Art & Language Arts Online

I incorporate illuminated manuscripts in to my 3rd grade class during the study of fairy tales, myths, legends. What I do is similar to a lesson you have but I’ve changed some things. We begin by learning something about illuminated manuscripts – sort of an over-view and show the very cool video about making illuminated manuscripts.
Then I focused on creating an historiated initial. I used the following criteria to create the piece:
A letter at the beginning of a section of text that contains an identifiable scene or character relating to the text.
There is often a small border and then a more elaborate border
There is a simple palette of red, blue, black, green and gold.
There is marginalia (my favorite part :))
There are simple backgrounds composed of abstract patterns (think doodles)and shimmering gold (think metallic pens)

I created a template with some basic borders and the words “Once upon a time” – relating back to the fairy tales. The “O” becomes the historiated initial, and makes for a fun, open place to create your illumination.

When they’re done, we put them up and see if we can guess what fairy tale, based on what is in the historiated initial.

Some of the Getty pieces I referenced:

Decorated Initial D: Detail of acanthus motif
Initial N: James I of Aragon overseeing a Court of Law
Initial A: Two Men Before a King and a Man Speaking to his Family
Alchandreus Presents his work to a King
Feudal Customs of Aragon (great example of marginalia)

I can email you the a picture of the template is you would like