Students will explore the mysterious atmosphere and foggy shapes found in Monet’s painting Waterloo Bridge. They will sing “London Bridge is Falling Down” as a class and use shape stamps to create a painting of a bridge.
Grade Level:
Early childhood (ages 3-5) / Pre-K
Length of Lesson:
One 30 minute lesson
Standards:
Visual Arts
Invent and Discover to Create
Observe and Learn to Comprehend
Relate and Connect to Transfer
• Language Arts
Oral Expression and Listening
Cross Content Skills
• Critical Thinking & Reasoning
• Information Literacy
• Invention
• Self-Direction
Objectives:
Students will be able to:
• participate in singing and acting out a class song;
• identify shapes and colors in a painting; and
• create a painting using repeated shapes.
Materials:
• Lyrics to “London Bridge is Falling Down”
• Gray construction paper
• Tempera paint in cool colors (blues, greens, violets) distributed on paper plates
• Sponges or blocks in a variety of shapes for stamping
• About the Art section on Waterloo Bridge
•
https://www.tate.org.uk/kids/explore/who-is/who-claude-monet• One color copy of the painting for every four children, or the ability to project the image onto a wall or screen
Lesson:
1. Warm-up: Sing “London Bridge is Falling Down” with the class.
2. Show students Monet’s painting Waterloo Bridge and ask them what they see in the painting.
1. What colors do they see?
2. What time of day do they think the painting is showing: morning, afternoon, or night?
3. What is the weather like in the painting?
4. What time of year do they think it is?
5. Encourage all responses.
3. At the end of the discussion, use the About the Art section to share information about the painting with students. The bridge is Waterloo Bridge in London, England, and Monet painted it in the winter from the balcony of a hotel.
4. Share with students that Monet loved to paint fog and that the weather in this painting is foggy.
1. Ask them about their experiences with fog.
2. Have they ever been outside while it was foggy?
3. Do they remember any foggy days or nights?
4. Where were they?
5. What was it like?
6. How can they tell this painting is meant to depict fog?
5. Focus on shapes in the painting and ask the children to find as many different shapes as they can. Point out the circle puffs of smoke and the arches of the bridge. Explore together how Monet created his scene using a variety of repeated shapes.
6. Tell students that they are going to experiment with shapes to make their own paintings of bridges. Give each student a piece of gray construction paper, different colors of paint on paper plates, and sponges or stamps of various shapes.
7. Look at the painting again to see how Monet’s arch shapes go all the way across the painting. Have students use their stamps to create their own painting of a bridge that stretches all the way across the paper. Students can use sponges to add splotches of paint that mimic the texture of Monet’s fog.
8. Once the paintings are dry, have each student share with the class what shape they repeated to make a bridge.
Lyrics
London Bridge is falling down
Falling down, falling down
London Bridge is falling down
My fair lady
Build it up with iron bars
Iron bars, iron bars
Build it up with iron bars
My fair lady
Iron bars will bend and break
Bend and break, bend and break
Iron bars will bend and break
My fair lady
Build it up with gold and silver
Gold and silver, gold and silver
Build it up with gold and silver
My fair lady
London Bridge is falling down
Falling down, falling down
London Bridge is falling down
M-y f-a-i-r l-a-d-y
Locked
