Here’s an art/engineering project that my students always enjoyed. Erik Erikson believed that children aged 5-12 were in the age of “industriousness” and needed opportunities to feel confident in their ability to achieve and produce. If you watch children as they work on these projects you can almost see their brains firing away as they create and problem-solve.
What?
2 lunch bags
old newspapers
scissors, tape, glue, markers
construction paper scraps and other art media
How?
Decorate one bag with construction paper, markers, paint, and your imagination to look like a building. Open the second bag and stuff with wadded up newspaper. Insert the decorated bag over the stuffed bag to make a rectangular cube.
Tie these sack structures in with a unit on community helpers by asking children to make buildings in their community.
Let children make places from a book they have read and use them to retell the story.
Divide children into small groups and let them collaborate in designing buildings and structures. Can they make a city in the future? Can they make dwellings from other cultures and countries?
Now that's what I call building skills for the 21st Century! Cooperation, collaboration, communication, and creativity all rolled into a fun thing for children to do!
