accueil site > Paysage et patrimoine > 01. Teaching materials > 01. Nursery school > Vegetal Carnival : big heads
To make sculptures to celebrate carnival at school, on the theme of the radio broadcast “Les grosses têtes" (“Bigheads")
OBJECTIVES
to make the most of the expressive resources of a given process or material
to create a 2-D or 3-D composition that matches a desire for expression
to adapt one’s gestures to material constraints (tools, supports, materials)
MATERIALS
1st phase : balloons, newspapers, wallpaper paste
2nd phase : multi-coloured glossy paint (yellow, green, red, orange, blue)
3rd phase : various natural materials collected by the children (branches, shells, sand, stones…, a glue gun)
REFERENCES
Music : Y’a qu’un cheveu sur la tête à Mathieu, Pour dessiner un bonhomme, Anne Sylvestre , Tu me fais tourner la tête , Edith iaf
Photos : various portraits among which, the child’s
Paint : Vegetal portraits by Guiseppe Arcimboldo
PROCEDURES
Prerequisites : get the children to work on the body for a proper knowledge of the different elements of their bodies, particularly their heads.
Preparatory work : a think-tank with the children about a possible Carnival decoration. How to create “bigheads", what with ? A suggestion : to implement with natural elements the idea of balloons wrapped in papier-mâché, a technique used the year before.
1st phase : 2 or 3 sequences, depending on the children and the size of the balloon.
Make the materials available for the children. The children will understand by trial and error how to improve their work (tear the paper into strips or pieces, neither too large nor too small, dip them into paste, then properly smooth them out…).
Get the children to talk about the techniques they have used, for examples the different stages of the initially wet and limp papier-mâché into something dry and hard.
2nd phase : (one or two sequences).
Paint the supports with touches of multi-coloured glossy paint.
3rd phase : (one sequence). Observe reproductions of the “portraits" painted by Guiseppe Arcimboldo, from vegetation for the eyes, the nose, the mouth, the hair and sometimes the ears.
Suggest each child should work on their portraits with natural elements for every part of the face and put them on the painted head, where they wish.
Help each child to stick these elements with the glue gun (adult job only)
Meanwhile appeal to verbal language by asking the child to account for his choices.
Set each “head" on bars and stands used in sports lessons, in order for everybody to observe them.
FOLLOW-ON-ACTIVITIES
Paper : how it is made, its various possible uses :(papier-mâché, cut-outs, collage, wrapping, recycling, sorting out waste).
Make the children animate the “Bigheads" during the Carnival, make act and express themselves through their bodies, work on the body with dances and mime…
ASSESSMENT
It will measure the child’s capacity to :
properly carry out the tasks they have been given
- list the criteria that define the resemblance of their creation to a big head
get involved in the project. Some children got tired of preparing balloons in papier-mâché, some adored “messing about" with this rather unusual material. The phase when they used natural materials was quite rich with creativity. Several heads were created in view of illustrating the song “n’ y’a qu’un cheveu… !“
Ardis Rambicur . École Maternelle Fourqueux (Yvelines ) France