Art and Literacy

I found these pieces of armor at the Georgia Museum of Art, and immediately had the great idea of using old armor to study for a history class.

First, I want to explain what I chose at the museum! The picture beside the armor is a description of everything included in this case. There is a golden charm that has a picture of Prince Sergei, helmet of Her Majesty's Horse Guards, sword with tassel, and the Cavalry Guard's cartridge pouch and chest armor. All of these artifacts are from the late 19th century. This armor is old Russian uniforms.

When I saw this, I couldn't help but think about the video we watched in class of a trailer for a video game. We discussed the idea or armor and how it has changed over the years. I imagined bringing together the video of the present warfare with a study on real pieces from the past. Students would then get to create their own armor they believe is best suited for them. We could dig into the history behind the armor as well and look into who was fighting back and then and for what reason. It would fit perfectly inside a history class on war.

Another project could be using this armor to determine the rest of the culture. I would have my students try to create the scene of the late 19th century in Russia. Research what was going on and create a video or presentation of why this type of armor was used and how it was made. I think there are many avenues that we could use this relic from the Museum in the classroom!

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Book Clubs!

The past two weeks we have been given the opportunity to participate in a book club, which I think was a very effective way for us to be able to experience this type of strategy. It gave me an extra perspective on this strategy rather than simply discussing what students would do and the potential pros and cons. I have been able to actually experience as a student what is exciting about this strategy and what is not helpful. The first thing I loved was being able to chose what I read. I was able to pick out which book was most exciting to me and read it with another group of people! This idea of letting students have options is honestly a very great tool for motivating students and helping with classroom management. They have been given their desire to feel as though they have some control. I got to choose chasing Vermeer, which is an absolute great book!

At first I wasn't sure how I could use it in my math class, however through discussing it with my group I think there are some great ways to make this beneficial. I'm not completely positive if I would use this specific book because I may not be teaching geometry. I highly encourage geometry teachers to definitely look at this book as a resource. There are some really good ideas for big group projects in this book such as making and decoding messages with geometric shapes. It has great connections to the real world and makes math into an exciting adventure

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