Pre-assessment: Students should have basic drawing skills and be able to recognize that artists use different techniques to create shading effects.

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1 LESSON PLAN: Fifth Grade TITLE: Illustration Techniques CONCEPT: Artist as Storyteller CONCEPT QUESTIONS: - Can a comic strip be called art? Why? - What shading techniques might an illustrator use and why? Established Goals: EL.4, EL.11 Essential Questions: - How can you tell a story with art? - What is the artwork and what is it about? ASSESSMENT: Pre-assessment: Students should have basic drawing skills and be able to recognize that artists use different techniques to create shading effects. Ongoing assessment: Students will learn about and use pencil shading, hatching and cross-hatching to create shadows and form in their drawings. Summative Assessment: Are students able to use these techniques effectively? Are students able to identify, practice and choose a preferred method of these techniques? Students will KNOW: How to tell a story and how to read a comic strip. Students will UNDERSTAND: Problem solving is an important part of the art making process. Students will DO: Create a 6-panel comic strip, incorporating drawing and shading techniques used by illustrators. KEY CRITERIA: - Ss will practice shading with a pencil, hatching and cross-hatching techniques. - Ss will create a 6-frame comic strip that tells a story or joke with a beginning, middle or end. OR create a 6- frame comic strip that is the beginning of an indefinitely longer story that makes the reader want to read more. This strip will incorporate the shading technique of the Ss choice. LESSON SEQUENCE: Session 1: Intro, demonstration of shading techniques

2 SET-UP: - Greet Ss and introduce them to writer and illustrator Shaun Tan s work (select illustrations from The Arrival) and Maurice Sendak s Where the Wild Things Are (and other illustrations). Something these two works have a lot of is shading but the illustrators chose different techniques (and media) to create lights and darks in their work. Look at the images and discuss what media and what kinds of marks made the shading: o Ss may have a hard time identifying media by sight: describe what the media (pencil or pen) can do and what it looks like on paper. Pencil can create continuous, grey tones. Pen is always solid black and needs shading techniques to create tones. - Define light source and discuss where light might be coming from to cast the shadows in the illustrations. Ask how they can tell where the light is coming from (lights and darks). Discuss the terms value and tone as well as shading. - Shading with a pencil: all about pressure and patience. Instruct students to do the following in their journals with a pencil: describe the way they should hold their pencil, and work along with them on scrap paper. o Try to make a mark without pushing down on the paper at all, just touching the pencil to it and moving the pencil, and the mark will be very light. Press down hard, very dark. Make a mark starting out light and go all the way to dark, or vice versa. Tilt the pencil for better coverage and make marks evenly across the paper with consistent, steady pressure, and you ll make an even tone. - Hatching and cross-hatching: usually done with a pen (you can use pencil to practice and graduate to pen if you re feeling confident) involves lots of lines. Usually made very quickly because the artist has had a lot of experience and practice, lines that go only in one direction are hatching lines. Lines that cross are crosshatch lines. Hatching is rarely used without cross hatching in the same image. I like to use them both. o Can anyone guess why it s called hatching? What do you think of when you hear the word hatching? (an egg) Hatching actually got its name from the sound the pen makes when it goes across the paper. Our pens don t do it as well, but remember old pens that were made out of feathers? They made a noise that sounded like ha-tch, ha-tch when it went across the paper. - After discussing and demonstrating these techniques, look at the artists works again and identify the kinds of techniques each of them used. - Hand out and explain a worksheet that allows students to practice these methods. Pass out pencils and erasers, have ball-point pens available for students who think they d like to try them. - The worksheets should include: o Value scales: completed examples and blank squares for students to fill in. o Light-source example and practice. o Pre-drawn characters for students to practice shading in. o The final page(s) of the worksheets will provide brainstorming for the final project: If you could write a comic book or any story with pictures, what would it be about? Who would the characters be, what would they do? You have 6 comic strip panels to tell a story or joke: what will you draw and write? There will be 6 blank squares to draw an initial comic strip idea. If their ideas seem sound, they may practice on the larger sheets of practice 6-square paper. If they mess up, have them sketch 6 squares on the backs of the worksheet pages. - Allow time for clean-up. - Have materials accessible for supply patrols to distribute. Session 2: Comics as art; Working

