There's a lot of 6th grade creativity on display!
Our sixth graders have been engrossed in a unit on memoirs and community building since September. They have been sharing stories from their lives verbally and in short written vignettes while studying the writing techniques of published authors. In December, each student chose one story to take through the revision process to a final memoir. As a culmination to this study, their work is showcased in a Writer’s Gallery to display the memoirs along with a work of art that adds an additional creative layer to their story.
The Writer's Gallery will be set up in the lobby of the West Performing Arts Center and open for viewing through Friday, January 31. Parents and friends are welcome to come between 8 a.m.-4 p.m. to read the memoirs and leave a comment for their favorite authors.
While in the Writer’s Gallery, take some time to appreciate the stands that support each student’s memoir collage. A lot of math went into their creation! Sixth grader Brady Greenberg worked with his math teacher Mr. Ruth to design the stands. Brady used the design and engineering process to research, design, prototype, and eventually finalize a memoir stand.
Brady began by researching different types of stands, and he and Mr. Ruth discussed what similarities he saw in their designs, and what differences stood out to him. He then sketched a draft of his own design and made the prototype out of cardboard in the Innovation Lab.
Brady met with Mrs. Mattesky and our intern Michael Levengood in the Innovation Lab, and they asked him to make three additional iterations of the same design, before making a detailed sketch of his final design choice. Finally, Brady created a 3D model in Tinkercad, and labeled an orthographic sheet of his design. He and Mr. Ruth discussed how to convert his measurements into millimeters, and explored compound shapes, angles and lines of symmetry as Brady created his model in Tinkercad. Mrs. Mattesky and Michael used the laser cutter to mass produce the stand for all the 6th graders.
We hope you can make time to visit and marvel at this terrific student work!