am I smarter than a 5th grader?

One of the school residencies that I have this year is at Douglas Magnet Elementary in Raleigh.  The coordinator there contacted me last year and we designed/wrote a grant for 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades to work with me to create 3 3x5' mosaic panels, each integrating a specific theme targeting their science curriculum.  I don't know if I have mentioned in the blog before, but I am not an art school artist, I have a biology/sociology degree from UNC.  I didn't even take one art class there (boo).  When I was a kid, I loved making things, but wasn't too great at drawing and painting (therefore, no one ever suggested I should be an "artist").  It has been a treat to marry science themes with mosaic for this residency, and this past week was super busy and super fun with hundreds of students!

Third grade is learning about phases of the moon.  I definitely had to refresh myself on this theme.  We did a worksheet together, then they chose one phase to render in paper mosaic.  Their collaborative glass mosaic was also completed this week (and I will post later).

In the 4th grade classrooms, they are studying rocks and minerals, so I suggested we base our project around geodes.  Plain and crusty on the outside, beautiful minerals and crystals on the inside...  We talked about how geodes are formed, and assigned colors to the different minerals that can be found inside.  They had creative choice to design their own geode and render in paper to prepare for the glass mosaic we will complete in a few weeks.

5th graders had a different challenge.  We looked at several examples of abstract and geometric art and looked for ways they could show the concepts of force, motion, gravity, friction, and inertia.  Then, they were to do come up with their own depictions of one of those definitions using only basic geometric shapes like circles, triangles, squares, arrows.  I wasn't sure how this would work, but they did GREAT, very creative in their conceptual thinking about science and art!  Their glass mosaic will also be done in April.

Thanks Douglas for a fantastic week!