Tear Self-Portraits

When I taught 6th grade my teaching partner and I would have the students do a great activity during the first week of school. We would print each of their photos in black and white onto a full sheet of paper and then cut them in half down the middle. The students would paste half of their face onto a blank sheet of paper and then use their pencil to draw the missing half. This was a great activity because they were working on symmetry and it was a great display that we would leave up the whole year. Parents and visitors would always do double takes because they didn't realize at first glance that half of it was a drawing. Unfortunately I don't have photos to share of this activity.

Moving to 5th I didn't want to step on my previous partner's toes because she will have some of those kiddos next year. Besides I had seen what 5th grade does and I was excited to give it a try. They would have the students do tear self-portraits using only construction paper. It was an extremely challenging project because students have to go slowly and make small tears. In the end they came out pretty impressive, especially because most of them you can look at and totally see that kid.