A walk through the tropics.

The Rand Family Magnet School's Rain Forest Project was an interdisciplinary, multisensory, cooperative learning experience for six and seven-year-old students. As the school's art teacher, I cooperated with two classroom teachers to integrate art, science, social studies, language arts and research skills into a unit of study focusing on the endangered tropical rain forests of the world.

The students created a multisensory, walk-through environment that incorporated the sights and sounds of the rain forest in an area measuring approximately 8 x 16' (2.44 x 4.88 m). The many forms of life one could encounter during a walk through the exhibit were created by students in art class, utilizing information they had researched and obtained in conjunction with classroom environmental studies. The students compiled and published Discovery Guides of rain forest facts to disseminate information to forest visitors.

Importance of Individual Action

The Rand Family School's focus is on the importance of individual action to conserve resources and protect the environment. This multisensory unit was in keeping with the school's integral environmental theme and had a great impact on our endeavor to nurture environmentally responsible citizens for tomorrow's world.

Two classroom teachers, Susan Becker and Marcia Haddock, introduced the Science and Social Studies component of the month-long project to their students. They assigned each student an animal to research. Facts about the rain forest, for example, layers (canopy, understory, forest floor), climate, indigenous peoples, and importance of and destruction to the forests, were assigned to be researched. The Language Arts component entailed having students compile, write and edit their information for the Discovery Guides.

The Design Process

In the art room, the students created three-dimensional, stuffed-paper representations of the animals they had researched. Each animal had its own special characteristics to be worked out. Since the rain forest was a walk-through environment, only standing, hanging or flying creatures would do.

As the animals were being completed, those students who finished early were given new tasks: cutting long strips of paper for overhanging canopy fronds; making tropical flowers from colored tissue paper; creating clay snakes with textured backs; designing ant colonies and spiders (recycled packing "peanuts" with pipe cleaner legs) to populate the felled tree trunks; making paper fish for the pond; and building spider webs of glue and crystal glitter.

Ensuring Success for All

Students

Observation skills were improved and previously taught art concepts about line, pattern, texture, shape and color were reinforced as the forest population came to life.

As educators, we are all aware that children's learning styles (visual, auditory, tactile, etc.) are integral to ensuring that each student can achieve a measure of success. Integrating art with the academic curriculum as we did with The Rain Forest Project ensured that all children's learning styles would be met. Even those students who were usually difficult to motivate could hardly wait to begin.

Active Participants in a Group

Endeavor

The benefits of interdisciplinary projects for the art program are numerous: Art is taken out of the context in which it usually occurs, as a discrete program unrelated to the "important" curricula in the school (thus considered to be the most disposable program when the budget crunches). Students begin to conceive of art as another thread interwoven within the fabric of their daily lives (which counters the "What (fun but meaningless thing) are we making today? " attitude about the arts that is still so prevalent in our culture. Art becomes a highly visible component of the school's educational philosophy (which serves to strengthen administrative and parental support for a healthy budget and better facilities). Older students who have begun to think of themselves as "untalented." and therefore disinterested, become excited, active participants in a group endeavor.

Joyce Korotkin is an art teacher at Rand Family Magnet School in Montclair, New Jersey.