3rd Grade
Castro Elementary School
Mountain View, California
I used this lesson to teach about Shape to 3rd graders. Main concepts included were: geometric forms, symmetrical forms and, many parts to a whole composition.
First I opened discussion to the class about what kinds of shapes they know, by looking at the print, "3 Machines" by Wayne Thiebaud, a San Franciscan artist who does paintings of everyday "sweets" and landscapes, like cupcakes, donuts, cakes, and...GUMBALL MACHINES!
The 2, 3rd grade classes had no problem identifying the basic forms they saw: small circles, large circles, cylinders!, ovals. I then stressed how all of the small gumballs, and small shapes come together to create ONE whole composition. We then proceeded to create the bases for our machines by tearing construction paper and layering that with aluminum foil (to emulate the metal). Then students went away tearing, at first, circular shapes.
What was interesting was how the process of tearing so many pieces changed over time. Students started to become more free with their concept of "circle" and allowed themselves to just tear bits and pieces, because they understood that these shapes still implied circles. A WONDERFUL thing to see students do! many students took the gumball concept even further by adding 3-Dimensional shapes! Which was beautifully done in some of the examples below.
Click to Enlarge!
