Terra Foundation for American Art Teacher Lab

Name: _Brenda Stevens____ School: _Wildwood IB Elementary__ Subject: _Art/ Social Studies______

Lesson Plan

Theme of the unit: ____Movement and consequences_______________________ Topic of the Lesson: _The Great Migration________________________________ Timeframe: __4-7 days__________________________________________________ Illinois Learning Standard(s): ! 3B Compose well-organized and coherent writing for specific purposes and audience. ! 5B Analyze and evaluate information acquired from various sources. ! 18A Compare characteristics of culture as reflected in language, literature, the arts, traditions and institutions. ! 27B Understand how the arts shape and reflect history, society and everyday life. ! T1 Students will appreciate American Art. Chicago Reading Initiative Correlation: x_word knowledge x_writing x_reading __fluency Student Objectives (Students will. . . ): 3.B.3a Produce a letter that conveys a clear understanding and interpretation of ideas and information and displays focus, organization, elaboration and coherence. 5.B.4a Evaluate primary and secondary sources (print and non-print) to draw conclusions about Ellisons Train Station. 18.A.3 Explain how the arts contribute to the development and transmission of culture. 27.B.3 Know and describe how Train Station increases understanding of our society, past and present.

Vocabulary students will learn: Great Migration Jim Crow laws Great Depression Segregation Standard of Living

Foreground Background Symbol Movement Repetition Line

American artwork(s) that relate closely to the theme or topic: Title 1.Train Station 2. The Migration of the Negro, panels 1,3 and 12 Artist Walter Ellison Jacob Lawrence Collection Art Institute of Chicago The Phillips Collection, Washington D.C.

Key Information to be presented ARTIST Born in Eatonton, Georgia Migrated north through Macon, Georgia in the 1920s to Chicago 1930s: attended the School of the Art Institute 1940s: employed by WPA/FAP and helped form South Side Community Art Center (still in progress). Actively involved in the South Side Community Art Center Had his work featured in The Art of the American Negro (1851-1940) and the First Annual Negro Exhibition at Atlanta University in 1942. Ellison had first-hand experience of the migration. ARTWORK Migration, relocation, segregation Vertical and diagonal lines show separation, train movement, the future and hope for prosperity When he put his initials on the suitcase, autobiographical account Reflect social values of that time (Jim Crow Laws, separation, segregation) There is much different between the black and white passengers. Prosperity/personal experiences Image of train symbolizes movement Repetition, body posture also show movement HISTORICAL CONTEXT Reference to Great Migration (after W WI, 1914-1918) Great Migration was a crucial stage in the development of the African American working class Segregation (South Jim Crow Laws were supported by Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896 which called for separate but equal facilities, yet this rarely occurred where the separate facilities were truly equal.) Limitations on immigrationopened industrial job opportunities for Blacks due to WWI jobs opened up Uprising of KKK in Southterror Drought/boll weevils on southern land/crops

Northgood schools, voting, public accommodations Painted in 1935reflects American historic event (make the past usable). Images of Chicago Defender show African American success in the North.
Source(s): Bailey, Maria, Train Station Poster Packet, The Art Institute of Chicago, 2003. Rossen, et.al., African Americans in Art: Selections from the Art Institute of Chicago Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999.

Key Pointsthemes & ideas central to lesson and artwork " People move in order to improve their standard of living. " Art reflects this movement. " One persons decision affects generations. " Every family has a story to tell. Resources High-quality art reproductions: Where will you get them and in what format? Source (e.g., Terra handout, museum store, Web site URL, etc.): Poster from Art Institute of Chicago, image online Format (e.g., overhead transparency, poster, jpeg, etc.): Poster and jpeg What texts, Web sites, and other primary and secondary sources will students review? 1. One Way Ticket by Langston Hughes (primary) 2. Poster packet from the Art Institute of Chicago (secondary) 3. Excerpt from African Americans in Art: Selections from the Art Institute of Chicago on p. 57-58 (secondary) 4. http://www.whitney.org/jacoblawrence/art/migration.html - view Lawrences image of migration, specifically The Migration of the Negro, panel 1, 3, 12 (primary) 5. Migration Stories (primary) from http://www.uic.edu/educ/bctpi/pt3/greatmigration.html and http://www.loc.gov/ehibits/africanafam011.html What other materials/supplies are needed for the lesson/unit? Large poster paper/markers LCD projector, laptop

Student Activities Day 1 Analyze and observe the artwork by Walter Ellison Train Station. Emphasis of this Lesson Idea/Outcome Activities 1. Introductory activity: Project the image of the artwork without the title. Students list what they see (silently) on their own paper. (Keep image posted for the entire week.) 2. Complete a close read of the image using the introductory activity as a foundation for formal analysis. (What did you see? What are the people doing? Where are they?) 3. Complete the contextual analysis with teacher assistance. Encourage students to justify their responses. (What is the main idea? What would be a good title of the artwork? Is there anything that seems out of place in this artwork? What adjectives would you use to describe the artwork?)

Students will discuss movement as it is reflected in the painting.

1. Introductory Activity: Students review what they discussed from the close read. 2. Discuss how the painting shows movement by looking at the diagonal lines and body posture. Also, consider how there is a pull between the two groups of people. 3. Look at images by Jacob Lawrences series The Migration of the Negro, specifically panels 1,3, and 12. Compare this idea of movement that was discussed in Train Station. Note lines, body posture, repetition and the train. Students respond 1. Introductory Activity: Review how movement is expressed to viewing of art through a two-dimensional painting. through creation. 2. Students will look at Train Station again and will work with collage and a professional artist to create their own image that shows movement. Remind students of how this is done through line, body posture, repetition and objects like trains. 3. Students create their own image that shows movement. 1. Introductory Activity: Hand out One Way Ticket by Langston Work Hughes. Read through together. collaboratively to 2. Pass out two secondary sources for Train Station. Students jigsaw information read independently, and then meet together in small groups to about the historical determine the historical context, information about the author context, author and list descriptions of the image. and image Train 3. Students complete a poster for whichever topic they were Station. assigned. Next, the group shares the information they found. 4. Teacher asks students to make conclusions about the image. 1. Introduction/review: Students will review what meanings can Students will be gleaned from the image Train Station by Ellison. discuss The Great 2. Ask students what it would be like to move from the South to Migration on a the North at this time period as an African American. (How larger scale. would the travelers feel? Why? What might be some

6 Write a letter that would draw or discourage people to move to Chicago.

7 Share written work.

fears/hopes?) 3. Discuss the Chicago Defender and its influential role in The Great Migration. 4. Look at some letters from the migration period. Pass out one letter to each group. Groups read together and infer how the author feels and determine the reason for the move. 5. Homework: Ask students how a family member came to live in Chicago, Illinois. This could be an international migration or a national migration. How did each student come to live in this city? 1. Introductory Activity: Students share what they found out about a family member with the rest of their group. 2. As a class compile a list of reasons why people moved here. Then ask groups to categorize the reasons into larger ideas: family, opportunity, problems in homeland etc. (Students title the groups themselves.) 3. Explain how students will write a letter describing why a person should or should not move to Chicago. Describe opportunity from the point of view of someone who already lives here, or take what experiences families have had to determine the reason for people to move. (Compare this to Chicago Defender.) 4. Begin writing letter. Complete for homework. 1. Final activity: pass around the letters so students can read the various works. Discuss which letter would convince you to move to Chicago if you lived somewhere else. Then ask which letters could have been published in the Chicago Defender in the 1930s, if any.