Planning the inquiry
1. What is our purpose?
Theme
How We Express OurselvesAn inquiry into the ways in which we discover
and express ideas, feelings, nature, culture,
beliefs, and values; the ways in which we reflect
on, extend and enjoy our creativity; our
appreciation of the aesthetic.
To inquire into the following:
Age
Class/grade: Units
group:
of Inquiry 4*
Grade 4
School
code:
Title: Artistic Expressions
Teacher(s):
Proposed duration
number of hours: over number of weeks:
Transdisciplinary Theme
(5 Weeks)
2. What do we want to learn?
[How We Express Ourselves)
Central Idea
[Artists manipulate light and colour to express
their ideas.]
What are the key concepts (form,
function, causation, change, connection,
perspective, responsibility, reflection) to
be emphasized within this inquiry?
Function, connection, perspective
Related Concepts: Discovery, Forms of
energy (Light)
What lines of inquiry will define the scope
of the inquiry into the central idea?
Summative assessment task(s):
What are the possible ways of assessing students’
understanding of the central idea? What evidence,
including student-initiated actions, will we look
for?



[the scientific properties of light
and colour and how they are seen ]
[the use of colour and light to
create mood in the arts ]
[a case study of how an artist uses
light and colour]
After viewing impressionist paintings, students
choose one to CONSTRUCT and DESIGN a
painting that they found interesting. Student had
What teacher questions/provocations will
to analyze the colours used by the artist and the
drive these inquiries?
subject of the painting to describe the mood the
painting portrayed. Student then used gridding to
draw the painting on canvas. Student then created
a new version of the painting, keeping the subject How is light and colour created?
the same, but changing the colours so the painting
portrayed a new mood. After, students compared How emotions are expressed through
the original piece of art to their new version and
paintings?
reflected upon which mood best suited the subject.
What are key characteristics of major art
genres?
Evidence of student understanding is that they can
analyze the mood and explain how they
manipulated light and colour to change the mood.
student questions(2005/06)
© International Baccalaureate Organization 2007
Planning the inquiry
3. How might we know what we
have learned?
This column should be used in
conjunction with "How best might we
learn?"
What are the possible ways of assessing
students’ prior knowledge and skills?
What evidence will we look for?
PRE-ASSESSMENT
-Students are given paint and asked to
make different colours, shades and
tones, as well as demonstrate different
brush techniques - Emma Hawks (Art
Specialist) was an excellent resource
throughout this unit and really taught the
students a lot about different painting
techniques and brushstrokes
What are the possible ways of assessing
student learning in the context of the
lines of inquiry? What evidence will we
4. How best might we learn?
What are the learning experiences
suggested by the teacher and/or
students to encourage the students to
engage with the inquiries and address
the driving questions?
- Students will learn about the scientific
method in a modelled experiment
-Students will then apply the scientific
method to a series of scientific
experiments learning that light travels in
a straight path, light can be reflected and
refracted, and that light can be
absorbed.
- Students will examine how colour can
be used in poetry to elicit mood in text.
- students will practice gridding so that
they learn how to enlarge items.
-use photos of landscapes (particularly of
sunrises and sunsets) and see how the
gradients of colour effect solid objects.
- Examine "Isolation Peak" by Lawren
look for?
- Students will select a piece of art and
discuss how it makes them feel.
- After viewing various pieces of art,
students will have to write
about the different moods portrayed by
various pieces of art. Isolation Peak by
Lawren Harris was excellent for this.
-Students will apply ratio and use
gridding to enlarge/ shrink an object
Harris and discussed how light and colour
was used to create a mood.
-Students will explore different forms of
poetry
-Read "Chasing Vermeer" as a readaloud.
-Visit the Vancouver Art Gallery and
participate in a tour/workshop.
Teacher will review and mainly focus
on grammar and vocabulary taught
from kindergarten to grade 4, to
describe some Spanish art pictures.
Looking at a variety of Spanish
Artists will be covered if time
permits.
Scientific Method
- Students engaged in a variety of
experiments and completed lab write
ups.
Artist Rubric(2005/2006)
What opportunities will occur for
transdisciplinary skills development and
for the development of the attributes of
the learner profile?
Artist Biogrpahy rubric(06-07)
Artist Project Outline(2005/06)
Light and Colour Unit test(06-07)
Transdisciplinary Skills:
Peer sharing about artist
Thinking Skills: students will use
analysis to identify art that appeals to
them, as well as fits in with
criteria. They will also need to identify
their persepective on a piece of art.
Communication Skills: Students will
view paintings and explain how it makes
them feel. Students will also
communicate how they worked with
colour through visual media to portray a
mood
Learner Profile:
Knowledgeable: Students will need to be
knowledgeable about light and colour in
order to paint their pictures
Reflective: They will need to reflect on
whether their use of colour was effective
in communcating their intended mood to
others.
Colour and Light Power Point
Roussea Response Sheet
Rousseau Rubric
Art Genre Descriptors
Artist Note-taking sheet
Matching Game(2004/05)
Experiment with light(transparent,
opaque, translu
How the Eye Sees(2005/06)
Light Basics Reading Comp. &
Questions(
Worksheet on Colours
Religious Significance of colors(05/06)
Why is the sky blue? reading
&questions(2005/06)
5. What resources need to be gathered?
What people, places, audio-visual materials, related literature, music, art, computer
software, etc, will be available?
[Field Trip to Vancouver Art Gallery
How will the classroom environment, local environment, and/or the community be
used to facilitate the inquiry?
[Mirrors, prisms, lenses and various science activity experiments about light, and
colour.
Research resources about artists and art history, define and discuss the different art
movements such as realism, impressionism,
Science videos - Bill Nye Light and Optics],various discovery learning videos on art
genres and artists
www.artinthepicture.com, Contact Ms. Hawkes about coming in to teach new brush
techniques.
There were two video resources from the VPL that were great. One was on various
art periods and the other was I can fly?
© International Baccalaureate Organization 2007
Reflecting on the inquiry
6. To what extent did we achieve our
purpose?
7. To what extent did we include the
elements of the PYP?
Assess the outcome of the inquiry by
providing evidence of students’
understanding of the central idea. The
reflections of all teachers involved in the
planning and teaching of the inquiry
should be included.
What were the learning experiences that
enabled students to:


