Course Syllabus
Visual Art
Description
Building on the educational outcomes of Visual Arts in elementary and middle school education, high school art prepares students for personal development in the arts through the construction of a body of work that may be instrumental in admission to higher education within the visual and media arts. This Visual Art course introduces art history, art criticism, aesthetic judgment, and studio production. Emphasizing the ability to understand and use the elements of art and principles of design through a variety of media, processes, and visual resources, students follow projects from the ideation and planning stages all the way through production, exhibition, and critical self-reflection. Prerequisites: None
Course Objectives: Upon completion of this course, students will be able to...
- Create original artworks that effectively apply the elements and principles of design to communicate personal and/or thematic ideas
- Discover and explain how personal experiences, culture, and historical context influence artistic choices and works
- Experiment with and adapt multiple artistic media, techniques, and processes to develop creative solutions
- Evaluate personal and peer artworks using appropriate art vocabulary and established criteria
- Assemble a cohesive portfolio of original artworks that demonstrates technical skill, creative problem-solving, and intentional artistic expression
- Review the creative process to make informed revisions and clearly articulate final artistic intentions
- Investigate and describe pathways and careers in visual arts, including required skills, tools, and knowledge
- Apply visual arts to other disciplines, real-world contexts, and societal or global issues through interdisciplinary projects
- Recognize and explain visual art concepts, vocabulary, and processes through analysis-based assessments
Course Outline:
Module 1: What is Art?
Module 2: Guiding the Eye: Principles of Design
Module 3: Drawing What You See
Module 4: From 2D to 3D
Module 5: Multiples and Messages
Module 6: Color As Communication
Module 7: Putting It All Together
Resources Included: Online lesson instruction and activities, opportunities to engage with a certified, online instructor and classmates, when appropriate, and online assessments to measure student performance of course objectives and readiness for subsequent academic pursuits.
Additional Costs: Students are responsible for acquiring basic hands-on art supplies. List of required art supplies.
Scoring System: Michigan Virtual does not assign letter grades, grant credit for courses, nor issue diplomas. A final score out of total points earned will be submitted to your school mentor for conversion to their own letter grading system.
Time Commitment: Semester sessions are 18-weeks long: Students must be able to spend 1 or more hours per day in the course to be successful. Summer sessions are 10 weeks long: Students must be able to spend a minimum of 2 or more hours per day, or about 90 hours during the summer, for the student to be successful in any course. Trimester sessions are 12-weeks long: Students must be able to spend 1.5 or more hours per day in the course to be successful.
Technology Requirements: Students will require a computer device with headphones, a microphone, webcam, up-to-date Chrome Web Browser, and access to YouTube.
Students must be able to download and open .zip, .doc and .pdf files and print document templates for use in certain assignments. Students must also be able to photograph and upload digital images of their physical artwork to submit completed assignments to instructors for scoring and feedback.
Students will create a digital portfolio of their art work and must have access to use one of the following sites, or an equivalent website authoring service, in order to create a webpage or website for this project requirement.
Ensure that your school or district network and device administrator establishes network access permissions or exceptions for online resources relevant to the course in which you are choosing to enroll. Ref., Michigan Virtual Course Allow List
Please review the Michigan Virtual Technology Requirements.
Instructor Support System: For technical issues within your course, contact the Customer Care Center by email at CustomerCare@michiganvirtual.org or by phone at (888) 889-2840.
Instructor Contact Expectations: Students can use email or the private message system within the Student Learning Portal to access highly qualified teachers when they need instructor assistance. Students will also receive feedback on their work inside the learning management system. The Instructor Info area of their course may describe additional communication options.
Academic Support Available: In addition to access to a highly qualified, Michigan certified teacher, students have access to academic videos and outside resources verified by Michigan Virtual. For technical issues within the course, students can contact the Michigan Virtual Customer Care by email at customercare@michiganvirtual.org or by phone at (888) 889-2840.
Required Assessment: Online assessments consist of formative and summative assessments represented by computer-graded multiple choice, instructor-graded writing assignments including hands-on projects, model building, discussion-based assessments (one-on-one conversations with your teacher), and other forms of authentic assessments.
Technical Skills Needed: Basic technology skills necessary to locate and share information and files as well as interact with others in a Learning Management System (LMS), include the ability to:
- Download, edit, save, convert, and upload files
- Download and install software
- Use a messaging service similar to email
- Communicate with others in online discussion or message boards, following basic rules of netiquette
- Open attachments shared in messages
- Create, save, and submit files in commonly used word processing program formats and as a PDF
- Edit file share settings in cloud-based applications, such as Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides
- Save a file as a .pdf
- Copy and paste and format text using your mouse, keyboard, or an html editor’s toolbar menu
- Insert images or links into a file or html editor
- Search for information within a document using Ctrl+F or Command+F keyboard shortcuts
- Work in multiple browser windows and tabs simultaneously
- Activate a microphone or webcam on your device, and record and upload or link audio and/or video files
- Use presentation and graphics programs
- Follow an online pacing guide or calendar of due dates
- Use spell-check, citation editors, and tools commonly provided in word processing tool menus
- Create and maintain usernames and passwords
Additional Information: This course requires the student to acquire physical art supplies (see the Additional Costs section of the syllabus) and submit images of their work to their online instructor for grading purposes. This course also requires students be able to download, open and print files for use (see the Technical Requirements section of the syllabus).