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Liz Brett Art Educator K-5 Hdes

This document provides an overview of a Kindergarten visual art unit that uses the story of "Little Dot" to teach students about lines and patterns. Students first draw their own versions of Little Dot's adventures in the snow, naming and practicing different line types. Later lessons have students using lines to create patterns on a snake character and tracing outlines to form shapes. The unit aims to introduce fundamental art concepts like line and shape while also developing skills in problem-solving, perseverance, and spatial awareness.

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Cymonit Mawile
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36 views11 pages

Liz Brett Art Educator K-5 Hdes

This document provides an overview of a Kindergarten visual art unit that uses the story of "Little Dot" to teach students about lines and patterns. Students first draw their own versions of Little Dot's adventures in the snow, naming and practicing different line types. Later lessons have students using lines to create patterns on a snake character and tracing outlines to form shapes. The unit aims to introduce fundamental art concepts like line and shape while also developing skills in problem-solving, perseverance, and spatial awareness.

Uploaded by

Cymonit Mawile
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Liz Brett

Art Educator K-5


HDES
This Kindergarten visual art unit demonstrates
how visual art can support

•specific grade level content


knowledge & skill development

•common core ‘big ideas’ (habits of mind and


practice which can serve us throughout our
lives)
The unit begins with the story of ‘Little Dot’, a character who is
blown this way and that on a snowy, blustery day, to create a
variety of lines in the snow.

Little Dot Goes Out to Play

Just like you, Little Dot started out very small. But……he grew and grew and
grew….until he became a line! One day he decided to go out and explore the
world. It was a wintry day and when he stepped outside the wind took hold
of him and blew him this way and that away but Little Dot thought this great
fun and he began to run as fast as he could through the snow which had
begun to fall. He ran into the woods and in and out of the trees then Little
Dot began to skip, skippety-skip, skippety-skip and then to jump for joy in the
fluffy white snow. Little dot looked down and there he saw in the snow the
tracks he had made in his play. He saw dashes and loops, he saw zig-zags and
swirls and he laughed with glee……what other patterns can I make in the
snow he thought? He twirled around and began to dance and slip and
slide…….can you imagine the line patterns he made? What patterns would
you like to make in the snow?”
The children create their own versions of the story using
lines to represent movement.
The next step is to name these lines after practice drawing them
in the air, walking them and even drawing them ‘giant sized’ with
water and chalk on the blacktop.
In the next lesson the children use their knowledge of lines to create a
beautiful patterned skin for Salome the ‘Slippery, Slithery Snake’ who
was sad because she had lost her colorful coat.
I saw a slippery, slithery snake
slide through the grasses
making them shake.
He looked at me with his beady eye
“Get out of my pretty green garden!” said I
“s-s-s”, said the slithery snake
as he slid through the grasses making them shake
“I’ve lost my lines, I’ve lost my spots,
my zig-zags, spirals, loops and dots. Please help me find my
patterns and colors
so I can be beautiful like all the others!”
“S-s-s”, said the slithery snake
as he slid through the grasses
making them shake.
We then move on to tracing outlines to form shapes using the
overhead projector and to manipulating materials such as yarn
and paper strips to create ‘three dimensional’ line.
Finally this connection between line and shape is developed to create ‘House Mouse’ a
character who visually evolves from a house into a mouse in the process of the
drawing. This ‘simple shape’ drawing technique is one that we will refine again and
again as drawing skills become more sophisticated over the years.
This unit not only introduces and explores such concepts
fundamental to visual art such as line, shape and pattern but
promotes and develops skills in (for example);

• problem solving
• perseverance
• experimentation
• spatial awareness

Knowledge and skill with the element of line build a strong


foundation for writing and establish an understanding of shape
manipulation & relationships so important in fields like engineering
and architecture.
The unit incorporates both narrative writing and poetry.
Such characterization of concepts helps students retain and transfer
their knowledge.
Please visit the display in the Bailey/’Electric’ Wing!

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