This was our cake for our end of the year celebration!
We made it!!! The Hornung Imagination Chapter had a year full of creative experiences! During the last month, we worked on games. From field day games to board games and even Kahoot Review Games, students created a wide assortment of fun games! Some of the games were displayed and utilized during the Hornung Field Day, which gave the students at Hornung an opportunity to see the creative designs and enjoy the fun!
Students drew faces on water balloons for the baby carrier water balloon obstacle course!
We also had a putt putt golf hole that was used for Field Day!
During our last meeting we had a pizza party and creativity showcase. Family members joined us for the food, games, and short celebration. Unfortunately, technology wasn't on our side when the video needed to be played. Here is the short video I created with some of the highlights from our pilot year!
There are great activities to do with common household items. I tried to give each child a baggie with the materials cards, but I know some kids snuck out before I was able to give it to them. If you were one of the families that did not get one, or if you would like to see more, check out Destination Imagination Free Printables.
It has been a wonderful year of developing imaginations through creative play! I am so thankful for the help and support of the parents of the Hornung Imagination Chapter, especially Mr. Sroufe and Mrs. Gates!
The Hornung Imagination Chapter will be having a few events in the summer! One of the events will include some of our members running a Maker Faire Detroit Booth with the MichEd Maker Connection July 25-26 at the Henry Ford Museum! Another exciting thing will be adding 100 new chapters across the globe for the 2015-16 school year!!! If you are interested in learning more about bringing an Imagination Chapter to your area, click here!
Cheers to creativity, developing future innovators, and allowing kids to do what they do best...play!
We have had a busy last few months with the Hornung Imagination Chapter! Here are some of the highlights!
We kicked off March with a Creativity in Our Community field trip to downtown Brighton. Chapter members and adults explored the streets, parks, and businesses in Brighton to celebrate the creativity that was discovered! Check out all of the things that we found!
We also had fun learning more about circuitry. During the March/April meetings we had a mix of activities including BYOD Days, Circuitry Fun with Makey Makeys and Little Bits, and Instant Challenges!
On April 24 we were honored to have Drew Minock attend one of our meetings to showcase the joys of augmented reality! The kids loved playing the boxing games, creating games on TinkerCad, viewing the solar system, and using the Color Alive and ColAR coloring sheets! We are lucky to have him here in Brighton, and I hope that he will be able to visit us more regularly next year!
To celebrate Earth Day, we had a day of upcycling fun! There were many awesome things that were created! Mrs. Giannandrea, a third grade teacher and Imagination Chapter helper, was graced with an original apron.
The month of May has had a game based theme! We have spent each meeting working on creating games. It has been awesome to see some of the games evolve week to week! In addition, we have taken time to play outside on recess! We are going to have a game showcase on June 4 to celebrate our final meeting and share our games with our families. We are also hoping to have 1-2 games available for the Hornung Elementary kids to play during their Field Day!
As you can see there are many wonderful activities that can engage children in creative play! If you are interested in learning more about the Imagination Foundation and bringing an Imagination Chapter to your area, check out their webpage! They are looking to add 100 new chapters for the 2015-16 school year. It is a FABULOUS opportunity to connect with creative people from all over the world and impact the creative lives of children in your own community!
I have so enjoyed engaging in Rube Goldberg themed play over the last 3 meetings! What a great experience! As you may or may not know, I am a third grade teacher, and I was able to see so many connections to my curriculum! My favorite experiences were hearing kids debate the possible reasons the marble's lost momentum. "I think we have to increase the pitch!" one boy said. The other said, "No, I think we have to change the angle of the blocks." To see them playing with a bunch of random materials and applying concepts they have learned in school is a teacher's dream!
Here are some highlight videos from this past week! Enjoy!
We are celebrating Rube Goldberg this month, with Rube Goldberg themed play! This is my first time ever doing a Rube Goldberg project with kids, so it should be interesting. I spent the last month collecting online resources and finding many examples of Rube Goldberg machines, as well as tips from other educators. Still with all the background knowledge, I wasn't sure how it would all play out.
Last week I had allowed the kids to play the PBS Goldburger To Go Game in the computer lab, and then they researched some of the simple machines that could be made. Afterwards we watched some of the Rube Goldberg Machine videos. There is an AWESOME video that has served as the main Rube Goldberg Music Video. It will blow your minds...and it gave my kids a ton of motivation!
