1. Revealing Character
A language arts teacher and a visual art teacher ask eighth-graders to demonstrate their understanding of a novel's characters by creating unusual ceramic place settings. Go to this unit.
2. Breathing Life Into Myths
A language arts teacher draws on puppetry techniques and help from her school's theatre teacher to engage her sixth-graders in exploring Greek myths. Go to this unit.
3. Two Dance Collaborations
In a first-time collaboration, a dance teacher and a science teacher combine forces to explore the laws of motion with a seventh- and eighth-grade dance class. At another school, a dance teacher and a math teacher work with sixth graders on imaginative interpretations of the idea of circles. Go to this unit.
4. Constructing a Community
A visual art teacher and a social studies teacher use the distinctive architecture and history of their school's neighborhood to help eighth-graders see their community in a new light. Go to this unit.
5. Making Connections
Teachers of music, visual art, and theatre build thoughtful connections to topics their seventh-graders are working on in social studies and language arts. Go to this unit.
6. Exploring Our Town
Seventh- and eighth-grade students explore Thornton Wilder's classic play Our Town from the perspectives of theatre, music, visual art, language arts, and social studies. Go to this unit.
7. Creating a Culture — The Story Begins
Sixth-graders develop their own cultures, complete with language, clothing, artwork, and rituals. Weeks of hard work culminate in a surprising twist. This program is the first of two parts. Go to this unit.
8. Analyzing a Culture — The Story Continues
Students become archaeologists, analyzing artifacts from other student-created cultures. They then design a museum exhibit from those artifacts. This program is the second of two parts. Go to this unit.
9. Folk Tales Transformed
A visiting theatre artist works with a language arts teacher and a visual art teacher to help eighth-graders transform folk tales into original scenes that the students perform. Go to this unit.
10. Preserving a Place for the Arts
When faced with budget cuts, the staff of a rural middle school finds innovative ways to keep the arts a viable part of the curriculum. Go to this unit.
11. Can Frogs Dance?
A dance teacher and a science teacher ask seventh-graders to compare the anatomy of frogs and humans. Then a language arts teacher coaches the students in a lively debate about whether a frog should be allowed to join a ballet company. Go to this unit.
12. Finding Your Voice
Drawing on themes of conflict and genocide that eighth-graders are studying in their World Cultures class, four arts teachers organize an interdisciplinary unit that encourages students to use their artwork as a form of protest. Go to this unit.
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