Ugly Doll Sock Monsters

This week in the 9 year-old classroom we created ugly doll inspired sock monsters. This lesson had its share of both ups and downs. On the positive side, the students were really excited about making their own ugly dolls. We asked our students to draw the monster that they want to create in their sketchbooks. Most students took this task seriously and really thought about what color socks they'd use and what shapes they wanted. We did, however have one child who said he just wanted his monster to be "sock-shaped". Despite our efforts to expand his idea, he insisted on making a very simple sock monster.

 We had a few behavioral issues with students playing with model magic in one of the learning centers. Rather than making monsters or any objects with the given medium, a few students decided to see how much model magic they could use to create a giant blob of swirling colors. Even after asking students to use the model magic to make objects one student persisted with making balls of swirly colors until we took away his model magic privileges.

During the actual making of the sock monsters, students were very engaged with the activity. I was a bit worried about this lesson because our class is male dominated and we were unaware of our students' abilities. After our sewing demonstration, Stephanie and I found ourselves running around the room for the next hour helping students cut string, tie knots, undo and redo stitches. It was pretty overwhelming to try to help all of the students at once, but I was glad that the students were so eager to get our help because they wanted to continue working on their monsters. One student, Thomas, said, "I really like sewing." When I asked him if he'd done it before he replied with, "No. This is the first time, but I think it's fun".

At the end of the day, we felt a bit disheartened and super exhausted, but it put a smile on our faces that many of the students didn't want to leave at 11 because they wanted to stay and finish their monster. We will have to alter our next lesson plan a little so that students have time to finish their monsters. We are also trying to figure out a way to explain to them, without discouraging them, that this past week's behavior of acting up and not listening to the teachers was unacceptable... Advice is welcome from anyone with ideas.