Activity
Teaching Tolerance

Identity Self-Portraits

For Teachers K - 2nd Standards
What symbols represent you best? Individuals consider how they would draw peers using symbols about their identities with an interview and art activity. After conducting interviews and portraits, the art makes a great centerpiece for...
Activity
Teaching Tolerance

Identity Portraits

For Teachers 3rd - 5th Standards
When you look at me, what do you see? Young learners answer this question by creating a portrait that reflects the identity of one of their peers. First, class members create interview questions. Then, they interview classmates to...
Activity
Teaching Tolerance

Identity Artifacts Museum

For Teachers K - 2nd Standards
Who are you? It's a simple question, but younger learners have the opportunity to express their complex identities by making artifacts that represent parts of their identities. After engaging in the activity, they share who they are with...
Lesson Plan
National Gallery of Canada

Self-Portrait, Mirrors and Metamorphosis!

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Using M.C. Escher's Hand with Reflecting Sphere as inspiration, learners create their own set of self-portraits using various reflective surfaces. The lesson begins with a discussion about portraiture and ends with a presentation of work...
Handout
National Museum of the American Indian

Fritz Scholder: A Study Guide

For Students 5th - 8th Standards
In this engaging activity involving close analysis of abstract expressionist art, your class members will not only discover more about artist Friz Scholder's Native American art, but they will also have the opportunity to consider...
Lesson Plan
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Learning for Justice

Looking Closely at Ourselves

For Teachers 3rd - 12th Standards
A thoughtful discussion about self-reflecting leads to a conversation about skin color and making a list of words associated with "beauty." Budding artists use a mirror to examine their features and create a self-portrait. Peers critique...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Portraits as Keys to History

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Students create self-portraits using images and words. They discuss portraits from the Memorial Art Gallery, create a self-portrait collage usng images and words from magazines, and complete a worksheet.
Lesson Plan
National Gallery of Canada

Who Are You?

For Teachers 9th - 12th
What can a self-portrait reveal about an artist? Discuss various self-portraits before tasking your pupils with creating their own. Learners research artists, develop an idea of their own individuality, and create photo collages with...
Lesson Plan
National Gallery of Canada

A Cultural Portrait

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Explore heritage and identity through an examination of art and a related project. The featured art, related to the African diaspora, includes several types of art created by different artists. Pupils consider their own backgrounds and...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Identity Boxes

For Teachers 5th - 8th
Students create a "portrait" box that contains symbolic representations of their own identity.  In this Lucas Samaras and Joseph Cornell art lesson, students discover ways that these two artists used symbols and objects to represent...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Who Am I? Exploring Identity

For Teachers 9th - 12th
Students define identity, consider who they are/what they value, explore the work of two photographers featured on an upcoming episode of EGG THE ARTS SHOW to see how they have dealt with the issue of identity, and respond using...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Color Your Destiny

For Teachers 8th
Eighth graders read and discuss a variety of children's books that deal with feelings, self-concept and how they affect a person's perceptions of themselves as well as their world. They also tie in interrelationships of visual and...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Portraits of the Artist

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Students reflect on the different roles they have for themselves in a journal entry. After reading an article, they discover information on the life of Rembrandt. In groups, they examine the roles of Rembrandt in his self-portrait and...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Self-Promotion

For Teachers 6th - 8th
Students create "assemblage boxes" displaying representations of themselves and the importance they see in their own lives. This middle school level lesson emphasizes the art of American artist Sarah Goodridge who has success in the...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Through the Looking Glass

For Teachers 11th - 12th
Students explore issues of self and identity. They create artworks through the observation and analysis of self-portraiture. They reflect about themselves and on fostering personal expression. They create a time-line that makes...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Meishi Game

For Teachers 3rd - 6th
In this Meishi game worksheet, students create six small identity cards, exchange them as self-introduction cards with other students and try to collect as many cards as they can to win the game.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Picturing Hemingway: A Writer in His Time

For Teachers 6th - 12th
Students analyze portraits of Ernest Hemingway to see how his private and public personalities are revealed through them. In this "Picturing Hemingway" lesson, students complete a variety of activities to investigate public and private...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Quilting Our Diverse Classroom

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students explore diversity and race by creating art. In this ethnic background lesson, students discuss their family history, where their relatives lived and how it affects their life today. Students create pieces of a quilt representing...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Turning Everyday Objects Into Art

For Teachers 9th - 12th
High schoolers are introduced to the art of assemblage - which is the process of taking ready-made materials, and ordinary objects and using them to create sculptures. They create a self-portrait by assembling and joining found objects...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

What's Special About Me?

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students identify personal strengths that can help them cope with events in life like 9/11. They address two factors that have been demonstrated by research studies to assist students in adapting to and coping with stress. Students are...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Historical Figure: A Monologue

For Teachers 4th
Fourth graders develop their speaking skills. In this monologue instructional activity, 4th graders watch their instructors model a monologue regarding Abraham Lincoln. Students apply these skills as they research a historical figure...
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

The Clothes Don't Fit

For Teachers 1st
First graders keep a scrapbook of themselves throughout the year and see how they have changed.
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

People, Places, and Things

For Teachers 4th - 8th
Students review art history in the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art. In this art history lesson, students discuss art vocabulary emphasizing landscape, portrait, and still life. They visit the museum and create their own pictures. 
Lesson Plan
Curated OER

Getting to Know You

For Teachers Pre-K
Students participate in tactile and visual exploration. In this tactile and visual exploration lesson, students listen to John Archambault's, Grandmother's Garden, and sing the song, "Friends Are Like Flowers." They participate in ice...