Lesson Plan #:AELP-ARA0020
Submitted by: Jamie Juergens
Endorsed by: P. Sean Smith, Ph. D.
Berea College, Berea, KY Date: January 31, 1998
Grade Level(s): Kindergarten
Subject(s):
- Arts/Visual Arts
- Arts/Computers in art
Objectives:
Students create products and make presentations that convey concepts and feelings.
Overview:
During Kindergarten, children learn many fundamentals of life, such as the alphabet, colors, and how to tie their shoes. At this age, curiosity is one of their main characteristics and nearly everything is interesting to them. Therefore, learning is not only vital to their development, it’s exciting. As adults, we often take for granted the simple things we learned in Kindergarten; instead, we must pause and realize the importance of those lessons. If we had never learned how to distinguish colors, we would never have been given driving privileges because we would constantly be running red lights. Our ability to give descriptions would also be greatly impaired. In this lesson, students will learn basic colors. Students will visit several web sites that will help them identify colors and even let them color pictures on the computer screen using the keyboard. This lesson will familiarize them with using computers and the Internet.
Learner Outcomes:
After this lesson, students will:
- be aware that many colors exist
- identify the colors red, orange, yellow, blue, white, and green
- understand more about the importance of colors, especially how colors can make us happy or sad
Procedure 1. Ask students if they know the color of an apple, orange, the sun, sky, clouds, and grass. Some students may be familiar with these, but I don’t expect all of them to be. This subject is one that all the students must learn at this early age. Although the lesson may be review for some, they will still benefit, particularly by learning more about the importance of colors. Talk about each of the above colors. The objects mentioned above should be familiar objects that will help them remember the colors.
2. Explain to students that there are many other colors than the ones mentioned above- the world is a very colorful place. Tell them that we are learning these colors first ,and we will talk about others later.
3. Next, students will use the computers and I will help them access the Internet.
4. Students will be instructed to click on the Open Location box. Realizing that most of them won’t be able to read, I will probably do this. The first address we will visit is: www.randomhouse.com/seussville/titles/days/
5. Next, we will click on the box called My Many Colored Days. A cartoon figure will appear as a color, and a simple sentence describes the color. Then, students click on the Dr. Seuss hand which points as an arrow would to reveal the next color. As the words on the screen are read to them, they will be able to associate the color to those words. This should help them distinguish the colors.
6. Students will repeat the clicking enough times so that they will see each color several times. This repetition will help them learn colors more quickly.
7. The next site the students will go to is: members.aol.com/RainboLand/index.htm
A story called Rainbow Land is at this site with brightly colored pictures of the characters that help explain the events.
8. Students will click on the Next Page option after I read each page to them. As they follow along, they will learn how colors can influence people. For example, the kids in the story begin to be sad because they keep throwing away toys with pretty colors as they get tired of playing with them. They start to miss all the colors that once made them happy when they saw them.
9. The Rainbow Land site gives them the option to print out pictures from the story that they can color. Students can either choose to do this or go to: http://www.landbeforetime.com/greatvalley/index.html
This site allows kids to color a coloring book page that they use the keyboard to color pictures from the movie The Land Before Time. Time permitting, students can do both activities, but this is doubtful because a couple of activities remain to assess what they learned. Students will be able to return to the other activity during free time throughout the week if not done today.
Extensions:
- The next day, students can review their colors by playing a color game. One person will pick an object in the room and tells everyone what color it is. Then, students look for things that color and make guesses. The one who answers correctly wins the round and starts the next round.
- Students can make up a song about colors that helps them remember the colors. They could use words that rhyme with a particular color to help them remember it.
- Students can bring in an object to show the class and describe its color, and why the color is important to them. (It could be their favorite color or may remind them of something happy. For example, I associate yellow with happiness because of sunshine, and the yellow smiley face you see on shirts and bumper stickers).
- If students have learned the colors, they can use paint later in the week and mix colors together to create new colors. Then, we can discuss those colors.
Assessment
- At the end of class, students will be asked to write the first six letters of the alphabet. I will tell them to write each letter in a specific color (one of the colors they learned from the lesson). For example, I may ask them to write A with a red crayon, B with a blue crayon, etc.
- Students will be given a printout of a bookmark with the cartoon figure on it from Dr. Seuss. I will ask them to color the bookmark with a few of those 6 colors they learned. I will walk around while they are coloring and ask each of them what color they are using and what the other colors they may have already used are.
- I can point to objects in the classroom and call on students to tell me its color.
- We will discuss how colors can affect people. I will ask them to recall the Rainbow Land story and tell me what made the kids so unhappy.