Through their presentations, students
demonstrated a solid understanding of

develop an understanding of the
concepts identified in "What do
we want to learn?"
demonstrate the learning and
application of particular
transdisciplinary skills?
develop particular attributes of
the learner profile and/or
attitudes?
the central idea and were able to offer
their own interpretations.
In each case, explain your selection.
CONCEPTS:
Assess the outcome of the inquiry by
providing evidence of students’
understanding of the central idea. The
reflections of all teachers involved in the
planning and teaching of the inquiry
should be included.
Function- Through the science
experiments, students learned about the
scientific principles of light and how light
affects how objects are seen and
processed.
perspective- students viewed and
analayzed a number of different works of
arts and discussed how the artwork
made them feel.
How you could improve on the
assessment task(s) so that you would
have a more accurate picture of each
student’s understanding of the central
idea.
This year students had a better
understading of various painting
techniques. Next year we need to
discuss and work on planning the mood
of their painting more
extensively. Students often used
appropriate colours to portray the
intended mood, however some project
became a bit of a paint by number.
SKILLS:
Thinking skills: Students used dialectical
thought when viewing different works of
art and then had to work on
communicating their emotional response
to the artwork to their peers. This was a
great way for students to learn about the
highly subjective nature of art and learn
how to communicate their subjective
thoughts to others who may have a
different perspective.
LEARNER PROFILE/ ATTITUDES:
What was the evidence that connections
were made between the central idea and
the transdisciplinary theme?
The focus was on how artists express
ideas and feelings through paintings, and
an appreciation of the aesthetic.
-Students were risk-takers as many were
not comfortable working with paint and
canvas.
-Students developed their appreciation of
the creativity in artists. Students need
to identify a mood that they wanted to
portray and then use their knowledge of
light and colour to creatively change the
mood of their art.
© International Baccalaureate Organization 2007
Reflecting on the inquiry
8. What student-initiated inquiries
arose from the learning?
Record a range of student-initiated
inquiries and student questions and
highlight any that were incorporated into
the teaching and learning.
[Please begin typing here]
At this point teachers should go back to
box 2 “What do we want to learn?” and
highlight the teacher
questions/provocations that were most
effective in driving the inquiries.
What student-initiated actions arose
from the learning?
Record student-initiated actions taken by
individuals or groups showing their ability
to reflect, to choose and to act.
[Please begin typing here]
9. Teacher Notes
The trip to the Vancouver Art Gallery was
very worthwhile, particularly when
combined with a workshop. It would be
beneficial to book this early and try to
find a workshop that more closely aligns
with the central idea and painting. If
possible, we would like to visit more than
one art gallery to give students more
bredth/exposure to various styles of art
and exhibits. - This year we booked early
and it was awesome. Both classes were
explosed to a different exhibit.
"Chasing Vermeer" had number of
engaging concepts that would be
worthwhile uncovering a more in-depth
novel study (such as the use of math in
art, forgery, the nature and perspectives
of artwork). We would like to do more of
a study into Vermeer as he is known his
calculated use of light in his paintings.
This year the students learned about the
concepts of light before engaging in the
experiments and most were able to apply
what they had learned into their lab
reports. Also, we had one experiment
that compared the primary colours of
light and the primary colours of
pigments.
Students are planning summer trips to
the Vancouver Art Gallery with their
families.
Combine more poetry - have students
write a poem that is inspired by thier
piece of art.
Students were excited to talk about
previous trips that they had made to the
VAG and were able to make connections
between our class field trip and previous
times they visited.
Three students brought in art work they
had completed outside of school to share
with the class.
There were several instances where
students applied the knowledge learned
throughtthe light experiments into
everyday outside of class.
I think this unit is a great component to
finish grade 4 Spanish curriculum. The
summative of task reflected the growth
of each student regarding Spanish
vocabulary and grammar concepts
taught. There was not enough time to go
over Spanish artists lessons; however,
the pictures that the students described
during formative and summative tasks
were from different artistic pictures
(photograph of a Spanish-speaking place
or a photo of a Spanish-speaking artist's
art or work). During the overall review,
students were concerned about the
summative task, but at the end they
realized how much they know and can
put in practice. This is a hard grade for
the students who have been having
difficulty learning this second language
through the PYP years. An update will be
delivered to the grade 5 Spanish
teacher.