This window portrays St. George and the Dragon and is called Louis
Comfort Tiffany and studio (American, 1848-1933). There were many paintings and
pieces of art that stood out to me and I saw potential lessons in but this one
stood out to me because in my math content courses this semester we have talked
a lot about fractions. I could see this piece of art being used in the
introduction to a unit on fractions. In the artwork, the window is partitioned
(math term for split up!) into 7 pieces. However, with fractions, to be able to
call each piece "1/7," the pieces would need to be equal which they
aren't.
I would begin by having a picture of the piece of art up on the
board and having students share thoughts on why I had this specific piece of
art up in a math classroom. Going off of this, once the students realized that
we are learning about fractions in class, asking the students to talk and write about
what they know about fractions and whether or not each piece in the artwork is
in fact equal to 1/7 could be a really cool experience. Having students defend
their reasoning would be a way to emphasize common misconceptions about
fractions and emphasize why the pieces are not each 1/7. This could tie in multiple forms of literacy, in art and writing and I think would be a memorable experience for the students on the topic of fractions which can often be seen negatively.
255 Words.
Hey Grace!
ReplyDeleteI really like this piece of art you selected. I think it is very interesting and see how you could tie a unit of fractions into the painting. I don’t know if you have time to do this in a class, but another activity I think you could do is have kids come up with a story and this have to be the cover of the story. I think this would allow students to have fun in math and get their creative juiced flowing. Or going along the same lines of having students write a story is have them make the story about math and using math terminology to create the story of the painting. Just some other ideas!
Word Count: 121