This lesson was AWESOME for me, because I was pretty terrified of teaching one-point perspective.
I ended up enjoying this lesson a lot! I had to step outside my comfort zone and it was a fun challenge.
I started with the basics, as a class we looked at examples of one point perspective in famous art.
One thing that really helped the class was to look at a picture of boxes drawn without one point perspective and a picture of boxes using one point perspective.
After explaining the horizon line and vanishing point, I demonstrated drawing simple shapes on a piece of paper.
We started with a box above the horizon line, then a box below the horizon line, then a box on the horizon line. For each of these I demonstrated first, then gave students time to try it. After the 3 boxes, I gave time for students to experiment.
It was interesting to see some students who had struggled with the comic book lessons do really well with one point perspective! Hopefully it helped them realize that there is all kinds of ways to make art, and get them excited about art making.
Next, I presented students with project to help them put one point perspective into a representational drawing.
The hardest part of the lesson was keeping the class focused while I did demos for each section. Overall, they did very well.
But I noticed that classroom management for this lesson was CRUCIAL.
This drawing assignment was fun because it was fairly structured, but I allowed students to add their own details or change things if they wanted. The basic drawing was a street with trees on one side and city buildings on the other side.
Some students naturally did very well with one point perspective, others just had a few things they needed help with, and a couple of students really felt paralyzed and needed help. Luckily, they didn't act really frustrated or stressed, and I was able to help them continue with their drawing.
Here are some examples!
