I was so pleasantly and genuinely surprised with how engaged every student was with the project and how different each of their creations were. My group had prepped a lot of materials for the sea creatures project because there were a lot of different elements involved in the final piece and I was unsure of how much assistance some of the students might require but after being introduced to what deep sea creatures were through reference photos and conversations, students got right to work brainstorming and sifting through our materials with a clear vision in their heads of what kind
of creature they wanted to make. It was such a joy to see their creative process unfold and to witness the whole project come together!
The adults seemed excited by the deep sea creatures as well, so often times they tried to get involved, offer ideas and help out with the actual making of the project. The children usually already had an idea in their minds and didn’t want their adults to guide the creative process but rather just help out with the busy work of cutting things out and helping with gluing. I had spent a lot of time cutting out little props for their backgrounds and my group and I had painted cereal and cracker boxes ahead of time as well. I think that this prepping worked very well because the students were able to put more focus into the development of their creatures which took a while.If we would’ve asked them to do everything themselves, it might have been asking too much. Things would’ve been having to dry and younger children might’ve lost interest if there were too many steps. The younger children were happy to sort through all the props I had made and they still were able to play ‘art director’ as they chose where they wanted to glue things down and how they wanted to craft their mini sea world. The props also didn’t stunt the student’s creativity as some of them still made their own props, decorated the props that we’d gave them, or even turned the props into new and inventive things that we as the ‘art teachers’ hadn’t thought of.
November 21, 2018 at 7:36 pm
First off- it was so nice to share the room with you guys! I’m sorry I kept asking to borrow popsicle sticks and other supplies haha. I saw how hard you guys were working on the props and I think it all came together nicely. I loved how one of the girls added cellophane to the top of her box, that was so smart! (Also that little boy pouting, LOL.) We had kids who invented really unique projects as well, and it was so satisfying to see. It made me feel great and in a way it validated all of our hard work.
December 10, 2018 at 1:46 am
I thought the props were a smart element to addition to our project! It definitely didn’t stunt the kids creativity because a lot of them decorated their projects in ways we weren’t even thinking of!
December 10, 2018 at 5:12 pm
Being in the same room as your group, I was able to watch these students engage with both my group’s jewelry making and your group’s light up sea creatures. The children definitely had so much fun creating there own aquatic animal and underwater backgrounds, they were so creative!! The projects with the blue cellophane over the box and with interior designs are my favorite!
December 16, 2018 at 10:18 pm
Oh how cute! the boy at the top was one of my students in Saturday Art’s Lab (& two of the other children in your pictures) I’m so glad they spent their Saturday creating art with our class (: This project looks like it was so fun for these students. I know that for my group they absolutely loved incorporating technology into art-making, because unfortunately, most students have not had that opportunity. I think maker-day was such an eye opening experience for our class because it really showed how fun and engaging making art with technology can be for elementary age students. For those of us who plan to teach elementary art we now have so many ideas of how we can use technology in our classrooms. I really enjoyed seeing all your group work, the students created really adorable under the sea projects. I love how many materials your group provided for the students to create, it really made each work of unique. The photos you took show how excited and proud each student was of their project.
Great Job(: