After a long "layover" due to Spring Break and report card conferences, the kindergarteners have returned to their around the world travels. This time leaving Asia and venturing to Africa. After sharing facts about Africa's geography and climate from our Atlas, I shared a renowned art form with them- folktales. The kindergarteners are just finishing learning about folktales with their classroom teacher, so I read "Anansi the Spider" by Gerald McDermott featuring Anansi, the iconic folktale character of the Ashanti people in Ghana. I love the artwork in this story. Students were able to recognize the symbolism used to illustrate Anansi's six sons. For instance, his son "River Drinker " has a symbol for water, "Cushion" looks like a pillow "See Trouble" has four circles, or four eyes that can see in all directions. After the tale, I had students choose a character they wanted to create, and practiced counting 8 legs, as well as fine motor skills while cutting out symbols and folding the legs into crinkles.
As they created, I told them the folktale of how a spider such as Anansi, inspired the art of weaving textiles in Ghana, eventually inspiring the symbolically colored, geometric patterned, woven textile, kente cloth. I brought in samples of kente cloth and left students with labeled art forms from Africa to look at after they were done working. Check out the photos of Anansi and his sons in the photos!
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The students had a half day on Friday, so we took a break from our regularly scheduled world traveling to celebrate Earth Day. I read "The Earth Book" by Todd Parr and talked to students about how to put their ideas into a poster. They started with their big idea, then thought of a title. From there, I encouraged them to tell their message with pictures. They did an awesome job!
Before Spring Break, the kindergarteners "traveled" more throughout Asia and settled into India. I talked to students about the tradition of mandalas, and how to create them using radial balance. Students looked at examples of mandalas and noticed that the designs remind them of elements of nature, such as leaves, flowers, spider webs, etc. Using a doted line template, student started at the center of their mandala and made sure each "slice" was the same. I am so impressed!
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