Tin Foil Art - A Change of Pace

One of my favorite aspects of teaching Kindergarten at Options is that I get to think outside the box and be super creative.  I'm excited to explore different forms or art and materials throughout the year.  We're going to be talking all about our bodies for the month of October as we continue talking about who we are and where we are in place and time.  I have so many activities set up that I decided to let one of our art projects jump to a week earlier :).  First, we talked about different types of art.  There are paintings and clay pots and drawing and statues.  Statues was the one I was looking for.  We talked about what statues are and then made our best statue poses.

 Next I showed them a pipe cleaner statue that I had made and we slowly worked through the steps together so each child could make their own statue.  1. fold a pipe cleaner in half for the legs. 2. bend and twist a pipe cleaner to become the body and turn over the top and twist to make a head.  3. use a slightly shorter pipe cleaner to twist around the body to make the arms.

 After our pipe cleaner statues were made we worked on a step by step tin foil statue.  Using this precut template we slowly crinkled the legs together, then the arms together, then formed the head into a ball.  There were some tears as the project was rather difficult and we accidentally ripped off legs, arms, and heads along the way.  Nothing a little tape couldn't fix though!

 After the two demonstrations the kids were turned loose with the tools for the day - pipe cleaners, scissors, tin foil and tape.  The creativity was fantastic!  I love providing an opportunity that they may not have considered (or would not be allowed at home).  So, if you haven't yet, check your child's backpack for the tinfoil and pipe cleaner villages, families, and plants versus zombies characters that were lovingly made in school on Friday.

A quick review of the rest of the day:

 We're still practicing how to shake hands, playing with play dough, loose parts and toys while building friendships, practicing finding letters and reading, as well as practicing drawing and writing in our journals.

 We are so busy and having so much fun that I'm taking WAY too many pictures all day long.  I tried to share with you an overall vision of our day in these 10 pictures.  We continued exploring different science themes and instrument families.  We did so much awesome learning!