Nature Diary

Sabine Fels

Grade level: 3 and 4

Provincial curriculum links: Nova Scotia

Subject: Visual Arts

Keywords: art making, writing, fractions

Description

This project involves creating a nature diary based on collecting objects found in or around the school ground. It can be stretched over the entire year by collecting two or three objects a day, or interspersed into the art and science program, or occur as a one-day event. Students are asked to pick objects from the school ground or the surrounding area based on the aesthetic quality of the item, its shape, size and the personal meaning of or curiosity about the found object. The objects should not exceed 5 or 6 cm in length and will need to be dry. Plant matter can be dried in a simply constructed flower press or in a silica gel mixture.

Curriculum Framework

• Acknowledge and express personal feelings, ideas and understandings through art making
• Use various materials and processes, exploring possibilities and limitations
• Use a combination of the visual elements and principles of art and design in art-making
• Demonstrate sensitivity towards the natural and built environment through artwork
• Demonstrate an awareness of the role of art and artists in their local and global communities

For the Teacher: This project was inspired by the work of Chris Drury, who is one of an ever-increasing number of contemporary artists who work in the landscape and make use of the materials and processes of nature in their art. Their methods favour observation, collection, and forms of manipulation that are more reflective than assertive, resulting in remarkably beautiful, sometimes ephemeral, work. Other noteworthy artists working in this context are herman de vries, Andy Goldsworthy, Ian Hamilton Finlay, Nikolaus Lang, Richard Long and Giuseppe Pennone.

Materials

• Collected items from the school ground and surrounding area (maximum 5-6 cm long)
• Flower press
• Square stretched canvas, or Bristol board cut into square shape
• Hot glue gun
• Writing implements

Vocabulary

• Diary
• Wheel
• Fraction
• Radius

Procedure

• After collecting the items, discuss the types of objects found, their names, significance and characteristics in both scientific and artistic terms. How did the object end up where it was found? What part of the ecosystem does it belong to? Is it an animal product or a plant or a man-made object? What would you like to find out about the items? What piques one's curiosity?
• Depending on the number of objects gathered, select the size of background material for the nature diary. Draw two large concentric circles, separated by enough space to accommodate the items. Using grade appropriate knowledge of fractions, divide circle into slices, similar to a pizza. For a year-round nature diary, 12 sections are most appropriate, one for each month.
• Involve students in writing about the items that will become part of the nature diary. The writing can be scientific, a narrative, poetry or be purely aesthetic. The artist Chris Drury kept his diaries very simple, repeating few words over and over in an almost illegible handwritten script.
• Once students have produced their rough drafts for the nature diary, the items are glued onto the outside ring of the wheel using a hot glue gun. Be guided by principles and elements of design, looking for aesthetic qualities, colour, lines, textures.
• Have students take turns adding their diary entries into the wheel while writing in small script in a radiating format. Each student can take turns, or the task of writing can be handed out to volunteer writers.
• Leave the centre space open for a special design - a miniature mandala, a fungal spore print, a dried and pressed flower exhibiting radial symmetry. Attach this decorative feature at the end, as the finishing touch, so it does not get smudged or soiled during the writing process.

Mandalas produced at Halifax Outdoor Classroom
Teachers' Institute, 2008

References/Resources

Artists, Land, Nature by Mel Gooding and William Furlong; Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers, 2002.

This exercise is from Teaching in the Outdoor Classroom, Evergreen Three-Day Summer Institute, Halifax, August 19-21, 2008.

Submitted by: Sabine Fels

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