3 - Greet Class. Review what shading techniques we talked about last time. Introduce the 6-frame comic strip project assignment, where we ll be using some of those techniques. - Look at work from Jeff Smith s Bone (ppt). Many students have probably read this series. When Jeff Smith decided he wanted to write a book, he wanted to create a 500 page EPIC novel. So he did. He used characters that he had been drawing since he was five-year-old! It took him years to finish his book, but he did it because after he started writing Bone and publishing it, people really liked his work and they encouraged him to keep creating it. How are Jeff Smith s illustrations different from Maurice Sendak s? Some things to consider: o Bone is a comic book, WTWA is a picture book, SO: o The pictures are smaller, there s more of them. o Both sets of images tell a story in sequence. o The speech is in bubbles. o *The shading techniques are different.* - Smith s work is more dependent on line-work that doesn t involve shading techniques like hatching and cross hatching. His characters look more like cartoons. This helps them stand out from the background more. (the background tends to have more shading/detail in it). This is a technique that Ss are allowed to use in their comic strip. They can choose to leave the character(s) without shading, focusing on the line work (outline, mouth, facial features all count as line work if left un-shaded.) The comic strips will be in black and white (most comic strips are colored later by a different artist), so the line work and shading are super important. If time allows, have students go over their line work (including hatching and cross-hatching) with pen/fine marker. - Set Ss to work: o Finishing the practice packet from previous session o Practicing on the larger 6-frame practice paper, making decisions about shading and practice drawing lightly. o Start on final paper. Draw lightly so erasing is easier (part of good line work). Trace with pen/marker. - Allow time for clean-up. Session 3 or 4 depending on progress: Finishing/critique - Greet Class and review previous progress. Depending on progress, begin or end with critique. - Work on finishing projects: Inform Ss what they should not shade with a pencil on their final drawings. They should use the pencil to draw the outlines and then put in the shading with marker. Also, they should not trace with marker on the practice paper. - Critique is administered by worksheet with a number of questions for students to reflect upon.

4 Fifth Grade: Shading Techniques and Comic Strips Name: 1. Why is shading important in an artwork or illustration? 2. In your opinion, are comics art? Give one reason why you think that. 3. What do you like or dislike about your comic strip? 4. If you could do this project over again, what s one thing you might do differently? 5. Shade the spheres in this picture using your favorite shading technique you ve learned. Label the light source.

5 VOCABULARY: - Illustration - Comic strip/comics/graphic Novel - Shading/Value - Hatching/Cross-hatching - Line work - Light source RESOURCES: Maurice Sendak s Where the Wild Things Are (images from) Jeff Smith s Bone (# 1) in black and white if possible (images from) - Or selected pages. MATERIALS: - Worksheets - Power Point Presentations - Student Journals/sketchbooks - Pencils - Sharpie Markers (fine and ultra-fine point) - 18x24 newsprint practice paper with pre-drawn 6 squares - 18x24 white final paper with pre-drawn 6 squares MODIFICATIONS: - On the worksheet, it may be necessary to have the 6 squares take up a whole page: Ss have trouble working in such small spaces. Emphasize that these drawings should be quick sketches: Ss may use stick figures! This is just for planning: positioning the characters and scripting the words, it should only take a few minutes. Show Ss an example of an artist s sketch to give them an idea of how this process works if possible. - To help students visualize shading and light source, it may help to have a model (I used a stuffed animal of a popular character it helps if it is one-toned) stand under a lamp (a desk lamp, propped up slightly taller than the model will suffice). Have students look at the model and consider: o Where is the light source? o Which part of the model s body is lighter? Darker? o What would you need to do with your shading techniques to show this part lighter? This part darker? The parts in between? - Students may need more instruction on drawing lightly with their pencils first: they will be tracing over these lines with marker, then erasing the pencil, so it s not necessary to have them very dark. - Students may benefit from: o Suggested subject matter/theme: while some students seem to have an idea (or two) for their comics right away, other will struggle with what to tell a story about. Have suggested characters, themes, stories, or jokes available for these students or for the entire class.

6 o Smaller frames. Instead of working with 18x24 sheets of paper with six frames (that are roughly 4 inches square), use smaller papers with smaller frames: the shading techniques can be exhausting when applied to large spaces. Alternately, use fewer frames (4), or other variations or requirements to direct student effort: Have no words in the comic/or only in a certain number of frames. Require shading only in the background around the characters or from the edges of the frame. Show Ss different kinds of shading used in different spaces: shading a forest in the background is different from shading a sky, etc. - Variation: Instead of one practice and one final, have Ss do two finals: one shaded in pencil and one in pen, using the same comic strip story and art. Limit the size so this doesn t become too much work.