K-2 Band Activities
Art
SAS Big Ideas:
- Artists use tools and resources as well as their own experiences and skills to create art.
- The arts provide a medium to understand and exchange ideas
Transforming Wood
Objective: Students will explore different ways wood can be used to create art.
Introduce the Artmobile exhibit Tree to Form using the background information provided (About the Exhibition) Discuss how artists and craftspeople transform wood into sculptures to look at and objects to use such as furniture and toys. Place various blocks of wood around the classroom for students to observe. Look at the texture, form, and shapes found within the blocks of wood.
- Pre-visit: Ask students to imagine what their block of wood could become and create a drawing of your wooden object. Share ideas as a class.
- Post-visit: Discuss the different artworks the children saw in the Artmobile exhibit Tree to Form. Have a brief group discussion on the students' favorite pieces. Create a second drawing as a response to the show using the same block of wood as before as a platform for inspiration. Display the drawings side by side. Close the discussion with comparing how ideas change when artists are exposed to ideas from things they have observed or that surround them.
Shape vs. Form
Objective: Students will compare traits of shapes versus forms.
Compare the traits of a shape to that of a form. Shapes are flat and forms are three-dimensional. Look at a variety of scraps of wood, Popsicle sticks, or wood bits and the shapes they are. Discuss how shapes can be transformed into forms by stacking them onto one another.
- Pre-visit: Create a pillar or building using scraps of wood while considering balance. See how high they can stack the wood before it will loose its balance.
- Post-visit: discuss how wood can hold space. Bowls are bowls because they have empty space within themselves. This creates a concave form. Using the same wood scraps as before and Elmer's glue, this time create bowls. Start by gluing pieces in a circle to a circular piece of heavy board, card board, or poster board. To create a concave bowl, students will have to create slightly larger circles with each layer to reflect a staircase.
Language Arts
SAS Big Ideas:
- Listening provides the opportunity to learn, reflect, and respond.
- Language is used to communicate and to deepen understanding.
- Writing is a means of documenting thinking.
Inventions of the Imagination
This activity can take place alone or in conjunction with the “Transforming Wood” art activity for this band.
Objective: Students will consider how materials can be transformed using their imaginations.
- Pre-visit: Consider how artists have the ability to transform materials into useful and beautiful objects. Consider yourself as an artist and using your journal, or as a group activity, write a list of projects that you could create using one of the following materials: wood, metal, cloth, or paper. Challenge yourself to see how many items your imagination can create.
- Post-visit: Return to your journal activity made prior to the visit. Compare some of your answers to things you may have seen similar in the Artmobile visit. Discuss your thoughts with the class.
Scavenger Hunt
Artists and craftspeople can create works that are used, called functional objects.
Objective: Students will find functional wood objects that may have been turned.
- Pre-visit: Students will go on a Scavenger Hunt to identify possible turned wood objects. The Hunt can begin in school and continue as a homework assignment. Students will bring in their objects, or if too large, sketch and present their objects to the class.
- Post-visit: A show and tell can be held. The class can discuss whether they believe an object may be turned or not. (This, of course, depends on prior knowledge of turned objects.)
Math
SAS Big Ideas:
- Some attributes of objects are measureable, e.g., length, mass, capacity, and can be quantified.
- Two- and three-dimensional objects can be described, classified, and analyzed by their attributes, and their location can be described quantitatively.
Objects are Measurable
Concepts of length, height, and distance around can be measured. Children will be reinforcing their knowledge of three-dimensional objects and measurement.
Objective: Children will measure turned objects.
- Pre-visit: Use the turned objects the children brought in from the Scavenger Hunt for Turned Objects in this activity. (The teacher may wish to bring additional wooden objects.) Set up stations around the class. At each station have measuring tools available. Divide children into cooperative groups to measure and record their findings at each station. Depending on their level, children can measure in inches, centimeters, or by arbitrary units like paper clips, small blocks, etc. Very young children can have stations set up so they can compare concepts like “small and large” or “shorter and taller”. Record findings. A classroom discussion could follow based on the groups' findings.
- Post-visit: Further discussion could be held on the importance of measurement to wood turning. What pieces in the Artmobile exhibit Tree to Form required careful measurement and planning when they were made? What pieces required little measurement? Why?
Tall or Small
When objects are tall, do they make you feel differently than when they are small? Why does height of an object make the object change?
Objective: Students will describe and analyze objects according to their physical attributes.
- Pre-visit: Students will classify objects into categories of tall or small from the following list. Ask students to extend their answers by stating a reason why each object has to be small or tall. (Trees, dog houses, bird house, telephone pole, flag pole, acorn, hammer, chisel, totem pole, carved masks, swing set, mailbox, house, ship, etc.)
- Post-visit: Think about the chair sculptures in the exhibit - Joanne Shima's Child's Chair and the many tiny chairs in Robert Dodge's Razzle Dazzle. Each chair was either tall or small. Discuss how each chair is different and how the proportions of the chairs differ, then consider how the artwork would change if the heights were reversed. Would they still be good works of art?
Science
SAS Big Ideas:
- Technological design is a creative process that anyone can do which may result in new inventions and innovations.
- A technological world requires that humans develop capabilities to solve technological challenges and improve products for the way we live.
Tools of the Woodworker
Artists use tools in the production of their art. Culture, need, and time have advanced types of tools from simple hand tools to modern power tools.
Objective: Students will examine various types of wood working tools.
- Pre-visit: Explore with the students types of tools used with wood. Think about what each tool is used for. (Refer to the types of tools link in the glossary.)
- Post-visit: Create a drawing in response to an artwork at the exhibit. Label the drawing with the types of tools that may have been used to create each area of the object. Refer to the glossary for assistance.
Trees of the World
Type of wood depends heavily on the environment in which it grows.
Objective: Students will identify a variety of regions or habitats and categorize tree types based on these regions.
- Pre-visit: Consider the types of trees you would find in the mountains, at the beach, in the desert, in a rainforest, in the arctic, on a plain, in your neighborhood. Why do you think certain trees grow in specific areas?
- Post-visit: Refer to a map similar to the one you observed in the Artmobile. Using points from your previsit discussion play a game to match the tree type to specific areas in the world or across the United States. You can extend this activity by including Google Earth as a tool to figure out tree populations. Google Earth
Social Studies
SAS Big Ideas:
- Human actions modify the physical environment, and physical systems affect human systems.
- Geography is used to explain the past, interpret the present, and plan for the future.
- Geographic representations are essential to explain the spatial organization of people, places, and environments.
Carving Wood
This type of wood carving has occurred since the early age of man.
Objective: Students will reference wood carvings and categorize them based on their age.
- Pre-visit: Use the images below to determine when they were used and what they were used for. Try to place them in chronological order.
(Click on the image for more information)
- Post-visit: Refer to the texture and finishes on the pieces in the Artmobile. Do some of the works look older than others? Imagine you created a wood carving like those from the Artmobile exhibit Tree to Form, what would you make now and what would you have chosen to make 100 years ago? Is there a difference?
Identifying our Community
Objective: Students will discuss the role of members in the community.
- Pre-visit: Discuss with your students the role of community members. Include craftspeople such as artists, home repair workers, construction workers, house builders.
- Post-visit: Refer to the craftspeople in our community and continue the discussion now after experiencing the artworks of the Artmobile exhibit Tree to Form. Imagine you are a craftsperson, what trade interests you the most.