Grade 8 - Materials, Technologies, and Processes (Creating/Communicating)

PRESCRIBED LEARNING OUTCOMES

It is expected that students will:

• use materials, technologies, and processes, both alone and in combination, to make personally meaningful images
• select materials, technologies, and processes appropriate for a planned work
• use, care for, and maintain materials, technologies, and workspace in a safe and environmentally sensitive fashion
• demonstrate a willingness to try unfamiliar materials and processes and adapt familiar ones for unfamiliar uses
• invent and construct a technology for an applied use

To view the prescribed learning outcomes for Materials, Technologies, and Processes (Creating/Communicating) in other grades click on an icon below.

SUGGESTED INSTRUCTIONAL STRATEGIES

• Set up a series of work stations, each of which includes different tools and materials. Students create single works that involve the use of all the materials in sequence.
• Teach three or four short units on printmaking at intervals throughout the year. Use a vegetable print in the first unit and progressively more advanced and complex technologies for succeeding units (e.g., linocut printmaking, photo emulsion silk-screening). Pick a work from each unit and display the works side by side with a written commentary highlighting the different effects and possibilities of the technologies. (The same activity could be done with any medium.)
• When introducing new art-creation materials and techniques, work with the whole class to develop a set of expectations or rules related to the use, care, and sharing of those materials. Display the results.
• Challenge students to create various effects, using a given image (e.g., by tracing, photocopying, computer manipulation, photography).
• Have students invent creative technologies. Divide them into small groups and conduct a scavenger hunt to locate several objects not normally associated with creating art. Once groups have located and retrieved these objects, give them some raw material (e.g., a mass of Clay, some paper and paint, some cloth) and assign them to create an image or artwork using as tools the items they have located. Students record their processes and how they used their found objects as tools.

SUGGESTED ASSESSMENT STRATEGIES

• Observe students using a variety of materials, technologies, and processes to assess how their choices and decisions about image making are changing. Students should record their degree of success when experimenting with materials, processes, or technologies.
• Have students collect images that have been manipulated to create different effects and add them to their sketchbooks for reference. Discuss the images and the techniques artists have used, posing questions such as:
  • Which materials are used in these images?
  • Which of the materials have you worked with?
  • Which ones are you interested in exploring?
  • Which material gives the best effect for your purpose?
  • What projects are you planning?
  • What are some of the choices you need to make about materials?
• As students work through a sequence of printmaking processes, focus on how they use particular materials and processes. Discuss what they learned and discovered about the various materials, processes, and techniques used. Students identify one or two things to explore and refine, and make a plan for reviewing their progress.
• Students keep records of each technology, material, or medium used to create an image. The teacher may wish to provide a format for recording information, using heads such as: Date, Technology, Site, What I did, Comments, and Rating. Students rate their own satisfaction with the results as 3­high, 2­medium, or 1­low.
• Have students review their records and summarize their ideas. For example:
  • The material(s) or technology(ies) I enjoyed using most (least) was (were)____because____.
  • New material(s) or technology(ies) I would like to try is (are)_____because_____.
  • To do that, I would need to_____.

RECOMMENDED LEARNING RESOURCES

• Arttalk (Second Edition)
• Claywork - Form and Idea in Ceramic Design (Third Edition)
• Down Town
• Experimenting with Art: 25 Easy-to-Teach Lessons in Design and Color
• Exploring Art
• Eyewitness Film Kit
• An Introduction to Acrylics
• An Introduction to Drawing
• An Introduction to Pastels
• A Painter's Palette: A Collection of Painting Activities for Intermediate Grades
• Photographing the World Around You
• Stencil It!
• Video In Focus: A Guide to Viewing and Producing Video A World of Images
• The Young Artists Series

• Cel Mates
• Electric Dreams (Computer Imaging)
• Learning to Paint with Carolyn Berry
• Maskmaking with Paper with Peggy Flores
• Masks From Many Cultures
• A Model of Perfection
• One Step At A Time
• Paint by Numbers
• Painting With Fire
• Pencil Drawing with Gail Price
• Riding the Movies

• Themes and Foundations of Art

Table of Contents

Province of British Columbia
Ministry of Education
Standards Department © 1995 Copyright

Maintained by: Fine Arts Coordinator - Visual Arts

Revised: March 13, 1996

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