Paper-mache always has been and always will be one messy project! For some reason I decided to do it the with the older classes at school and had told them to bring scraps of paper.... last night when I was thinking about the actual process I was getting cold feet... but sure enough, they all brought paper scraps to school today and we had a mache party!
I tried to maintain some order by having only one bowl of goo and making them stay in line and file through one at a time... they listened generally well and it went almost as well as could be expected.
I learned some things from class 6 and worked out a few wrinkles in my system before class 5, and it went a little better.
When I was leaving school several kids had already given up on letting them dry and were throwing, kicking, and playing with them. After I spent an extra hour trying to patch up holes myself, most of them were still not very well covered like a normal paper-mache project should be. I have my doubts about how well the project will turn out, but the cute part is that the kids were still thrilled! While they were throwing and kicking them I heard numerous excited squeals, "it wont burst," "they are strong!" "they don't burst!" A lot of kids are almost scared of balloons because there's so many things on the ground to "burst" them and they are used to balloons that "burst" while being blown up... so in their minds, paper-mache simply imortalized their balloons and they were more than happy if that's all it did.
I was slightly terrified and expected to be reprimanded for the noise and mess... but he was inviting me to attend a staff meeting.
It was a handful, but it worked out, the kids loved it, and worse things have happened! ;)
1 comment:
Well Tabby, you certainly are making memories with your students. The things you're introducing them to and the cute things you make with them they will never forget. They will no-doubt try again making those crafts later or teach them to their siblings and friends. It's neat to see how thrilled they are with simple things. How sad it is when we see how board kids here are with high tech electronic gadgets and neat things most of those kids will never dream of having. Keep "wow"ing them and help them to have as much fun as humanly possible in the next few weeks! LOVE YOU, mom
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