Creativity Lab

You Found What? Where?

 

This week we took the time as lab groups with our instructor to do a creativity lab. What is that you may ask? It's like new teacher 101. many of us struggle with creative to keep our lessons interesting and have that desired variability.

So we did what any group of young teachers would do....We went to the Dollar Store!

Never underestimate any store for its teaching qualities. many unexpected things can be used for lesson enhancement. Especially, when you are on a budget and your school supplies are low. necessity, is indeed the mother of invention. For this lab I chose to focus on a landscaping unit. I wanted to find something that would allow students to conceptualize some of the things we would be talking about, and boost their creativity. I wandered around for what felt like eternity, until at last bam it hit like a ton of bricks! Or a foam brick that is lol. I found floral/ craft foam at the dollar store. This would be my ground or "landscape". The I found some colored push pins, and sharpies in the business supplies. I decided that the students would label their pins with the markers for the different components of a landscape then create a model using the foam. maybe not the most glorious thing in the world but it really gives you an activity that students wont forget. I chose to use the white type of foam so that it wouldn't be as messy as the softer greet kind. we are going for creation not messy destruction. Some variations to this would be using different shapes of foam for different landscapes. also shaping softer green foam to create the actual land formation. Different shaped pins could also be utilized. A great little extra will be that the students will have to make a key for their pins! Id say this lab was fun, but really took some serious thought for something that seems so simple.