Learn about visual and performing artists. They often use their creativity to raise their voices and share lessons, stories, and important ideas with the world. In this episode of The Creative Corner, two artists from Richmond, Virginia help us explore how art sparks crucial conversations. Public artist Hamilton Glass shares how (and why) he gathered a group of artists to paint murals with a message all across the city after some challenging current events, and musician Victor Haskins talks about storytelling as human nature — and why sound and performance tell stories so well. Then you’re invited to share your own voice through a poster project!

Explore how writers use storyboards to visualize books and movies, learn how actors train and use fight choreography to portray stories on stage, and become a work of art yourself on this episode of The Creative Corner.  Everyone loves a good story.

Students will participate in a 5E lesson. To ENGAGE, students will connect their understanding of similarities between parent and offspring to the fundamental molecule of life: DNA. To EXPLORE, students will participate in interactives to observe, analyze and summarize how genes are used to create proteins and traits. In the EXPLAIN section, students will take notes on DNA replication and the Central Dogma. To ELABORATE on their understanding of DNA, students will participate in a protein synthesis race (game) to practice transcription and translation. Formative evaluations of students's ability to explain the process of protein synthesis include (1) a protein synthesis and codon practice sheet, (2) a labeling activity, and (3) making a recording that models and explain the process. As an extension, students can apply their understanding of mRNA to explain how the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines work. Finally, int summative EVALUATE, students model replication, transcription, and translation as they build an organism!

There are two ways you can collaborate using the tools available on #GoOpenVA.  This screencast demonstrates those two ways.

Creating a Group requires just a little effort and thought.  This shows you how to do it on #GoOpenVA.

Designed for two 90-minute class periods. First students will imagine they are stranded on an island with no way to escape. It has all necessary resources to survive, and they have been tasked with creating their own system of government. Students will work in groups to create a government system, using slides or a poster to display their work.In the next class period, groups will take turns presentig their form of government to the class, and peers will ask them questions about their form of government and discuss if it would last several geerations. Includes Lesson Plan as well as Google Doc/PDF of student handouts and teacher/peer rubrics

Global Art Collaboration. Facilitated by the teacher, students connect with classrooms in other parts of the world to collaborate on a digital work of art in a cloud-based digital art platform.

In the engage section of the 5Elesson, students are introduced to the role of fossils as evidence of evolution and evolutionary relationships by watching a videos about the discovery of Lucy and Ardi and consider what type of information that they can gain from skull fossils. Students will then explore features of skulls from human ancestors and the modern day Homo sapien. After measuring skull to cheekbone ratios, students will create a graph to compare various species. Several interactives are provided to explain fossils, skeletal evidence for human evolution, and phylogenetic trees. Then, students will apply their skills of analyzing data about anatomical similarities and genetic information to depict evolutionary relationships between organisms using cladograms. To evaluate student understanding, students will complete an evolutionary relationships CER.

This interactive and collaborative group activity lets the students master the vocabulary “En ville” and give and follow directions.

This is an instructional strategy that has students work in small groups to construct a "honeycomb" that analyzes a text's structure. Students are given a set of ten honeycomb cards connected to their text and then must work together to assemble the honeycomb by ensuring that all connecting cards can be logically connected through careful analysis of the text. If they cannot successfully argue the connection between literary elements, they must reorganize the honeycomb until all the pieces work together seamlessly. This is a learning strategy that works well during a text unit (as opposed to before or after the unit) and is designed to help students understand the intentionality of a text's structure. It can be paired with any text, but I have provided a sample card set for "Frankenstein" and "The Picture of Dorian Gray" in this resource.

This is an instructional strategy that has students work in small groups to construct a "honeycomb" that analyzes a text's structure. Students are given a set of ten honeycomb cards connected to their text and then must work together to assemble the honeycomb by ensuring that all connecting cards can be logically connected through careful analysis of the text. If they cannot successfully argue the connection between literary elements, they must reorganize the honeycomb until all the pieces work together seamlessly. This is a learning strategy that works well during a text unit (as opposed to before or after the unit) and is designed to help students understand the intentionality of a text's structure. It can be paired with any text, but I have provided a sample card set for "Frankenstein" and "The Picture of Dorian Gray" in this resource.

This is an instructional strategy that has students work in small groups to construct a "honeycomb" that analyzes a text's structure. Students are given a set of ten honeycomb cards connected to their text and then must work together to assemble the honeycomb by ensuring that all connecting cards can be logically connected through careful analysis of the text. If they cannot successfully argue the connection between literary elements, they must reorganize the honeycomb until all the pieces work together seamlessly. This is a learning strategy that works well during a text unit (as opposed to before or after the unit) and is designed to help students understand the intentionality of a text's structure. It can be paired with any text, but I have provided a sample card set for "Frankenstein" and "The Picture of Dorian Gray" in this resource.

This is an introduction to foundational drawing and observational skills, through a series of practice drawings that culminate into a creative still life project. The still life projects focus on foundational observational drawing skills, basic composition, and allow opportunities for student collaboration.

This unit of study allows for students to gain understanding and confidence in figure drawing over a series of 3 separate lessons that result in a collaborative mural. These lessons can be used to facilitate an assessment of student growth and skills development, while still encouraging expression through different types of art explorations and working both individually and collaboratively.

In this printmaking project inspired by the work of Virginia Beach native and artist, Ryan McGinness, students will learn about simplifying complex imagery into basic symbols and design a personalized symbol stamp. They will also get a glimpse of artists working together in a studio environment. Students will print their symbols on a collaborative work of art in addition to creating individual prints.

Students learn communication and collaboration skills for theatre with improvisation games. Once games are learned and practiced, improvisation teams are formed and opportunities are given for students to perform for a live audience.

There is a mystery in the music room and students will solve it by working together. In these three short activities, students will actively listen to the order in which instruments perform, work to create a “Blob Opera” quartet, and identify which type of ensemble matches the description. If they get all three secret codes, the music room might just be saved!

During this lesson, students will work in teams to plan, construct, and test a functional miniature golf sculpture while they explore topics related to collaboration, design thinking, and peer critique. A focus on specific art production skills such as armature building and rendering objects using paper mâché will be explored. The finished artwork will be peer reviewed for creativity, craftsmanship, and challenge. 

In this lesson, students work in groups of 3-4 students to analyze their paired novella in order to deepen their understanding of the text. Each student takes on a specific role - leader, skeptic, or scribe in order to form an assertion, support that assertion with evidence, and refine their assertion in order to craft a clear, specific argument. In addition to providing a collaborative, multi-modal analysis experience, this lesson also incorporates movement and reflection and is easily adaptable to any paired text or close-reading skill.