The 6th graders are working on a project with the glass artist, Darren Goodman, who came to our school a few weeks ago and shared his dynamic presentation, Glass Experience.
We are creating a mural of painted tears. Each student is designing their own tear to be a part of the mural, and Darren will select from these and re-create the tears that he chooses in glass. This glass installation will then be donated to Children's Hospital.
One of Darren's installation pieces is Tears of Joy. Each glass piece is shaped like a tear and no two tears are alike. All of the tears as a group make a statement of strength as a whole.
The students started by drawing and cutting out the shape of a tear. Various sizes were encouraged to add interest.
I told the students to choose a feeling or emotion and draw a design that represented that. Using crayons, the students were able to draw as well as do texture rubbings with some great texture plates that I have.
The next step was to do a watercolor wash over the crayon designs, creating a watercolor resist.
The result were many different, brightly colored tears. The students wrote the feeling or emotion that their tear represented on the back. 
I apologize for the poor quality of this picture. This is one of my favorite tears!
I had two classes make three-dimensional tears that we hung from the ceiling in front of the mural. Each student positioned their own tear on the mural with tape. This will make it possible to take them down and allow students to take them home later. But not before Darren Goodman selects around ten tears and creates them in glass!
Next post I will reveal the first tear that Darren chose and the glass piece that it inspired! The look on the student's face that designed that tear when Darren unveiled it in class was priceless! I almost cried!
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