“Principles for the Development of a Complete Mind: Study the science of art. Study the art of science. Develop your senses- especially learn how to see. Realize that everything connects to everything else.”
― Leonardo da Vinci
Our students are urban teenagers in San Francisco.
They are in 9th grade Conceptual Physics and 11-12th grade Astronomy. We are a small public school where roughly half of our students are on free and reduced lunch and students come from all over the city. About half of our students speak another language at home.
Many of our students are interested in art and media, and although we only offer basic art classes at our school, they have pursued art projects in academic classes with enthusiasm. This year, the science department has been embracing STEAM (science, technology, engineering, ART and math) to increase student engagement. Many students, when asked this year how they would improve the school, mentioned how the physical environment could do with some visual interest, such as more art or murals in the classrooms, especially on the ground floor of the school.
My Project
In my astronomy classes, we are planning to research the mythology behind different constellations, then learn about the life cycle of stars and how this affects their perceived color and brightness, and then produce scale paintings of constellations to mount on ceiling tiles in the otherwise windowless physics classroom.
I saw painted ceiling tiles at another school, and our art teacher mentioned it would be easier to do this painting on paper, so we will be painting on 24"x24" paper sections and then using adhesive mount to attach them to the ceiling tiles in a rough representation of the night sky of both hemispheres. We need black paper, tempera paint and spray adhesive to make this happen.
My astronomy students are in their last semester of high school and want to leave something behind in the school.
However, the campus will be going under renovations soon so it is difficult to do any permanent projects like hallway murals. They have mentioned wanting my windowless basement classroom to look better and this is a good start that will both improve the visual interest in the classroom and also allow them to use their creativity in combining art and science.
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