Constellations!

This week’s topic was constellations.

The day started out a little chaotic. Two of my students had agreed to come in early for a chance to complete the pendulum painting project (it was a pretty fun one to miss out on). One of the girls arrived early-ish, one didn’t. So we were still working on girl #2’s pendulum painting when the class assembled. 

I felt a bit harried by all the activity that wasn’t related to my lesson that day, and the slight delay to getting started. I guess transitions can be hard for adults, too! But we wrapped up the pendulum painting and were able to get started mostly on time. 

To begin, I had a book I was going to read out loud to the girls. After assessing the noise level of the space (noise carries really well in the basement work area) I decided I would show them the book and tell them they could read it on their own if they were interested. It’s really a fantastic book.

"You Are Stardust" By Elin Kelsey

We moved on to the informational slideshow I had put together about constellations and myths. We talked about how constellations have been around for over five thousand years (also the difference between BC and BCE) and how many of them have myths or stories associated with them. We talked about Calisto, Jupiter, and Arcas—the story behind the Big and Little Dipper.

We also talked about muralists Diego Rivera and Banksy.

Then I explained that for this project, the girls were going to *write* a short myth about themselves and figure out a body pose to go with their myth for a large constellation mural.

I read the myth I had written about Athena turning me into a winged constellation for stealing her paint out loud, and showed them my example body pose (minus my body outline).

After the girls finished writing their myths (and they were so fun!), they chose their pose and lay down on the mural paper. I traced their bodies and then they decided where they wanted their constellation “points” to be. Then we connected the dots.

This project was more ambitious than I realized, even for a 90 minute workshop. I had planned for the girls to weave stars to attach to their constellation points. So while some girls were traced, other girls were working on their woven stars.

The girls need to make two smaller stars:

And one larger woven star:

During the weaving, I had the girls come two at a time to splatter paint our mural paper for an even starrier effect. They seemed to really enjoy doing this part.

 

We didn’t get the weaving done. But I’m planning on abbreviating next week’s workshop, or only having girls who are caught up work on something new, in an effort to finish our mural and wrap up other loose ends before the last day and exhibit. 

Meanwhile, I’m going to type the girls’ myths to be hung underneath the finished mural. I’m really excited to see it all come together and show off the girls' weaving and awesome creative writing!