La Gioconda by Leonardo da Vinci

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mona_Lisa#/media/File:Mona_Lisa,_by_Leonardo_da_Vinci,_from_C2RMF_retouched.jpg

Shared by Yolanda Martínez:

I’ve chosen La Gioconda by Leonardo Da Vinci for my final task.

I love this painting, not only because it is Leonardo’s most famous painting but also, I think that there are many queries about Mona Lisa’s identity that continue unresolved.

Taking into account that my students are from 3 to 11 years old, I think that we’d be able to use this painting in different ways with the older ones. These are the activities to work in class:

- Showing the picture to my students (4 and 5 grade), I will ask them to make sentences with present continuous talking about what clothes is she wearing; in negative, affirmative and interrogative way. 

For example: She’s wearing a…, she isn’t wearing…, is she wearing…? Or thinking about how she is feeling: She is/isn’t smiling and so forth.

I can ask my students: what does she look like? And they have to use the verbs to have and to be to make phrases that describe her. For instance: She has long hair, she is happy/sad; etc.

- I could give my older students (Grade 6) questions to be answer: does the artist paint reality or is Leonardo’s reality itself a puzzle? Was Mona Lisa the wife of Francesco del Giocondo, or a duke’s widow or a Medici mistress? 

Students’ll have to look for information and taking into account that Leonardo loved riddles and optical paradoxes, they’ll try to explain it with a sentence, a word or try to change the picture itself.

As a final task they can write a description about another famous portrait or painting. Older students can edit this picture or another one using Canva web page. And finally, we posted their works on our blog.