Saturday, April 25, 2015

Recycled Art Challenge

In honor of Earth Day, my 2nd and 3rd grade students participated in a "Recycled Art Challenge". We started by looking at this self-portrait gif on Tom Deininger's website and talking about why an artist would choose to make art out of trash. Next, we scrolled through some examples I'd collected on my Recycled Art Pinterest board. I had a buffet of materials from which they could choose- cardboard, toilet paper tubes, tissue paper I saved from gifts, bottle caps, and a variety of other items- and after explaining how the supplies were set up and that they'd have two class periods, the students set to work.
 The students worked REALLY hard on this project. I didn't see a single student slacking. There was a lot of collaboration, a lot of advice-giving, problem solving, creativity, and excitement. Several students finished and immediately asked if they could make another recycled project.
 This student wanted to make a park with trash to try to get people to pick up litter and recycle. She even used a glue stick cap as a trashcan and tied up trash inside a teeny tiny little bag.

 I used a hot glue gun to attach some things when students were having a hard time keeping it steady long enough to dry.
I loved this simple dog! The burlap scraps someone donated were very popular. The eyes are made out of watercolor wells.
This student also used watercolor wells to make the eyes and mouth. Instead of gluing them to the flat surface, he cut holes in the cardboard and poked them through.

I think this challenge will be repeated next year at my new school!
I posted this lesson in a bit more detail on the smARTteacher- check it out!

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