Working with Scale

6th graders know about scale – they define it as: “Big & Small” but “not just big things or small things, but taking something big, and making it small, or taking something small, and making it big.” Like Florentjin Hofman does, for instance, with his 50 ' floating rubber duck http://www.florentijnhofman.nl/dev/project.php?id=104

6^th graders work with scale all the time – take these detailed interiors, for instance, in which found objects are re-purposed as bathroom fixtures, table lamps and computer monitors. 

5th graders know how to make two wooden beads transform into a pet bird for a dream-bedroom:

8^th graders know about scale too – as in the “boy-sized book big enough to get into” that a student is making into a long term project. 

"C" is using each center and new process to decorate the cover of his "Boy-Size Book"

In the choice-based art room, art history lessons often follow student initiative, instead of precede it. That way, when students invent a project, they can see how their idea relates to others in the art world – who else is working in “their” preferred medium, or who else is considering similar subject matter or approach. This makes learning relevant and personal, while honoring innovation and creative approaches to artistic problems.