Local Hanukkah Projects

I enjoy checking out the Hanukkah projects that students at our local schools make each year. This year I got to see projects from gan through 6th grade at three different public schools, both religious and secular.

Greek urn inspired student mini urns

This is a cute assignment that mixes Greek history class with Art. You may note that the teacher shows classical pottery shapes, techniques as well as Greek mythology. You might also notice that while many students stick with simple patterns one or two students include Hanukkah or Hanukkah stories in their urn decorations. I like how they keep their color palettes simple to fit what they were learning. These urns were made by sixth graders.

Mini greek urns made by sixth graders based on classical greek urn designs.

Mini urns made by sixth graders along with posters with classic examples.

Embossing and Watercolor

The embossing and watercolor projects are by third and fourth graders and combined to make a display of candles. The third graders made embossings on rectangles. I assume that the fourth graders were learning watercolor techniques using watercolor paper which they subsequently cut into flame shapes. Together the two techniques look visually interesting.

Hanukkah Projects using lots of techniques

At a local gan, the children made works with many different techniques. Embossing, patterning, and surface ground relationship. They used these different techniques to make different symbols of Hanukkah. They also made your traditional Hanukkah lamp and dreidel. Note that while the Hanukkah lamps/Hanukkiyot are hard to see, since they are wrapped up in packages on the tables, they are glass bottles filled with fish, rocks, fake plants and blue colored water. The dreidels are made of recycled materials- coffee pods and cds. The cds is pretty common but coffee pods is a new thing. I personally do not drink coffee, but I have seen lots of discussions locally regarding what you can make out of those pods.

A variety of kid made designs for hanukkah lamps, temples, oil pitchers as well as your traditional dreidel and hanukkah lamp.

Dreidel made out of recycled materials including coffee pods.

I do not have pictures but there were also Hanukkah lamps made by 3rd graders using bolts and large tiles. As in, kid made Hanukkah lamps that are fairly safe. However, since the local custom is to try to light outside, they are a bit large for the traditional glass cases used to keep the flames from blowing out.

What projects have you seen?