Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Paper-making with my fifth graders

the focus was on Paper-Making for the whole of term 1 for my P5 pupils.... 

it started with 'scaring' the pupils that this year's art lessons were gonna to involve a lot of researching, planning, sharing and reflecting and they all went 'HUH?!?! Why like that???' and were ignored!!!!.... oopx 


then there was a ME demonstration in week 2 on how paper can be made from toilet paper with the equipment that we have in the art room. Pupils were strongly encouraged to jot down the procedures into their art journal as mrs ang is one art teacher who does not repeat her instructions and definitely not one who goes around correcting their shortcuts... dun judge me as i learnt this from my art tutor too..... wahahahaha.... =P .... art is just this lovely subject where pupils can afford to make mistakes and then learn from them or make new discoveries from their mistakes oh... =D 

Hands-on lesson started in week 3 and for this lesson, and only this lesson, all the necessary equipment was prepared for the 7 groups of pupils. After which they had to stock-take, wash them after the lesson and pick them up at the beginning of the rest of the lessons. 

This was a trial 'strategy' to reduce teacher preparation time which many art teachers had complaint about. And i am glad that i had decided to spend the time to try it out cos the rest of the lessons on paper-making were all super fuss free.... 

i only needed half an hour per week to prepare the paper pulp before the lesson and then give the green light for the pupils to go ahead to pick up the equipment and then just stood around to take pictures of them at work during lessons.... 

oh... and the doing it on the corridor and grass patch outside the art room was so that they have more space for movement and also to reduce clean up time...and hence the pupils had more time making their paper... =) 








the different colours and sparkles and glitters were all ideas from the individual groups... some used food dye, others used poster paints, and there were even some who used marker inks....

was really happy when they had the initiatives to bring their own sponges and rags to speed up the process as only 1 of each was provided for each group... =P 

on average, each group could produce up to 5 pieces of recycled paper per lesson.... the first few weren't as perfect as what they hope to achieve




but they soon got the hang of it after a few tries... =) 


extra learning for this group of pupils who overlooked the importance of pouring ALL excess water through the sieve

they ended up having to rake up the dried paper pulp that got stuck on the grass the next lesson and hence had lesser time to make their own paper. 


and with the paper (and scrap) made during the term, Mother's Day cards and Thank You tags were created to be sold at our annual art bazaar... =) 





love this art activity as pupils get to work in groups, practice their communication skills, be in-charge of their creation and improvement, work at their own pace, there are opportunities to make improvement to their skill mastery etc etc etc.... 

would further refine how the lessons were conducted to include some artists study and hopefully a project work (read: bigger artwork) for next year's lessons.... =D 

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