Frank Lloyd Wright Theme Week?

Question

I work at a summer program at an elementary school, mainly kids 5-8 and I was trying to think of fun things to do for Frank Lloyd Wright week. Any Suggestions?

Answer 1

There's a Frank Lloyd Wright pop-up book:

http://product.half.ebay.com/_W0QQprZ191...

Of course, there are also web sites that allow you to see his greater works up close.

Once you've gone through his major works and his ideas, it might be fun to have the kids actually try to design like FLW.  One possibility would be to build several little landscapes-in-a shoebox--maybe make a rocky cliffside, a desert tableau, a forest with a lake, a town square--and then have the students attempt to put FLW style houses or museums or churches in them using index cards and other cheap materials.

There are also the contemporary architects who were influenced by Wright, like E. Faye Jones:

http://www.thorncrown.com/architecture.h...

Answer 2

Definitely find some pics with his works.  You could have the kids design their own buildings with craft materials at one point.  You could also use blocks or other building materials to do this, maybe by splitting the group into a few small teams (not as a competition at this age, though).  Though blocks might be a bit hard to represent, perhaps Legos?  Or various materials together?

You could do a short description of what makes his architecture so unique compared to others, though it might be hard to hold their attention with too much detail.  Maybe show some pics to them to compare and guess which one is FLW's building and why...

You could also teach some vocabulary by having them do  an acrostic with his name (as a group, I'd think, since it's such a long name).

Look up a bit of history, it'd be nice if you could find some information on his young life (to give the kids a point of reference)  and why he became an architect.  This could turn into a general discussion about what might be exciting about this career path.  If you were an architect, what kind of buildings would you create?  

This is such a cool topic, hard to make interesting for this level...these are ideas and not meant to be done in any particular order.  Best of luck.

Answer 3

Read about all the buildings he designed and talk about Math.