The first part of the session was the reveal of the Tie dyed Tshirts which were done two weeks before. Buckets of water were put in the playground and they were to wash the Tshirts clean until no green dye came out. Everyone was very well behaved during this process and were all really pleased with their creations, apart from one student whose Tshirt was mainly white with green circles, she was unhappy with this Tshirt however I thought it looked great and made her stand out from all the other children whose were mainly green. I love how varied all the students look and really pleased that they had their own creative input into their costumes...
After break I handed out bits and bobs from the scrap store that they could choose to decorate their tentacles with. Because of the problems that occurred when I realised I didn't have enough white Plasterzote and the tentacles that I had made broke in half, I made some extra tentacles but in coloured plasterzote which they also had to decorate. As well as the revealing to the Tshirts it was also a chance to show the outcome of the latex experiments. I think the reaction of the children was shock, as they couldn't grasp the concept of how it was all going to work out as the latex was obviously white and watery the last time they saw it. I explained what latex is usually used for (in terms of prosthetic and special effects) which taught them a completely new approach and skill to work and create the gloopy texture for the mask and use this technique that I wanted to recreate throughout the whole of the class of masks. The latex pieces and the scrap store decorations needed to be glued on the masks and tentacles....Which meant that glue guns would need to be used which meant health and safety measures had to be in place such as goggles and only a certain number of children completing it, as well as keeping a careful watch on all the students as many things could possibly go wrong when hot appliances are involved... 
The students got on with this fantastically and you could see how pleased they were once this has was all done and really keen to get on with the collars. With the demonstration of the paper mache on the collars I made sure I was really clear on the instructions, however because it was tissue paper I was using rather than newspaper it was harder to wrap around the wire frames because if it became to wet the tissue paper would rip so there was a certain technique to it, and one that clearly the children found hard to grasp. We started the paper mache after lunch and it took up until the end of the day to finish, when actually some didnt even finish. The class in my opinion was actual mayhem with many students needing assistance and some taking so long to even start it. I have learnt during just this half of the session how challenging teaching can be, when a task is difficult and more than just a small group need help it can cause havoc. Luckily enough I had the main year 5 teacher and art tutor to help me assist the children and without them I wouldn't of been able to complete the lesson. I am glad I went forward with this lesson as it has taught me again never to assume what children can do and make sure its not too challenging that they don't enjoy themselves...
No comments:
Post a Comment