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Painting on Wet Walls: The Art of Fresco worksheet preview

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Painting on Wet Walls: The Art of Fresco

Read an article about fresco painting on wet plaster and use details and examples from the text to explain what it says and to support inferences.

Grade 4ELAInteractive · Printable

Aligned toRI.4.1

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What’s included

  • Single worksheet
  • Auto-graded online
  • 1 Common Core standard
  • Printable answer key
  • 10 questions
  • Classroom-ready

Details

Format
Interactive · Printable
Grade
Grade 4
Subject
ELA
Question types
Fill in the blank, Multiple choice, Matching, Circle the answer, Sorting, Short answer

About this worksheet

What students practice

  • Students use details from an article to explain what the text says directly.
  • Students choose details and examples from the text that support an inference.

How to use

Read the article together or independently. Before the questions, ask students to mark one place where the text tells something directly and one place where they had to infer.

Curriculum

Common Core standard covered

RI.4.1

Use details and examples from a text to explain what it says directly and to support inferences drawn from it.

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Painting on Wet Walls: The Art of Fresco

Use details from an article to explain and infer.

Read the article

Painting on Wet Walls

1Imagine painting a picture that becomes part of a wall. That is what artists do when they paint a fresco. The word fresco comes from an Italian word that means "fresh." A fresco is painted on fresh, wet plaster, the smooth paste that covers many walls.

2Painting a fresco takes careful planning. First, the artist makes a full-size drawing on large sheets of paper. These drawings are called cartoons, even though they are not meant to be funny. The artist pokes tiny holes along every line of the drawing and then cuts it into pieces.

3Each morning, a helper spreads a fresh layer of plaster over one part of the wall. The artist holds the matching piece of the cartoon against the wet plaster and pats charcoal dust over the holes. When the paper comes down, rows of tiny dots show where the lines go. Then the painting begins. The colors are made from powders, such as ground-up minerals, mixed with water. They soak into the damp plaster.

4The artist must work fast. As the plaster dries, it hardens and locks the colors inside it. Paint brushed on after the plaster has dried does not soak in, so it can flake off over time. For this reason, the artist covers only as much wall as can be painted in one day. In Italian, each of these patches is called a giornata, which means "a day's work." On some old frescoes, you can still see faint edges where one day's patch meets the next.

5Mistakes are hard to fix. If an artist is unhappy with a patch, the only way to change it is to chip off that plaster and start the section again.

6All this hard work pays off. Because the colors are part of the wall itself, a fresco can last for hundreds of years. Ancient Romans painted frescoes in their homes, and some of those paintings can still be seen today. Many famous frescoes were painted in Italy about five hundred years ago, and visitors travel from far away to see them. Artists in other countries, such as Mexico, have also used fresco to paint huge murals on public buildings.

What the article says

Find the details in the article to answer each question.

1.
Write the word from paragraph 1 that completes the sentence.

The word fresco comes from an Italian word that means  .

2.
In this article, what is a cartoon?
  • A. a funny picture painted in the corner of a wall
  • B. a patch of plaster that is painted in one day
  • C. a full-size drawing made before the painting
  • D. a powder that is mixed with water to make color
3.
Write the Italian word from paragraph 4 for one day's patch of a fresco.

Each day's patch is called a  .

4.
Read paragraph 4 again. Underline the sentence that explains why paint added later can come off the wall.

The artist must work fast.As the plaster dries, it hardens and locks the colors inside it.Paint brushed on after the plaster has dried does not soak in, so it can flake off over time.For this reason, the artist covers only as much wall as can be painted in one day.On some old frescoes, you can still see faint edges where one day's patch meets the next.

5.
Match each cause to its effect in the article.
  1. The plaster dries and hardens.
  2. Charcoal dust is patted over the holes.
  3. An artist is unhappy with a patch.
  4. Paint is brushed on dry plaster.
  1. A. The paint can flake off over time.
  2. B. The colors are locked inside the wall.
  3. C. That plaster is chipped off and painted again.
  4. D. Rows of tiny dots show where the lines go.
6.
Does the article support each statement? Sort the statements.
The colors soak into damp plaster.A fresco is painted on dry plaster.Mistakes on a fresco are easy to wipe away.Ancient Romans painted frescoes in their homes.A fresco can last for hundreds of years.Fresco cartoons are drawings meant to make people laugh.
Supported by the articleNot supported by the article

What you can infer

Use details from the article to support each answer.

7.
Paragraph 4 says you can see faint edges between patches on some old frescoes. What can you infer from this detail?
  • A. The painters used one color for each patch.
  • B. The walls cracked after the paint was dry.
  • C. The artists drew a border around each picture.
  • D. Each patch was painted on a different day.
8.
Why does the artist poke tiny holes along the lines of the cartoon?
  • A. so charcoal dust can mark the plaster
  • B. so the wet plaster can dry more quickly
  • C. so the paper is easier to cut into pieces
  • D. so the colors can soak through the paper
9.
Which detail best supports the idea that frescoes last a long time?
  • A. A helper spreads fresh plaster each morning.
  • B. Some ancient Roman frescoes can be seen today.
  • C. The colors are made from powders and water.
  • D. Charcoal dots show the artist where lines go.
10.
Why must a fresco painter plan carefully before starting? Use two details from the article to explain.

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