"Typography" with 5th and 6th

When I first got my long term sub job I went NUTS on Pinterest pinning anything that had to do with art education. One of my favorites was this pin. You will have to translate it, it's in dutch ;)

I loved the way they turned out the first time I taught the lesson so I used it for an end of the year project with my 5th and 6th graders last year.

It worked great for end of the year because there was different ways they approached it based on time so they really went in whatever direction they wanted with it. I also let them take them as soon as they were finished as long as I snapped a picture first. 

I CAN statement: I CAN create a 3D or 2D work of art using text.

Day 1: Intro! 5th and 6th graders are REALLY into YouTube so without me saying anything I played this YouTube video when they came in...

I was very impressed by the kiddos that knew the song, way to go parents! Then I asked them what they thought typography was based on the video and we brainstormed to get to the answer!

My biggie when it comes to projects, is connecting them to something in real life they can relate to. SO, I introduced typography and talking about graphic design. While I myself am not a talented graphic designer, I love the endless possibilities of it and type is just one very small piece. It also gets some light bulbs going for kids that think the only art careers are being an artist or art teacher. One of my other favorite things to do is talk about the billion different fonts in the world. I go to a font website and show them different categories and talk about the fox sentence that contains every letter so they can see the entire font. They usually don't believe me and we go through the sentence to find all the letters. Don't they know i'm always right!?!

I show them examples of the project from my long term sub students and show them mine and we talk about requirements like both sides being colored if 3D and 2D requirements like space and size. They quickly convinced me they shouldn't have to do their names. Thus proving, I'm not always right. Most start working penciling things out on the white tag board.

Day 2, 3, & 4: Work time! Drawing and coloring take place for two solid classes and finishing touches and assembling during the last. We use sharpie and marks-a-lot permanent markers to do the coloring and designs. They get really into this project. Choice baby, choice! Some classes had more time than others so the wide range of assembling happened. I let them hot glue independently after I review with them quickly how to use it. I warn them about the strings and usually the ones with zero help from me or another student end up with the most strings. I hate those things!

Many had the intention of 3-D but ran out of time so they improvised...

3D

That E is seriously awesome.

2D