Graphic Novels

I find that the students that I have worked with love reading comics and creating them. I think it is a very creative and engaging ways for students to show their knowledge of the content through a comic strip. The comics made by the class could be put together into a book to create a graphic novel. Before reading the article I have not heard a comic book be called a graphic novel. I think for children, hearing that they will create a comic book is more exciting because that is the term they are familiar with but they can be taught the new term. Comics tend to make the content more interesting to the reader because you are not just reading the text and the pictures are able to help the students to make better sense of the material. This is very good for students because people are very visual learners.

Rube Goldberg

I really liked how the art teacher used Rube Goldberg’s ideas in his class. I have seen science teacher’s work with their students to create Rube Goldberg machines, while learning about different machines such as a lever or pulley, but I haven’t seen any art teacher work with their students on this. I think it is a great way for students to be very creative and different from their other peers. By drawing their designs on paper, they can think of anything, whereas if they were to actually create it, they may be limited due to materials.
In my science course a few years ago we created our own Rube Goldberg machines. This was so much fun because I was able to do anything I wanted. It really made me think about each piece of my machine and how the would all work together. Rube Goldberg’s machines amaze me and his drawings can be comical sometimes too. I enjoy seeing the chain of events that happen between the different parts, just like in the game Mouse Trap. I feel that designing these machines either on paper or actually doing it would be great for visual learners and students who are more hands on. It gives students such excitement when creating these contraptions to see everything work and the final, simpler task is achieved at the end.
One thing that I like to do is to go onto Youtube.com and see all the different intentions people have made using Rube Goldberg’s ideas.