Update on the paper mache

Last month just before spring break I posted about my first graders making paper mache globes. After drying for a week, the children painted them blue.  I had great pictures of the globes.  But after my phone went swimming while we were in San Diego, I lost the pictures.  They were the only thing I had not transferred to my computer.  But now I have pictures of the globes with the oceans and continents on them.  I really wanted to take pictures of the children working.  But not cool to post pictures of children without the parents' permission.

Tuesday the class as a group colored the continents (which were on a worksheet) and then cut them out.  Ms. H had her own blank globe and a real globe to show the children.  She then walked them through each step.  Besides me helping, we had two mothers helping. 

Ms. H held up her globe by the tied end, that was the North Pole.  They had already marked the equator.  They looked at the real globe, decided where the equator cut South America and began to glue. And then on to the next continent.  The adults walked around to slide continents up or down.  We also wiped up glue from the desk, their hair, and the globes.

After the continents were glued on, the names of oceans were added.  The really amazing thing was they did this together.  And they finished together.  The children who never keep up with the group were on this.  They colored, they cut, they glued, they kept up.  Yay for the first graders.

This is how we started out.  Balloons with torn newspaper and a glue flour paste smeared on.

Here they are painted with the continents and ocean names glued on.

Look at each picture and each globe.  The coloring skills and cutting skills vary greatly.

More for comparison. 

Here are all the globes.  One student was absent, so one globe has to be finished later.


Using scissors for many first graders is really hard.   It is a muscle development and experience thing.  Again I go back to the "old days".  Girls cut out paper dolls and their clothes, little boys cut out decorations for their balsa wood airplanes.  We cut out snowflakes and connected paper dolls.  We had no TV, no video games.  We used our hands differently than do children today.  Neither one is better or worse.  Skills are developed today by young children that are different from the skills I learned as child. No way can I use my thumbs on a video game or to type on a phone.  They can.

That said, paper mache has been around for centuries.  Little children use it to create as well as do artists.  Some things don't change.