15 minute “do now” assignments where they have to describe what they see in the painting that I’m showing them. After they get some grasp on that, I’ll move on to the next part of the process.
Will you be doing more with Van Gogh? I’d like to see what where you take it from here. Or, are you going to provide another example of describing an artwork?
January 6th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
Thanks for those kind words JWP. I am not sure what I will do next, but it seems like a good idea to do more on this important skill. Last semester I had them describe and then swap with a classmate who didn’t have the image in front of them, and they could see just how little their descriptions really worked!
February 6th, 2008 at 10:38 am
I’m not a teacher but a journalist who found your website by Dandileon Diva.
I have a website on my own
http://www.bluedawnmedia.net
with lots of pictures that are useful for doing such things you do. I likie it very much. It’s important that people learn to look closer to the things that surrounded them. Just to understand more the beautiful meanings that are behind the scenery.
October 8th, 2008 at 5:56 pm
I have had interesting luck with this “observation/description ” lesson
One student gets to privately look at an art reproduction to gather their observations- this student then describes what they see to another student who draws what is being described.
October 8th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
ps: Google “visual thinking statagies”
excellent infrormation is available on guiding students through loooking exersizes