I asked if I could come and set up a table where art and science were used together. Combining science and art is probably one of the most fun things to do (I often tell my husband that if this art teacher thing doesn't work out I am becoming an earth science teacher. To which he replies with raised eyebrows!).
Anyhow, I needed to create a project that would entice children to stop at my table, stay a couple minutes, have a high success rate, and be cheap (hey, I'm paying for this and I didn't know if I was going to have 100 or 300 kids at this event!). So, I chose a basic animation "machine" called the Thaumatrope. Here's my original post here with the "how to."I used plastic drinking straws instead of skewers because they were safer.
Here are some of the examples of Thaumatropes I brought to the event. Compare the two images to see the front and the back of each... |
Here are some photos from the event...
My display explaining lenticular animation & optical illusions (top portion) and animation and the persistence of vision (bottom portion). |
How it went:
Great! I tried to think of some great hook to get children to stop and do my project—I was worried it
would seem like too much work. So I would say—“Hey, do you want to make a magic
picture?—It only takes a minute!” and then I’d show them a couple of examples.
My favorite was one that I created that has an image of a top hat on one side.
I showed this to the children and said “I can make a rabbit come out of this
hat—want to see?” And then, when I spun it, the rabbit (image from the other
side) appears. It was really fun seeing the look of awe on some of the kids’
faces when they saw the two images come together!
The Lesson:
Because I had about 30 seconds per
child to explain the concept, I tried to be pretty descriptive when showing
them the examples. I’d say the following:
- See how there is one picture on this side and one on the other side?
- When you draw your two pictures, they will come together when you spin your thaumatrope—so think about that when you draw—use pencil first so we can try it out.
- Don’t worry if it doesn’t work at first—this is tricky! I made mistakes too (I had one of my mistakes on hand to show them)—if you make a mistake, you can erase, or make another one—I have more!
I noticed the older they were, the more complicated they tried to make their animations and therefore the more thought needed to go into them (and then they sometimes needed to make some adjustments). But I tried to work with the students so that everyone went away with a successful Thaumatrope.
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