Implementation of ‘What if I were Monet?’ (SoI-GR-566)
Author/Photographer: Alexandros Parousinas
Introduction
How can the environmental and cultural heritage of a place be combined and displayed, with the help of famous painters and artistic currents?
So, the main purpose of the implementation of this Story (based on What if I were Monet?, LS), is to strengthen the environmental and cultural empathy of the students at the same time and to develop soft digital skills in order to project images from the local forest ecosystem of their area.
The students get to know through images various landscapes from the unique and beautiful southernmost forest in Europe, Frakto Forest, in the Paranesti area of Drama (Greece), and digitally transform selected images into paintings by famous painters from various artistic currents. This story of implementation was applied to students in the 6th grade of Primary School for 2 teaching hours in the context of the Informatics course.
The process of work
But through this “walk”, the students will also encounter works by famous painters, on the subject of landscapes and nature. Through commenting on the wonderful landscapes and color contrasts of nature from the forest of Fraktos, the students are presented with paintings by famous painters and artistic trends, through the Europeana’s collection (Monet, Picasso, Kandinsky and Van Gogh).
The first steps of implementing this story include introducing the students to the environmental ecosystem of the Frakto forest (Greece) , as the southernmost intact forest in Europe. For this purpose, photographs from the teacher’s personal file are presented and basic information is listed. Our digitally ecological walk through the paths of our forest has just begun.
Students discuss and capture their impressions of the forest images and painters’ artwork. Immediately after that they are asked to choose one of the 4 painters (Monet, Picasso, Kandinsky and Van Gogh) and digitally convert, using a suitable tool (Lunapic image editor), an image of the forest they liked into a “painting” of that painter and make a photocollage of these if they want moreover.
The main purpose is to place all the images on an electronic wall of padlet and make in order to combine and digitally display the environmental and cultural heritage of a European landscape, through famous European artistic currents of painting and finally make a question: How would I paint a landscape of a forest in the my area if I were a famous painter?(Monet, Picasso, Kandinsky, Van Gogh)
In conclusion
Via this story of implementation the students recognized the importance of the Fraktos forest ecosystem and its environmental importance and in the other hand came into contact and recognized the painting style of famous painters through the presentation of their various works combined the art of painters with the art of nature and digitally processed images of the forest to turn them into paintings.
Finally, they recognized the ease with which information can be processed and circulated digitally and the importance of using licensed information to be processed.
Did you find this story of implementation interesting? Why don’t you read about the related learning scenario? Link to the learning scenario implemented: What if I were Monet?
Do you want to discover more stories of implementation? Click here.
CC BY 4.0: the featured image used to illustrate this article has been found on Europeana and has been provided by the Lusto – The Finnish Forest Museum.