Project Overview

As an additional art piece to enhance the learning of our "I've Been Working on the Railroad,” an in-depth Expedition of the Transcontinental Railroad, our 2nd and 3rd grade students at Sierra Expeditionary Learning School created a detailed line drawing of a locomotive using basic lines and shapes. Students looked at locomotives to identify shapes and then break down the smaller parts of the locomotive to draw. After completing the initial drawing, students colored their illustrations to highlight atmospheric perspective showing how mountains in the background are darker in the forefront and get lighter as they get further away. The final project was matted on black and displayed for viewing during our Celebration of Learning. These beautiful pieces of art will be on display in our local Train Museum located in historic downtown Truckee, California.