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Lesson Plans


Re: 6th grade question.....

From: artrageous
Date: Sat Jul 22 2000 - 22:42:55 PDT

  • Next message: The Austin's: "Re: 6th grade question....."

    I teach 5th through 12th graders at a small private school. (Now THERE's a
    mix of ages and stages!)

    After years in an elementary school where the 5th graders were the "big
    guys," it was amazing to see how young and immature kids of this age seem
    when compared to the older students! (I enjoyed the diversity, though.)

    I didn't see much of a difference between 5th and 6th graders last year.
    7th graders were generally okay--not as silly as the younger ones, but not
    as cocky as the 8th graders.

    Major difference between the jr. school (5th-7th) and upper school
    (8th-12th) was the energy level. (Of course over half of my young kids were
    ADHD and that made a difference, too!)

    Again, though, as Bunki said, I think your point of view has a lot to do
    with it, but I can relate to the questions about nudity--last year when my
    young kids were studying the art of the Sistine Chapel, one 5th grader was
    VERY interested in some of the "naked ladies"..... Most of the time when
    they'd ask questions about it, I'd just be very matter-of-fact, treat it
    like it was no big deal, etc. And somewhere I read that gods were usually
    portrayed naked, lesser gods were partially clothed, etc. I shared this
    with my students and said that it was kind of like they were seen as perfect
    beings, just the way they were, and that's why they were portrayed
    (sometimes) with no clothes on.

    This approach seemed a whole lot healthier than not talking about it at all,
    and yet I didn't get into a whole big discussion about it. Just sort of
    kept it casual.

    Still, though, I'm not going to make a point of showing a lot of artwork
    that has nudity in it to this age group. In fact, I ruled out a particular
    painting today as I was starting to plan a unit on the art of the Middle
    Ages for the junior school students. I can find another (clothed)
    example...somewhere...

    Sharon
    WEBSITE: http://www.bigfoot.com/~artrageous
    Featuring art and art lesson plans, examples of my
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    EMAIL: artrageous
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