Perspective Lesson Inspired by Toy Story

I've been teaching perspective just about the same for the past ten years and sadly, I've been teaching it the way it was taught to me. Which isn't always a bad thing. Except for when it's boring and not relevant.

This year, I'm trying a new perspective lesson with my 4th graders. They are going to draw a box from worm's eye view. So I had them start with some homework. They had to promise me that they would put a toy that is a rectangular prism or cube on the floor and lay on their belly and look at it. They were supposed to rotate the object so that a corner, not a flat side was the closest thing to their face. Most were very excited to brainstorm a list of things that could potentially fall into this category.


I gave myself some homework as well, and set up a few photos at home to display on the board during the next class. For some reason they really love knowing that I have a daughter just about their age. They think it's funny that I borrow her toys and things for our lessons. So I knew this would be a crowd pleaser.


Today we started following the steps to creating the box using two point perspective. I reminded them that they were working like an animator from the film "Toy Story" and they were drawing not what Andy would see, but the little green army men. I had them imagine what they could see. Could they see the top of the jenga blocks? (NO!) Could they see out the window? (NO!) Could they see the outlet (YES) the carpet? (YES). The jury is still out, but I felt like more of them were with me, and had a clear picture in their minds of where we were going. So, ah....homework for the win?

** Update ** Lesson plan with two demo videos now available.