Calder with 1st Graders

I have definitely been on a "Calder kick" this year after seeing a great exhibition last summer in Newport Beach. This week, after seeing a brief clip of a video on Discovery Education explaining how Calder (at age 8) made his first animals as a gift for his parents, first graders will be creating their own kinetic (moving) bird sculpture.
My sample:

Here's the plan:

Each child gets a pre-cut circle (about 3" diameter) folded in half for the body, which will rock. These were from old wall art calendars that I have  a LOT of. This was a good way to make use of them. They also get a piece of galvanized steel wire, 24 guage (about 7 inch length), a small piece of folded copy paper (1  1/2 inches by 2") for the head, and a 4 1/2" X 2 1/2" piece of copy paper for the tail feathers. This may sound like a lot of preparation, but it really didn't take too long.

Students insert the wire from the underneath side and twist the wire til it holds. I pre-bent the wire at the point where it needs to bend back towards the neck. I anticipated kids having trouble knowing how much wire to leave for the twisty part. Frankly, I am a bit anxious about that twisting, but I am keeping my fingers crossed that most of them will be able to do it without help:))

Once the neck is assembled, we draw the head on one side of the fold and cut it out. Then they can draw a matching head on the other side. The bottom part above is the fold line. That is where the wire will be sandwiched when we glue

The tail feathers are pretty straightforward. Students  color...

fold into narrow strips, cut a point on one side and then cut apart on the fold lines.

The head gets glued first. Notice that it faces the body. This is important when adjusting for the balance point as kids glue tail feathers.

Tail feathers are glued last, making adjustments in the neck for balance.

I'll take photos of the kids at work so you can see if this all works!!