Easy Project You Can Do Tomorrow: Action Playgrounds

I've seen a lot of posts of these paper "line" sculptures. You simply cut paper strips on the paper cutter and let the kids bend, twist, and manipulate them to create 3D forms. They glue them to a base and have a really impressive sculpture.

Here's a TWIST on that idea. Excuse the pun.

We made a "playground" out of white paper. Students talked about words that described actions like over, under, around, slide, crawl, balance etc. while creating their playgrounds. Next we looked at Jackson Pollock's "ACTION" paintings. I asked students, "How do you think Jackson Pollock put the paint on the canvas?" Show me with your pretend paintbrush. At first they all said he "splattered it!" Then I helped them build their vocabulary to drip, pour, drizzle, flick, throw and we tried each of these actions with our imaginary paintbrush. Finally, we used some watery paint that had been sitting in my closet to do our action painting on our playgrounds. The big rule was. . . you can't touch your paintbrush to your sculpture. These were made by Kindergarteners. 

Check them out!