Washed Away! Erosion #4 - Music & Art

This unit is the perfect time to get acquainted with Felix Mendelssohn's concert overture The Hebrides, also known as Fingal's Cave.  This piece was inspired by Mendelssohn's tour of the Scottish Hebrides archipelago and Fingal's Cave on the island of Staffa; he immediately had the motif for this musical tone poem in his head when he saw it and penned it on a postcard he sent to his sister. We first watched the following musical video of the entire piece and then the kids learned a shorter, simpler piano solo of Fingal's Cave.

Music was also incorporated into the unit with the song  "One Smooth Stone".

For art I wanted to do something unique and relevant. I decided we'd create pictures of weathering and erosion with an agent of weathering and erosion--sand! I found inexpensive colored sand and we got to creating. (I opened the bags of sand and put them in muffin tins for ease of access as well as cleanup.)

It's best to use card stock as your base. With a pencil, draw your weathered landform or landscape. Apply glue with a Q-tip, one section at a time.

Fold a large piece of paper in half and place under your art piece to reduce waste as well as mess. Apply sand to your glue-covered section a pinch at a time until covered, then shake excess off onto folded paper.

Return unused excess sand to its "bank" by letting it slide down the crease of the paper into its cup. (This is a great way to apply glitter to projects as well.)

Keep at it bit by bit. 

 Here is my first finished piece.