Last week while preparing for the after school art class I teach for kindergarten and first graders, I had big plans for more work outside. However, mother nature herself had other ideas as she brought in nothing but cold, wet weather for the week. While Andy Goldsworthy works in all weather for the sake of his art, we have to be a little more judicious about when to take children that are not our own outside.
When it came down to it, I had to think quick about how to make outdoor art of the Andy Goldsworthy variety indoors. Because we have been focusing so much on pattern and contrast as we study his art, I thought introducing the idea of creating our own patterns onto felt pieces might reflect these principles well.
As each child finished their work, I suggested making pencil or marker sketches of what they came up with. I took a picture of their end product, and for those who work quickly, I suggested attempting a second design with the same pieces.
When class was over, all of our materials were collected and returned to where they came from, the felt to be used another time for another project.
This is what they came up with:
Pretty nice, I think!
Here at home, we are keeping up with the Andy Goldsworthy study as well, though I confess my own children are not as enthusiastic about these things as the ones who come to my class are.
For today's project, I noticed a lawn full of leaves ready to be raked up and composted, but thought making art sounded more fun than yard work. I was sort of able to convince my kids of that too. I know they would be into this stuff more if the idea came from their own minds, but that hasn't happened yet. Well, that is unless you could the military barracks they make from sunflower stalks and branches, but I turn a blind eye to those things. I have a really hard time with military play, but have a harder time saying- no- don't build with nature! That- and 12 years into this, I haven't figured out a way yet to keep boys from playing war, especially since they live IN a time of war.
Back to leaf art though, my four year old and I did our best to make lines and patterns with the leaves as I raked them up. The four year old started with wanting a circle, which was easy enough, and then he wanted two. This led to much jumping and laughing as he tried to leap in and out of the circles.
Suddenly, he thought it would be great to make the number 8, so we discussed how to join our circles together. I confess that my four year old acted mostly as director of the art project, while I did all the work. But oh well, I admit it- I was having fun even if the boys were running around doing other things while I did the raking.
When we finished the 8, he wanted another number, so we added a three, to make an 83- quite a big number for a four year old. Finishing the 83, he suggests a one, commenting it would be easy for me to make a nice long line.
Suddenly art was becoming math, a natural integration of subjects. I love it when that happens!
After spending a considerable amount of time raking and thinking and creating a huge number 831 out of leaves in the yard, I went in for a little water break and thought I'd grab my camera for a quick pic of the end result to share with you.
Well, I guess even laid back teachers like me who constantly preach the adage "value the process over the product" need a few lessons in practicing what they preach sometimes, because when I walked out with my camera this is what I found:
But they sure were having fun.
What followed was hours of playing in the leaves,
running in the yard,
breathing fresh air,
and even some of the leaves ended up in my compost pile.
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