Lesson plan Grade 1 Art & Music
Still, Wavy, Zigzag: Splashmill Creek's Water Lines
A 40-minute grade 1 art lesson on line quality where students fold a three-page booklet and draw still, wavy, and zigzag water with a fact on each page.
Objectives
- Students will draw three kinds of lines: still, wavy, and zigzag.
- Students will match each kind of line to still water, moving water, and falling rain.
- Students will write or dictate one fact on each page of a three-page booklet.
Vocabulary
Key words: line, still, wavy, zigzag
Teacher overview
Line is the first element of art most first graders can control on purpose, and water gives three clean examples of it. Still pond water reads as a set of long straight lines, a moving creek reads as wavy lines, and falling rain reads as short zigzag or slanted lines. In this lesson students practice all three lines on scrap paper, then fold a small booklet and give each kind of line its own page with a one-sentence fact underneath.
Draw the three lines on chart paper before the lesson and leave them up all period, since students refer to them constantly while drawing. The mistake worth watching for is speed: a wavy line drawn quickly turns into a zigzag, and the two pages then look the same. Telling students to draw the wavy line slowly, with the crayon never leaving the paper, fixes this faster than any correction afterward.
Procedure
Hook with the air draw (5 min): Ask the class to draw three lines in the air with one finger while you name them: a still line that does not move up or down, a wavy line that rolls like a small hill, and a zigzag line with sharp points. Then name a place, such as a pond on a calm morning, and have students draw the line that fits it in the air.
Practice the three lines (8 min): Students fill one scrap sheet with three rows of practice lines, one row for each kind, while you circulate. Say the rule aloud: still lines stay flat, wavy lines curve without corners, and zigzag lines have points. Ask two students to hold up a wavy row and a zigzag row side by side so the class can name the difference.
Fold and draw the booklet (18 min): Each student folds one sheet in half to make a booklet with a cover and three pages. Page 1 shows still water in Splashmill Pond, drawn with long flat lines and a fish below them. Page 2 shows Splashmill Creek running downhill, drawn with wavy lines and two rocks. Page 3 shows rain falling on the creek, drawn with short zigzag lines and a cloud. The cover gets a title and the student's name.
Write the facts (6 min): Under each drawing, students write or dictate one sentence, such as "Still water is calm," "The creek runs downhill," and "Rain fills the creek." On page 3, below the rain drawing, students also finish one closing sentence: "The water goes ___." Scribe for students who dictate, and let confident writers add a second sentence on any page.
Read and check (3 min): Partners trade booklets and read them page by page. Read aloud: "Hold up the page with the sharpest lines." Every booklet should be open to the rain page. If more than five students hold up the creek page, redraw the wavy and zigzag examples together on chart paper before the next art period.
From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.
Differentiation
Support
Pre-fold the booklets and pre-label the pages with the words still, wavy, and zigzag so the working time goes into drawing. Offer a strip of the three practice lines taped to the desk as a model to copy from directly. Sentence frames with the first word supplied help students who stall at the writing step.
Extension
Ask students to add a fourth kind of line for water they have seen that does not fit the three names, such as the spiral at a drain or the dotted line of a slow drip, and to write one sentence explaining where they saw it. Some students can turn the booklet into a small poster with all lines on one page.
ELL supports
Teach the three line names through the air-drawing motion first and repeat the motion each time a word is said, so the gesture carries the meaning. Provide a picture card of a pond, a creek, and rain to sit beside each booklet page. Accept the fact sentences dictated in a student's home language, then scribe a short English sentence beneath.
Extensions
Take the booklets outdoors after a rain and ask students to find one real example of each line, then mark a small check on the page when they find it. Back inside, a class chart of who found which line first makes an easy follow-up during morning meeting.