In this short video, students learn about seashells and the creatures that use them on the coast of North Carolina.
In this short video and accompanying activity and readings, students learn about a unique blackwater river in North Carolina - the Lumber River. The river has played an important role for the plants, people, and animals that have called it home.
In this short video and accompanying activity and readings, students learn about navigating the Lumber River and the people who navigated it for hundreds of years.
In this short video, accompanying activity, and readings, students learn about the wildflowers at Medoc Mountain State Park. These resources examine how wildflowers survive and their role in their ecosystem.
In this short video and accompanying activity and readings, students learn how each rock has a unique story about how it formed and how the forces of erosion shape what it looks like today. There are places where, long ago, big pockets of magma cooled deep underground, and after years and years of erosion, we can now see this igneous rock at the surface of the Earth. This video shows how we can see one of these locations in North Carolina - a granodiorite pluton called Stone Mountain.
In this short video, students learn about the butterfly life cycle and how they can help protect and take care of butterflies and moths in their own neighborhood.
In this short video and accompanying activity and readings, students learn about Longleaf Pine Ecosystems by exploring Weymouth Woods Sandhills Nature Preserve in North Carolina.
In this short video and accompanying activity and readings, students learn about the Weymouth Woods Sandhills Preserve and the many unique plants and animals that call this type of ecosystem home - including the red-cockaded woodpecker.
The NC Kids' Exploration Journals are a fun educational tool to help youth explore their communities and natural surroundings! Each journal contains: 18 multidisciplinary activities with guided prompts, 6 lined journal pages for recording observations and reflections, and 4 blank pages for individual creativity.
The digital versions of the journal are designed to be printed out for students either as individual activities or in its entirety so that they can explore their school yard, local park, or own backyard. Though designed for 1st - 5th-graders, older audiences may enjoy them too! They are also available in both English and Spanish languages.
While supplies last, hard copies of the journals are currently available for free to teachers by contacting karen.ipock@ncdcr.gov.
In this special 360 interactive tour, students can learn about the science used in an art museum by exploring the NC Museum of Art's conservation lab!
This lesson will focus on using found & recycled objects to create a three-dimensional narrative landscape. Essential Question: How can we re-create a place we have seen?
Students will delve into Hans Thoma’s Wondrous Birds to discover an aerial perspective and learn to see more deeply. Using dance, English language arts, science, theatre arts, visual arts, and poetry, they will explore landforms and bodies of water from a bird’s-eye view.
In this lesson students practice gratitude and mindful meditation inspired by Auguste Rodin’s Cathedral. Essential Question: How can art inspire gratitude?
Students will examine the role of perception in interpretation of primary sources in Ralph Earl’s portrait of Andrew Jackson. In small groups, students will research periods in Jackson’s life and use gathered information to create their own portraits of Jackson that communicate facts about actual events filtered through the point of view of someone affected by Jackson.
Students will examine the three historical portraits Andrew Jackson, William Pitt, and Portrait of a Boy for symbolism and its relationship to the concept of meaning. After learning more about Andrew Jackson’s involvement in the Cherokee Indians’ Trail of Tears in North Carolina, students will research another historical figure important during that movement and produce a historical portrait, similar to the examples shown, and a cinquain poem.
Students explore the topics of interpretation and intertextuality by investigating and creating texts and works of art inspired by other texts. Essential Question: How does meaning change through interpretation?
Students will ask and record questions as they reflect upon the work of art. They will develop understanding of metacognition while considering questions and themes. ESSENTIAL QUESTION: How does asking questions lead to deeper thinking?
By researching field guides and the work of John James Audubon, students will research an assigned bird. Students will create a story about the bird using the Elements of Story, and create their own bird track print from a collagraph stamp they create. Students will then create a triptych to accompany the research and the story with three panels: 1 - wide view with oil pastel, 2 - close-up view using scratchboard, 3 - track view only using monoprint track students created. Students will assemble the work into a display for exhibit. Essential Question Asked: How can we explore characteristics of animals through research, using storytelling, illustration, and printmaking?
In this multi-day lesson, students will study the function and use of Tji Wara crest masks of the Bamana people of Africa. Using the masks as an example, students will develop a cultural study of their personal talents to create their own crest masks. Students will then choreograph a dance to go with their mask. Essential questions asked:
What are Bamana Tji Wara crest masks? In creating a crest mask of my own, how can I show what I am good at? How do I make choices to include in my choreography?
Students will improve visualization skills through role play, texture identification, and creating an original work of art depicting their own families. They will also discuss connections between the painting and their own lives.