Middle School Studio Lesson
BLUE WILLOW
Kris Fontes
In the December 1997 issue of
SchoolArts is a lesson titled
“Blue Willow Story Plates” by
Susan Striker. I have used this
lesson with my middle-school stu-
dents many times over the years,
tweaking it to fit my curriculum.
My school district requires that all
teachers spend the first ten minutes
of each class period doing some type
of reading activity, and I spend this
time reading out loud to my seventh-
grade art students. For this lesson,
I read The Willow Pattern Story by
Allan Drummond. It
is a tale of star-
crossed
lovers who are put to death by the
maiden’s vengeful father and reborn
as doves, eternally kissing above the
painted landscape.
Pattern Analysis
Projecting the image of a blue wil-
low plate on my Smart Board, I asked
students to interact with the image
by circling specific details from
the story; for example, “circle the
pagoda.” I was surprised that only
a few of my seventh-grade students
knew what a pagoda is. We stopped
at this point and checked
the story for any
other unfamiliar words that they
might not know, such as “mandarin”
and “motif.”
Using one of the dinner plates
from my own Blue Willow collection,
students and I analyzed the decora-
tive elements on the plate, which
traditionally include a pagoda, a foot-
bridge with two or three figures run-
ning across it, an island, two doves,
and a border. We noted that certain
elements of art were present, such as
line and shape and also, repetition,
one of the principles of design. We
also discussed the fact that the Blue
Willow pattern was actually created
in England, and is created using a
transfer technique.
Shannon,
grade seven.
Elizabeth,
grade seven.
