This week, children will work on larger sheets of cartridge or sugar paper (A3 or larger) and revisit the two resources used last week (“Drawing Source Material: Amazing Architectural Homes” and “Talking Points: Tiny Houses“). This time pupils will make drawings of paused moments in the video (so they are working from a still image).

The aim here is not to design a building (they are not designing on paper) but instead to deepen understanding of the form and structures architects might use. Children will use drawing to help look more closely: to collect ideas for when they ‘design through making’. 

Try to create between 3 and 5 drawings, each on a fresh sheet, during the session. Pupils will work in handwriting pen and, if they wish, coloured pen to highlight/accent certain features.

They might like to be inspired by the drawings by the Shoreditch Sketcher. You can see his work at “Talking Points: Shoreditch Sketcher“.

You might also like to use the following drawing exercises to inspire their drawings (using handwriting pen):

Continuous Line Drawing

Drawing with a Ruler

If there is a sense of perspective in the image pupils are drawing, invite them to try to capture it on the page. Sometimes, if they are drawing from a still image on a whiteboard, they can use a metre rule or a cane to help see where the lines of perspective are. 

Rather than try to draw the whole image, invite them to record what they consider to be the most important elements of the architectural design. 

Start Week 3 with a recap about the architectural dilemma: dream big or small?

Decide as a class if the children are all going to make models of aspirational homes, or tiny houses, or a mixture of both. 

Have sketchbooks open so that pupils can use them as reference material, and have access to the drawings made the week before. Use the “Ink and Foamboard Architecture” resource to help pupils build their architectural models.

Tips:

Remember they are not designing on paper first. Instead pupils are using sketchbooks as reference and using the “Design Through Making” technique.

Remind pupils (if they get frustrated!) that Making is Hard!– but that’s ok! 

Allow pupils plenty of time to cut and stick their shapes. You may want to get a head start by having a member of staff cut a selection of shapes beforehand so that pupils can use them as “building blocks” and then cut their own as they need them. See how to cut foamboard here Coming Soon.

Buying foamboard (coming soon)

Time to see the work which has been made, talk about intention and outcome.

Pupils will display the work in a clear space, and walk around the work as if they were in a gallery.

Remember to display sketchbook work too, so that they remember the whole journey and give context to the outcomes.

Give the work the respect it deserves. Remind the children of their hard work.

If you have class cameras or tablets, invite the children to document their work, working in pairs or teams. You could also make films by bringing the cameras really close to the models, to see different perspectives and interiors. Explore how children can take high quality photographs of 3d artwork with this resource.

Use the resource here to help you run a class “crit” to finish the project.