Today we had Day 1 of our Rube Goldberg play! I asked the children to bring random household items, trinkets, and whatever they could think of to use. Fortunately, many of the students brought a bunch of cool things. I had found many lids that were lacking containers in my cupboards, as well as random things around my house to add to the materials. I also raided my Destination Imagination materials for things like cups, paper clips, straws, etc.
To begin, we had a warm-up. I used one of my Destination Imagination challenges...create a device that can make a ping pong ball travel farther than 6 inches without the ball touching the floor, using 4 index cards, 10 paper clips, 4 straws, 2 labels, 1 clothespin, and 2 rubber bands. It was neat to see all the different ways kids tackled this challenge, and it gave them a way to explore creating a path for a ball. We then went right into our Rube Goldberg exploration. Many students teamed up, but there were some that worked individually. Some are still at the beginning stages of their machine, while others were able to move a bit further. Check out all the fun that was had on Day 1!
I can only imagine it will get more and more awesome each meeting!
I love seeing the ways kids take things and run with it! Today for Imagination Chapter, I went through some of the options for holiday themed crafts, but I also gave them the freedom to create whatever they wanted with the materials. Looking around the room, they appreciated the choice of freedom. Q-Tip snowflakes turned into Q-Tip animals, houses, race tracks, and people. Random scraps from The Scrap Box turned into foam shooters, villages, scarves, and more. Paper intended for snowflake cutting became the canvas for illustrations. They took the supplies and made it their own! Creative Play at its best!
The Q-Tip Station was fun!
The random material station was utilized a lot...and it also got pretty messy.
Sometimes just the simple act of drawing can be the most gratifying!
Here is an example of the one craft that shown and completed as shown...a wonderful crystal wreath made from fold-top baggies and floral wire!
To end our meeting, we did an instant challenge to group up and create a carol about creativity. Here are some of the highlights:
Two weeks ago, we used our artistic talents to create designs on cloth and create tee-pees. The students decorated their cloths with Native American symbols. It was challenging to build the wooden structure, but we were lucky enough to have a few extra parent helpers lend a hand.
Today we kept our chapter meeting lower key, and we enjoyed being creative with our coloring! Here are some of the stations that were available for the kids!
Color a Smile:
There is an organization I recently came across called Color a Smile. They are a nonprofit that sends coloring pages to people in need of cheer. From the elderly to the troops, they send out colorful pages collected from people all over the US all the time!
ColAR:
One of my favorite apps is ColAR. ColAR is an Augmented Reality app. that allows kids to color special pages and then use the app to bring their colored pictures to life 3-D on the screen. I printed off the fireworks page, as well as the animal cell picture and the disco bear picture. For some reason or another, the kids thought the animal cell was gross. Since they are only in 2nd-4th grades, they have not gotten into learning about the different parts of cells, but I was surprised to hear they thought it was gross. ???
Artist Trading Cards
I first learned about Artist Trading Cards about 4 or 5 years ago when I visited Art Snacks, a site ran by Kevin Honeycutt. Since then, Artist Trading Cards have been part of my classroom. I decided to introduce the Hornung Imagination Chapter to ATC's. Like my students, they were drawn to them instantly and created, created, and created some more. I even created a couple cards to trade with some of the kids! Artist Trading Cards have an interesting history. Check it out!
T-shirt Design, Logo, and Slogan
We are SO fortunate to have the creative talents and time of Mrs. Gates, who is a clothing designer and owner of Blue Platypus. Mrs. Gates has been a constant parent helper and creative idea generator for chapter meetings. Today she gave the kids a quick lesson on the importance of good design, and then she met with the kids in small groups to generate ideas for our Hornung Imagination Chapter t-shirts. Next week the chapter members are going to vote on their favorites!
Finally, we took a peek into the Hour of Code for next week's meeting. One of our students coded the tree lights for the Michigan tree in Washington, DC. If you go to www.madewithcode.org, you can also be a part of the light design on the many trees representing the states. The students were super pumped to wee this highlighted and excited for the Hour of Code next week.
To close our meeting, I went over some contests that are out there for kids to try. One of my edutech friends, Rushton Hurley, has an awesome site called Next Vista. It is a wonderful site full of videos that are for kids...made by kids and teachers! There are several video creation contests going on right now. Check them out!
