Crossing Borders/Breaking Boundaries VI
The Arts and Artistic Legacies of the West African Civilizations, 700 - 1600 c.e.
July 17-25, 2006
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Lesson Title: Making Akan Gold Weights and Understanding their Proverbial Meanings

Name: Elaine Jones

Discipline: Visual art

Grade Level: 4, 5


I. Conceptual Framework

Big Idea: Identity

Rationale: The study of the gold weights from the Asante people will give students a visual perspective of ancient West African art. In the process, they will learn the proverbs associated with each piece of art and begin to understand the underlying moral teachings of that culture.

Essential Questions:

  • How can a proverb reveal who you are?
  • How can an object symbolize the beliefs of a community?

Key Concepts:

  • Identity is about arts in a culture.
  • Identity is about community.

State and Local Standards:

Standard I: Perceiving and Responding- Aesthetic Education
Indicators:

  • Identify and describe visual qualities found in ideas, experiences, and the environment.
  • Create thematic works showing personal observations, feelings and stories.

Standard II: Historical, Cultural, and Social Context
Indicators:

  • Inspired by the art of people from different times and cultures, create a work of art that reflects aspects of his or her daily life.

Standard III: Creative Expression and Production
Indicators:

  • Draw upon personal sources as a basis for meaningful images developed through a process that includes idea generation, research to solve representational problems, and artful crafting of a quality product

Standard IV: Aesthetics and Criticism
Indicators:

  • Based on criteria generated from the study of selected artworks, create art on a related theme.
  • Based on the study of examples of narrative expression by a variety of artists, create an artwork expressing his or her own story through personal aesthetic choices.

II. TOPIC

  • Objects can be symbols.
  • Symbols can express complicated ideas.

III. ART FORM

  • Asante gold weight sculptures
  • Photographs of African goldsmiths

IV. LESSON

Motivation/Warm-Up:

  • Students will listen to the story, Kwajo and the Brassman’s Secret A Tale of Old Ashanti wisdom and gold by Meshack Ascare

Modeling/Discussion:

  • The teacher will introduce some images of Akan gold weights.
  • The students will read from a hand-out, a wide variety of proverbs that are accompanied by a description of the miniature sculpture.
  • The teacher will initiate discussion of the proverbs.
  • The teacher will show an example of a gold weight figurine, the Sankofa bird.

Guided Practice:

  • The students will decide which proverb is meaningful to them and make a
    sketch of a sculpture that captures the essence of that proverb.
  • The teacher will circulate the room to offer any guidance or assistance needed.

Independent Practice:

  • The students will model the clay using an additive method of sculpting.
  • After the clay piece is fired, the students will display it on a mat board base that has the proverb that it illustrates attached to it.

Assessment/Closure:

  • The students will share their completed artwork with the class.
  • The evaluation will be made through use of a rubric.

Materials/Resources:

Texts:

  • Antubam, Kofi. Ghana’s Heritage of Culture. Leipzig, Germany: Koehler & Amelang, 1963.
  • Ascare, Meshack. Kwajo and the Brassman’s Secret, A tale of old Ashanti wisdom and gold. Ghana: Sub-Saharan Publishers, 2002.
  • Bisson, Michael S. Ancient African Metallurgy: The Sociocultural Content. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press, 2000.
  • Fox, Christine. Asante Brass Casting: Lost-wax casting of gold-weights, ritual vessels and sculptures, with handmade equipment. Cambridge: African Studies Centre, 1988.
  • Garrard, Timothy F. Akan Weights and the Gold Trade. London and New York: Longman Group Limited, 1980.
  • Graffenried, Charlotte. Akan Goldweights in the Berne Historical Museum. Bern, Germany: Benteli Verlag, 1990.
  • Naylor, Rachel. Ghan. Oxfam, GB, 2000.
  • Nitecki, Andre. Equal Measure for Kings and Commoners: Gold Weights of the Akan from the Collections of the Glenbow Museum, Calgary, Canada.
    Calgary, Canada: Glenbow-Alberta Institute, 1982.
  • Rattray, R.S. Ashanti Proverbs. Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1916.

On-line Resources:

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