My third graders ended the school year learning a little about the symbolism of the sun in Mexican pottery. The sun has been used as a symbol of the life-giving energy and of good luck. Cassie Stephens has a very good Prezi here about Metepec, Mexico.
To make these colorful, sunny pictures we started by tracing a circle shape for the face of the sun. Then we designed our faces with unique facial expressions, rays and other designs. We talked about cool and warm colors, but they weren’t required to use a specific color scheme. They used markers, paints or both to color their designs. We also discussed how the suns were “stylized” and did not need to look like real suns, because clearly you wouldn’t see the rays of the sun like these are shown and the sun wouldn’t actually have a face on it! One students wanted to paint a moon instead. Can you spot it amongst the bright suns?
Extra resource:
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