Mrs. Sroufe shared with me a contest created by the Paradigm Project with the American Red Cross with the aim to prevent home fires. It is a really neat challenge-based activity that would be an awesome fit for our Imagination Chapter! Children can work alone or with a team, and the online program allows you to go along step-by-step with plenty of resources to help!
For fun this month, they also have a photo challenge involving baking. Kids can bake anything that spells out the word "Change", take a photo of it, post it, and get people to vote for it. The top 10 photos win prize money!
All in all, our Imagination Chapter is still going strong, full of creativity, collaboration, and childhood fun!
“I really like this!” a student said to me after the 2nd Hornung Imagination Chapter meeting.
“What do you really like about this?” I probed.
“I don’t usually have the time to create anything I want. We got to build for a long time. Plus, I don’t usually have all the supplies.”
“Well, I’m glad you are enjoying yourself!” I replied.
I have kicked off the Hornung Imagination Chapter pilot, and we have met for 2 weeks now. The first week was spent celebrating the Global Cardboard Challenge, and this past week we had fun building towers out of paper and creations out of marshmallows and spaghetti. I will admit, this past week’s meeting was messy! There were spaghetti noodles everywhere and marshmallows that ended up getting squished on the bottoms of shoes and into the carpet. I definitely have reflected on a better way to do it next time, but like most things in life, you learn as you go.
It was a busy room full of 33 creative children in grades 2-4, 2 parent volunteers, and 2 college students. Kids were spread out, some working in partnerships, while others worked individually. There were tee pees being made, bridges, towers, and villages. Kids were having fun! Many of the creations were not able to make it home and ended up in the garbage, but the kids were OK with it. Imagination Chapter outcome: play doesn’t always have to have a product to take home.
The above interaction I had with a student came at the end of the meeting when we were cleaning up. He pretty much captured the intent of this chapter…to set aside specific time for creative play. To designate a space and time for kids to explore, imagination, and play. I shared our conversation with his mom, and I laughed that he was impressed with all of the supplies we had. In week one we played with cardboard and tape, while week 2 we used spaghetti and marshmallows. She said that before this meeting, they looked at those things as food, and that this program will probably open up their eyes to the things around them and the potential they have in creation. Imagination Chapter outcome: children will be able to see the world in different ways.
While we were in play mode, one of the creative parent helpers, who has her own clothing design company, had a suggestion to make totem poles. Then we started brainstorming materials for it. From our brainstorming conversation, we have plans to make milk jog creations that will stack to be a totem pole. Perhaps we will even make seasonal ones to switch out throughout the year. These could be permanent art pieces for Hornung. Imagination Chapter outcome: Adults can come together to collaborate and inspire the creativity within each other.
The kids were asking me throughout the meeting, “What are we going to do next time?” There are many things flowing through my mind, and I hope that I will be able to find a way to do all of the things that I have thought of. But…it all comes down to time…a very precious resource! Stay tuned to our next Imagination Chapter adventures!
Welcome letters will be sent home on Tuesday and our first meeting will be Thursday! With such a short time in between, I can only imagine parents will have questions. Our first meeting will primarily focus on getting to know each other and focusing on the Cardboard Challenge. I am asking all children to bring cardboard (whatever is able to be brought to school.) We will be creating cardboard games and other creations, so it will be a pretty opened ended first meeting.
As far as future meetings, here is a general agenda, as well as my expectations:
3:50-4:00 Settle in, snacks, and socialization.
4:00-4:25: Sharing/Instant Challenges
4:25-5:20 Planning and Creative Play
5:20-5:45: Sharing (If students need to leave at 5:30, that is fine, but I would love to have parents be part of the share time. In the future, I would even love to have family creative time from 5:30-6:00 possibly)
*There could be times where we will go on field trips or have other themed meetings.
I expect kids to come to the meetings excited to learn, take risks, and explore.
I expect kids to work together, but also develop self-regulation and independence.
I expect kids to be the leader sometimes and bring their ideas for projects to the meetings.
I expect kids to be inspired by each other!
I expect the kids to record their ideas, thoughts, and progress in their Imagination Notebook each week!
I expect the kids to respect the materials, Hornung Elementary, and follow the normal expectations of the school environment.
I expect this to be one of the most awesome after school activities Brighton has ever expereienced!
To have an idea of the types of things the students may do for their first meeting, check out my page on the Global Cardboard Challenge:
To learn about the true inspiration behind the Imagination Foundation, check out Caine!
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