2nd Grade Architectural Communities

Well, I was talking to one of my second-grade teachers the other day and she said they were about to start their community lesson and I was like "I used to teach a really cool lesson on communities to first graders." Then I skedaddled back to my trusty old filing cabinet and pulled out my example which I knew would be perfect to have a correlated art and ELA lesson :)

So we began class by reading "Iggy Peck, Architect" (which is my absolute fav book ever!!!!). Next, we reviewed what an architect's job is, and then we talked about communities and all of the structures within our community that an architect would be responsible for. 

After brainstorming whole group, we went to our seats and began our sketches on a 4x5 sheet of drawing paper. Once they were happy with their designs they would come to share with me and IU would hand them a piece of 12x15 piece of tracing paper. They would decide where their structure would be "built" within their community and they would trace their original drawing using a Sharpie onto the tracing paper. Next, they would get a friend's small design and trace their drawing within their community and so on and so on until their tracing paper was full of classmates' designs. They absolutely loved the idea of trading their design cards with their friends, kind of a sneaky way of bringing a Pokemon-like activity into the art room!

Next, they were to add creative elements to their community. For example, if they wanted Godzilla tearing down their friend's library they could or a hot air balloon flying through the sky!

Finally, they could choose any or all of the available drawing materials to add color to their final artwork.

As an extension to the lesson they will design their origianl building using Legos.