Natural vs. Manmade Tour, Part One

And here we are at the final GROW tours of the 2016-17 year!

Visit 3 (2nd grade) / Visit 4 (3rd-5th grades) Vocabulary:

natural / natural

manmade / artificial

concentric / concéntrico

weld / soldar

carve / esculpir

First, we discussed the meanings of natural and manmade.  We drew a spectrum in our journals and labeled one end with the word natural and the other end with manmade, adding a few examples of objects (a tree, a pen) where we felt they should be placed on the spectrum.  On another sheet in our journal, we wrote down one word - this could be something that the students saw, heard, thought, or felt at that moment.

2nd grade

3rd grade

4th grade

We began with a sculpture by Richard Long.  Students described the sculpture, noting that it has three concentric circles.  When we were sitting around the sculpture, we were passive viewers.  To become active viewers, we walked all the way around it and talked about how that changed our viewing experience.  The artist Richard Long loves to go on nature walks outside. His walks can take place over one day, or several weeks!  He had the idea to present a nature walk as a work of art – an active work of art. During his walks, he arranges stones that he finds into sculptures that often take the form of straight lines, circles, and spirals. With this sculpture, titled Midsummer Circles, Richard Long brings the outdoors in.

2nd grade

2nd grade

2nd grade

2nd grade

3rd grade

3rd grade

4th grade

4th grade

4th grade

5th grade

5th grade

5th grade

Sometimes, Richard Long creates what he calls textworks - works of art made with words.  In his textworks, Long records sights, sounds, smells, and other words that describe his journey.  Without realizing it, the students had already started their own textwork when they wrote down one word that expressed something they saw, heard, thought, or felt at the beginning of the tour.  We continued to write down one word at each stop during our tour to compose our textworks.

3rd grade

4th grade

Before we moved on to our next sculpture, students drew a symbol to represent Midsummer Circles in their natural to manmade spectrum.  Where would you place this work of art?