Unit Table of Contents

LESSON 3: USING DRAGON MYTH IN ART AND LITERATURE

One 40 minute session
Materials Needed:
1. Homework assignments
2. 1 copy/student of Laurence Yep’s Dragon of the Lost Sea (Harper-Trophy, 1988)
3. 1 Response Journal/student
4. Paper and large manila envelopes for collage dragons with Instruction Page.
5. Slide or pictures of the Nine Dragon Wall, Beijing (available at
http://www.chinapage.com/dragon9c.gif or
http://beifan.com/034dragon/cd08h.html. Slides available at Primary Source.

1. Students will hand in homework assignments and discuss any difficulties with vocabulary or confusions in text. Make additions to “Dragon Vocab List.”

2. Teacher will show slides or pictures of the Nine Dragon Wall in Beijing and challenge the students to develop their own dragon for a library wall. Dragons should be based on their reading though they may combine elements from different sources. All kinds of assorted colored and textured paper scraps should be spread out on the meeting table to encourage the stretching of artistic muscles. This might involve creating some papers or their own. Each student will be given dimensions, instructions, and an envelope for the materials they select.

3. Students begin planning their dragons and work for 20 minutes.

4. Teacher will introduce Laurence Yep (Materials included) to the class and say a bit about Dragon of the Lost Sea stressing that Yep relied heavily on Chinese Folklore for his creation of Shimmer and Thorn and the world they inhabit. (Included at the end of Part 1 ).

5. Teacher will distribute books and begin reading Chapter 1 orally as a group identifying folklore elements whenever possible. Model the identification of descriptive passages which bring the setting alive as students will be required to do this in their response journals this week.

6. Assignment: Read the first third of Dragon of the Lost Sea (70 p.) and continue work on dragons. In the response journal, students should record at least 10 words and phrases that create a picture of the setting in the story. Dragons are due at the beginning of Session 5 (2 weeks).

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STUDENT ASSIGNMENT
Instructions for creating your dragon:

1. You will each be given a large sheet of oak tag on which to
construct your dragon. Please have your dragon design take up as
much of the space as possible.

2. Once the design is completed, you may work with marker, crayon, craypas, paints, collage or any combination of these to decorate your design. On the table are many different paper samples, magazine pages, tissue paper and homemade papers. Take what you need to complete your dragon design and to make it more interesting. If you need additional supplies, check with your teacher.

3. Pay attention to all of the reading you have done about dragons
when you begin constructing the
a. head
b. body
c. legs and claws
d. scales
Refer to drawings and illustrations if you need help beginning

4. Think about a setting for you dragon: river, mountain, lake, ocean, clouds and design accordingly. Your final assignment will be to write a vivid description of the world your dragon lives in. You may want to make notes as you work.

5. When you have completed your creation, you must cut it out so that it can be attached to our “Dragon Wall.”

6. Your completed dragon is due in two weeks.