collections

At the end of the winter trimester I ask my 6-8th students to choose their favorite project and have me photograph it. This term most students choose between three projects.
1. the chalk pastel stuffed animals I blogged about before
2. Our large pop art sweet treats
and this project
3. collections
(their always has to be a Sponge Bob project...eye roll)
All thee of these projects required the kids to use grids with their art. In this lesson a grid helped the kids create a interesting composition. We got to talk about those two fun concepts of unity and variety.

Each student was told to divided a sheet of card stock down the middle and from their they needed to divided the paper into 9 rectangles and or squares of different shapes and sizes. Then they choose a theme for their collection. We brainstormed everything from sports to cartoons to sushi!

I allowed the students to use how to draw books, bring in photos and use images from the Internet to get ideas. I encouraged the students to shrink, enlarge and crop images to make interesting compositions within each space. I'm sure some kids were sneaky and traced a bit but when they are really interested in a lesson I get a little looser with my rules.

We used this lesson as something to work on when you were done early with your other projects or waiting for a turn at the printmaking station.

The kids got really into this lesson and spent way more time than usual drawing their pictures and working on the coloring. I even had some take them home to work on them! I think this would be fun for kids 4th grade all the way up to high school.

and of course their is always the student that comes up with their own twist on the lesson. My only rule to him....absolutely no tracing and he had to enlarge the image. He did a great job!