Last Wednesday, I accompanied the Grade 4 students and their homeroom teachers on their field trip to the Museum of Islamic Art to visit both the permanent collection and the temporary exhibition ‘Treasures of China’ that includes the Terracotta warriors.
The Grade 4 students have just begun their Unit of Inquiry ‘Civilisations’ and Visual Arts is integrating. In art class, the students’ main focus is on exploring the line of inquiry ‘The traces left by different civilizations’, and the art work they produce will reflect inspiration from traces left by their chosen civilization, either Ancient China, Ancient Egypt, the Vikings or Ancient Greece.
The visit to MIA was an excellent opportunity for students to gather visual research and to improve their observational drawing skills. They showed great enthusiasm and commitment during their drawing time, and collected lots of valuable research that I am excited for them to share back in the art room.
At the end of the trip, we used the location and grounds of the museum to our advantage and took the opportunity to do some sketching of the impressive landscape surround the MIA park. Some students chose to sketch the Doha city skyline, others wanted to draw the interesting architecture of the building itself, and some were inspired by the nature around them, the trees and the ocean.
Visiting the museum was an excellent learning experience, and a lot of fun was had by all!
Thanks for organising such and interesting unit. My daughter is really enjoying this unit and I like the cross disciplinary approach and the fact pupil’s chose the ancient civilisation that interested them the most.