Archives: December, 2007

Introduce your students to African American artist Jacob Lawrence. He began painting during the era of the Harlem Renaissance. He is known for his dramatic use of primary and bold color and strong geometric figures. Lawrence had a strong interest in creating visual narratives about historically important African Americans. One series of narratives about Harriet Tubman was published as a children’s picture book.

In this lesson students will look closely at the paintings in his Harriet Tubman series and some of his other works depicting historical figures. They will learn to identify Lawrence’s unique style from work by other artists based on the elements of color and shape. After devising a plan, students will create a painting using the same art elements of color and shape to create a picture showing an imagined scene from the life of Tubman.

In this eighth grade lesson, students will apply their knowledge of literary elements (plot structure and archetypal characters) to the analysis and creation of African and African American folktales. Students will work in groups to read several picture book versions of African and African American folktales. Each group then creates a plot map for a story and highlights other literary elements identified within the text. Students then compare the folktales with fairy tales from other cultures and explain what they learned about African and African American culture from reading the folktales. Finally, students work independently to write their own modern-day folktale.

In the summer of 2008, LEARN NC will switch to the Moodle Learning Management System, replacing our Blackboard service. Moodle’s widespread use throughout North Carolina and open-source development made it a logical and cost-effective replacement.

We are currently formulating a migration plan for existing Blackboard users, which includes free Moodle training for users who have completed LEARN NC’s Blackboard Training course. Users who wish to transfer their Blackboard courses to a different Blackboard server will be able to request course archives at no cost.

As additional details become available, we will post them here and make them available as system announcements on our Blackboard server.

These two music lessons from Merritt Raum Flexman integrate easily into collaborative fourth and fifth grade social studies units.

In Freedom Songs of the Civil Rights Movement, students will listen to freedom songs recorded during this turbulent time in American history. They will write personal reactions to the music and lyrics while exploring the historical events where these songs were sung.

Students will listen to and analyze songs from two North Carolina tribes in this lesson plan about Native American music. While doing so, they also learn about the Cherokee and the Haliwa-Saponi. Students are engaged and active throughout the lesson with singing, moving, and playing instruments.