8th Grade Kaleidocycles and Thaumatropes

Part of the beginning of the year is reviewing key vocabulary. This year I decided to take a different approach. The students used kaleidocycles and thaumatropes as tools for using the elements of art. I was excited to try something different with the kaleidocycles because they are so versatile for the classroom. The students were experiencing building form after emphasizing each art element except space.

This is where the thaumatrope comes in because their whole reason for working is understanding the use of space. Many students struggled with the abstract concept of negative space but when it's changed into a math problem of a+b=c they seemed to understand it more. Most of the students wanted to take the route of reverse engineering as opposed to figuring it out from the step by step handout we went over so if you want to try it maybe you might want to look at quite a few built thaumatropes to come up with an idea.

We will be moving on soon to look LED painting next!