Lesson Plan: Illuminated Manuscripts

Overview
After learning general information about the Middle Ages, students will accomplish the following:

• Select a poem, song or rhyme

• Use the text to create an illuminated manuscript

Standards Addressed
Grade 7
Social Studies — History, Benchmark C

05. Describe the impact of new ideas and institutions on European life including the significance of printing with movable type; major achievements in art, architecture and literature during the Renaissance; and the Reformation.

Materials
Light-brown grocery bags

Procedure

1. Use the previous lesson plan, Medieval Art, to help students understand about art in the Middle Ages.

2. Explain to the students that in general, illustrated manuscripts contained religious information. Direct them to the poems, songs or rhymes that they can use. They can use library resources, the Internet or textbooks to make a choice, or go to www.pbs4549.org/middleages/resources.htm for help in finding text. Works of about 15 to 18 words are best.

3. Have the students practice designing each letter. The library may have books on calligraphy that give examples of different styles of print that students might use. It works best when students start with the lower case letter O and practice until it looks consistent. Then move to Cs, Es and finally the vertical letters such as L, T and H.

4. Using a grocery bag, students should cut out the front and back panels along the crease. Students may wrinkle and crease the paper a little so that it looks like old parchment paper. They also may want to make the edges look a little ragged.

5. Have the students lay a ruler along the edges of the top and sides of the bag and pencil in a guideline for the border. Remind them to write very lightly so that the lines can be erased.

6. From the top and left border, measure a box that is 41⁄2 inches by 5 inches. The first letter of the first word will be decorated in this box.

7. The bottom line of this box should extend across the entire page and will become the bottom guideline for the first word.

8. Measure down the sides of the border in 1⁄2-inch increments and pencil in the guidelines. The lettering will be flush left along the border and will continue across and down until complete. Students should skip every other line to have room for tall and dropped letters. They should make each letter completely fill the space between the upper and lower guidelines.

9. Have the students do everything carefully in pencil first, checking for spacing and spelling. Then have them go over everything with a calligraphy pen, a marker or colored pencils.

10. After the students are finished, remind them erase to the pencil lines.

11. Instruct them to illustrate the page and inside the initial box.

12. Students may want to illuminate the box or borders with metallic gold or silver paint.

Evaluation
The following is how the work will be evaluated.

This lesson was designed by Ann Karam from Hudson City School District.