Lesson 1 - LearningThroughMuseums

Lesson 5
Choices
Summary
In this lesson, students learn how to interpret the ideas expressed in an artist’s representation of
contemporary life using skills that they also would apply when reading a text. The focus is a painting
about the Great Migration, when African Americans chose to move to the northern part of the United
States in search of improved working and living conditions. Students infer the motives of persons in a
painting and analyze the context of the situation. They apply writing skills to explain their insights.
Featured Artworks
Walter Ellison (American, 1899–1977)
Train Station, 1935
Oil on cardboard
8 x 14 in
Illinois Benchmarks
Reading
1.A.2b:
1.B.2a:
1.C.2e:
1.C.2b:
Writing
3.B.2a:
3.C.2a:
Clarify word meaning in a glossary.
Establish purposes for reading: survey materials; ask questions; make predictions;
connect, clarify, and extend ideas.
Explain how authors and illustrators use text and art to express their ideas.
Make and support inferences and form interpretations about main themes and topics.
Generate and organize ideas using a variety of planning strategies.
Write for a variety of purposes and for specified audiences in a variety of forms.
Social Studies
17.A.2b: Use maps to gather information about people and places.
17.C.2b: Describe the relationships among location of resources, population distribution and
economic activities.
18.A.2: Explain ways in which artistic creations communicate about a culture.
Art
25.B.2:
26.B.2d:
Understand how elements and principles combine within an art form to express ideas.
Demonstrate knowledge and skills to create works of visual art using problem solving,
observing, designing, sketching and constructing.
80 • Lesson 5: Choices