Happy Easter!
Wallace the desktop (Easter Bunny?) pygmy puff hopes you get all the candy you can eat.
Sunday, April 16, 2017
Tuesday, April 11, 2017
Fantastic Beasts Movie Night
This week, our teens got to watch Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.
We pulled out the popcorn machine, bought a couple boxes of paczkis (theme appropriate), and had a crafting opportunity in the back corner for our more restless movie-goers.
We kept it nice and simple so the craft could be completed while they watched the film.
Anyone who's seen FBAWTFT knows that Mr. Scamander's case of magical creatures is crucial to the film. We created our own cases, using plain plastic containers. Ours were left over from an old program where they were used for mini first aid kits. Any rectangular container should work.
I spray painted these brown ahead of time, and promptly ran out of brown spray paint (if you see white spots... that's why).
To decorate the case, our teens cut circles of gold duct tape to wrap around the corners. Simply trim off whatever duct tape hangs over when it covers all three sides.
Of course, what good is a magical creature case without any magical creatures?
To go inside, we created a Swooping Evil.
In the film, the Swooping Evil is a charmingly terrifying creature with a skull-like face, and a habit of eating brains.
Newt flings the creature out of his hand like a yo-yo when he needs its assistance.
For our super simplified Swooping Evils, we started with making basic origami butterflies, like the ones shown here.
We cut out images of skulls that I found online (I very much liked this one. It looks fairly similar to the face of Newt's SE).
Not my photo! This image is credited to SeaWolf_1 on photobucket
With a dab of glue, we were able to attach the skulls to our butterflies.
Then came the fun part.
We used sticky bugs (like the hands you get at bowling alleys or kids' vending... something to the effect of these).
By sticking the bug part to the back of our Swooping Evils, the teens were able to fling them out from their hands the way Newt does... with 'creature' returning.
Friday, March 17, 2017
Thursday, March 16, 2017
Home School Hour - Brains
March was a special month for our home school program!
We had a visit from a good friend of mine, Dr. Trish Schiml, to learn all about BRAINS.
Dr. Trish is a Neuroscience/Psychology instructor at a nearby college. We talked last year, (I used to babysit her kids when they were little) and she offered to help out at one of my home school hours.
She brought three of her college students along to help out, and we were very lucky to have them (thanks, guys!).
Our special guests set up three stations for the children to visit.
The first station had brain hats that the children could make. They were pretty similar to this one, but ours weren't colored. The hats could be cut out and assembled, so that when the children wore them, they indicated locations for different parts of the brain.
Our students seemed to enjoy making them, but the best part was seeing these bright green hats moving around the library after our program was over.
The next station included a play-doh brain activity.
Students were led through the process of making a brain model out of play-doh. They were instructed piece by piece, directed in how to shape each part, and how to assemble them together. They learned the names and roles of each piece while they made them.
When I was a kid, I loved these kinds of hands-on learning activities. It always helped me remember things better (plus, this was a nice activity for the younger kids to participate in).
Our third station was led by Dr. Trish herself. She brought in a few real brain samples from the college!
She brought in a mouse brain, a rat brain, several sheep brains, a few horse brains, and even a human brain (not pictured). She was able to point out the parts our students learned about in their other station, and to answer any questions the children had. The kids were also allowed to (gently) handle the brains (as long as they wore gloves!).
Our program ended up having 65 home school guests in attendance. It was really nice to be able to stay on the sidelines and participate with the kids this time. I was able to learn a lot myself! Plus... we got to make my own brain hats too.
HUGE thanks to Dr. Trish and Wright State University for making this program possible!
Wednesday, March 8, 2017
Friday, February 17, 2017
Home School Hour - Collages
February was another Art themed Home School Hour.
So we focused on collage!
I made a few different types as examples, so we talked about creative freedoms, and how important it is to experiment with things.
We discussed some important artistic elements for their collage work. Each kid got a page with this Elements of Art printable for their definitions.
The examples I have here are all cut outs from old book covers (which we have in excess, here at the library).
Our collage examples were at a few different levels (since our ages range from 4 to 15 at most of these programs).
My very favorite was this picture I made of Humphrey Bogart.
Here you can see a sketch of the shapes I need, labeled in a scale from light to dark.
I used a gray scale to talk about value, and had all of the steps for this one visible to talk about making a pattern for shaped collages. After drawing the original design (pictured above), I traced it on a second piece of white paper. This second copy was cut along the lines to use as patterns for my final colors.
I also had an abstract collage example, and two other created shapes (one that relied on color, and one more dependent on texture. I used book covers for the pieces to all of these other examples.
After we went over different types of collages, it was time for the students to try their own.
We got to use up a lot of the book covers that have been sitting in our office for months. This doubled as a cool lesson in recycling, and in reclaiming materials.
The students were free to make whatever type of collage they wanted. Some were designing and planning ahead of time, and others made their work up as they went along. Some students cut characters out from the covers to use in their entirety, giving them backgrounds, or combining them with characters from different books.
The program even prompted a few kids to check out books they were interested in, based on the covers they saw!
I used a gray scale to talk about value, and had all of the steps for this one visible to talk about making a pattern for shaped collages. After drawing the original design (pictured above), I traced it on a second piece of white paper. This second copy was cut along the lines to use as patterns for my final colors.
I also had an abstract collage example, and two other created shapes (one that relied on color, and one more dependent on texture. I used book covers for the pieces to all of these other examples.
After we went over different types of collages, it was time for the students to try their own.
We got to use up a lot of the book covers that have been sitting in our office for months. This doubled as a cool lesson in recycling, and in reclaiming materials.
The students were free to make whatever type of collage they wanted. Some were designing and planning ahead of time, and others made their work up as they went along. Some students cut characters out from the covers to use in their entirety, giving them backgrounds, or combining them with characters from different books.
The program even prompted a few kids to check out books they were interested in, based on the covers they saw!
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
Valentine's Day
Here at the library, we love a lot of things...
Including puns!
So Valentine's Day is one of our favorites.
Have a good one!
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