Words that POP!

 Keeping with my modern art theme 4th and 5th graders learned about the American Pop Artist Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) and his comic book style of art.  We also talked about onomatopoeia (a 4th and 5th grade ELA connection).  I originally got this idea from the blog, There's a Dragon in the Art Room.  I showed the students examples if Lichtenstein's art and we discussed the ways they look like comics and the scale of his art.  Then I showed his art that focused on using words, like the painting Whaam! and we discussed how the words made us feel and other examples of words to use. I also found a clip from the 1960's Batman TV series which show the action words! After writing the block letters students began painting with primary colors.  It's amazing the variations with just using the 3 colors and black.  Another day we looked at comics with magnifying glasses, discussed Ben day dots and how to make nice dots, then kept painting.  Later we outlined the words to really POP off the paper!

   Here is a great video from CBS Sunday Morning - It is an interview with his son and is a great introduction to how Lichtenstein grew from being called America's Worst Artist to record auction sales.