I am a general music teacher and feel that we could definitely find parallels between music and visual art. Even the principles of art (line, shape, form, value, space, color, texture) can easily be compared to the principles of music (rhythm, pitch, melody, harmony, texture, timbre).
A lesson I would like to do in my classroom is "Drawing to Music."
https://teachrock.org/lesson/drawing-music-hearing-colors-seeing-sounds/This lesson seems designed for older students, but it could easily be modified for elementary grades. The premise is to have any number of pre-chosen songs for which students will listen and evaluate. The lesson suggests 10, but I might start with 4 or 5 for younger students. Students are given blank paper and post-it notes for which they number 1-5 (or 1-10 depending on number of songs). Students are then encouraged to “feel” each song quickly--without overthinking. They can use color, line and other essentials of art that represent what they are hearing and how it makes them feel. Students repeat this process for each song and stick their post-it note on to the drawings. They hang them on the board or wall together. When looking at all of the drawings students made for each song, students can then look for similarities that they see in each person's work.
They can also answer questions like these: In what ways do you “see” rhythm? How do you think rhythm may have affected various artists’ choices of lines and form? In what ways might you “see” the tone you hear in music? How might tone affect our choice of color?
This is a great lesson to teach visual literacy as well as using arts integration to meet music and visual art standards. Students are using higher order thinking skills to compare similarities and differences between represented visual artwork and verbally explaining how the music inspired a visual representation. This is a perfect example of visual literacy.
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