This lesson guides students to carefully observe of works of art, leading to deeper understanding of cultural and historical background. This lesson introduces thinking and analysis strategies that students will use frequently in art class and beyond. This lesson is also great to way to formatively assess student skills related to language acquisition, critical thinking, analysis, and communication.

This session will use various cognitive routines (such as "See-Think-Wonder") to guide educators on how to lead classroom discussions of printed music which uses traditional and nontraditional notation, with young students. Concepts and strategies covered in this session will focus on the Music Standards of Learning of the strand: Critical Thinking and Communication.

In this video (4:30), a Virginia middle school art teacher explains how to use a thinking routine to explore cultural and historical context of works of art.