This was the first project I introduced as a long-term substitute and the first unit I ever taught as a high school art teacher. During my transition period with the regular classroom teacher, she had mentioned that she was concerned about her students’ struggle with critical and independent thinking. This led me to introduce my first unit with plenty of choice, and these students truly rose to the occasion.

Project Description:

I chose colored pencil as the medium for this class because it was a skill that I personally needed to focus on. I started the lesson by workshopping advanced colored pencil techniques with my students. The skills we focused on were: blending with paper towels, blending with colorless blenders, and creating undertones. Students practiced these skills on toned paper as well.

Once we had workshopped our colored pencil techniques, I introduced the big idea: TIME. I prompted them with some higher-level discussion starters, such as:

• Think about who you were on this day, one year ago.
• Think about the effect that time has on a sapling.
• When does time seem to go by the quickest for you?
• How different do you think your life will be 3 years from now?
• How are different species affected by the passage of time?
• Where have you seen references of time in works of art?

After students had their discussion and took visual notes on their ideas about time, they began sketching. They completed 5 thumbnail sketches of different concepts regarding time, then chose their favorite one, which eventually became their final work of art. Students chose the size and tone of paper they would like to use.