Representational Art: Line and Shape to create Cityscapes with Space!

For these two class periods, the First Grade students were introduced to Cityscape. We began by reading the book Tar Beach and discussing how the city is depicted with shapes. The students were shown that buildings close to us appeared to have the largest windows. We then noticed that buildings that were overlapped appeared further away with smaller windows. The buildings that were behind all others were the farthest distance requiring nothing more than dots or slashes. This is an introductory lesson to space and use of shape! The students have now been introduced to Abstract and Representational art, and are able to recognize that the artist is arranging shapes and lines in a thoughtful and intentional way!