Welcome to UpCycle's Homeschool Class

It was a pleasure to have your children in our UpCycle class. In our first class we had an opportunity to get to know each other a little better. We started with clay and worked together adding to a group design. After warming up our fingers we moved over to mixing paint and creating new colors. We selected one of the sample colors we made and made a larger quantity of it. That paint was then used to paint a board that we will use as a base for next week. 

Eve and I like to let the children work at their own pace. While some were still mixing their paints others were ready to move on. During that transition we read a book: Mr. Cornell's Dream Boxes by Jeanette Winter. This is a children's book about an American artist who created his multi-dimensional work inside of boxes. This lead us to investigate cigar boxes. Each child selected a box and took a moment to think about what they could do within the box. Materials were available to create dividers within the box and cover the inside spaces. One box was turned into a tic-tac-toe board. Some were so pleased they wanted to take their work home even though there will be further opportunities to work on the box in future classes.

If you are interested in more information on Joseph Cornell, some of his work can be found at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. There is also a fun website that offers information about the artist and the site is set up like one of his boxes. The site is not up to date as it has events listed from 2006. But other parts of the site are informative and aesthetically pleasing.

http://www.josephcornellbox.com/

We look forward to meeting with you again on 11/17, 12/1, 12/8 and 12/5.