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Lesson Plans


Lesson info Skyscrapers and alien visitation

From: Anna N. (anna)
Date: Thu Feb 03 2000 - 15:25:19 PST

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    I got a few requests for this so here goes! First I showed them lots of
    pictures of skyscrapers. I have a great calendar I bought thats about two
    feet long and 8" wide with color photos. They were wowed. I also hung a
    chart that I snagged frfom the web showing the twenty tallest buildings in
    the world. Initial discussion was where we find them and why did they
    begin to build skyscrapers? (Cities out of space) intro of steel. and
    what goes on inside them. Then we looked at the physical aspects. How can
    it get so high...steel skeleton first built was the Home Insurance Building
    in Chicago. Could we use a skyscraper if there were no elevator invented
    yet? And we finally looked at shapes. Some symmetrical, some not. We
    looked particularly at the "tops". I gave them pieces of 9X24 colored
    construction paper (choose their color) and they could fold it half and
    make a cut to get a symmetrical top, or choose their own interesting shape.
     (they also considered what their building was for) next class we looked at
    the skyscrapers again and found that there were many patterns, especially
    in the window placement. We discussed what a "storey" is. How large some
    of these windows are, and how many some buildings have (wow facts!) We
    looked at the lines IN the windows (patterns inside patterns) and shapes
    etc... We then created as stamp using styrofoam and drew our lines on it.
    We then printed our windows on. If they had extra time they could make
    another stamp to print a sign or doors. Since we couldn't all print at the
    same time some students were making black silouette skyscraper shapes (on
    9x12) to fill in background of the mural. We then arranged and glued!
    Beautiful! (they could name their city if they could agree on a name. (I
    had them in groups of four, I attached all the murals at the end of the
    project when hung...four third grades owrth of cities!) Then a following
    project was an alien visitation to Earth, particularly our city. Why would
    an alien want to visit Earth? Our city? What kinds of things might
    interest someone who knows very little of Erth. What might make them
    scared or nervous to visit/be here? Do they think people on Earth would
    welcome them? Why? (this was all on a worksheet) Then they had to consider
    what type of planet the alien was from (real or imaginary) and based on
    that what it might look like. Does it need a mouth talk? Does it talk?
    Maybe their planet is liquid...etc... We made collage aliens and included
    some foil papers for details like eyes and spots etc... and then used
    "3D-O's" (those foam buttons with stick-um) to stick them to the mural to
    that they popped out a bit. Very cool. It was long and a lot of work but
    they seemed vested, and were very proud of their work. It took about four
    weeks (40 minute sessions). A couple of classes also did drawings of
    skyscraper to start with (instead of the first day being cutting the tall
    paper)...very creative and let them go a little nuts with thei excitement
    to create their resturaunts spinning at the top and snowboard resorts
    connected to hotels by icy tubes! The drawing also gave kids something to
    continuously work on when they had down time (waiting to print, finishing
    early etc...) A lot of thought went in to this adventure...I want to treat
    them with a loose free (but learning) experince next a quicky...any more
    ideas out there?
    Hope this was remotely clear...My brain is tired.
    Take care
    Anna N. 

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