Background
The goal of this curriculum unit is to provide students with the experience of creating graphic stories based on historical references. The students will produce original works of art in visual and written form that tell stories based on the stories and characters of Greek mythology. I plan to connect this social studies objective of my third grade students with the Visual Arts content of illustration. The instructional focus will explore how pictures tell stories. The overall curriculum content of this unit involves the integration of visual arts, language arts and history. The visual arts aspect focuses on the study of skills and techniques for creating illustrated panel drawings that will be adapted to create comic strips or graphic novels. These drawings will be used to retell the stories of Greek mythology. The students will use these images to help create a written narrative related to a mythological character of their choice.
My intent is to encourage storytelling and creative thinking about how the combination of pictures and text communicates information. I believe that this unit will be a great vehicle for allowing students to experience the dynamics of telling a story through verbal, written and visual methods. Many students have difficulty telling stories in written form, but feel comfortable with expressing their ideas through artwork. I encourage my students to create their own visual narratives using paper or canvas as a space to share feelings and experiences. Artwork can tell multiple stories. I believe this premise will assist me in creating a curriculum unit that helps my students become more expressive artists as well as writers.
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