The gods would be pleased

I've moved over to Stacey's room for a couple weeks to help with the Ancient Greece unit in Social Studies. It's an art-project-heavy unit and the kids are seated in city-state groups (Athens, Sparta, Corinth, etc.) for the whole thing, so they get to practice cooperation skills beyond the textbook's scope.

My main contribution so far was designing a crazy Greek mythology project! Here is the assignment I gave the kids:

Greek Mythology Pottery Project March 2-4 2011


Over the next two days, you and the fellow members of your city-state will be modernizing ancient Greek pottery by creating a comic book version of a popular Greek myth and adhering it to a vessel of your choosing.

The project will consist of the following steps:

1. Research the myth.
2. Outline and storyboard the myth.
3. Create the comic version.
4. Attach the comic strips to your piece of “pottery.”

To help make the process run smoothly and ensure that everyone has a part to play, you will need to divide up responsibility into these six categories: Group Leader, Storyboard Designer, Scribe, Sketch Artist, Color & Detail Virtuoso, and Maintenance Manager (if your polis only has five citizens, you will need to share the responsibility of Maintenance Manager among you). Each member of the team will participate for the entire project, but the different jobs will help a different person be “in charge” at different stages of the project.

Your group grade will be determined by:
- Accurate adaptation of the classic myth
- Clarity of the drawings and text in the comic strip
- Creativity and/or humor in the final product
- Using the appropriate number of panels to cover the pottery
- Cooperation within your team during the project

Your individual grade will be determined by:
- Outline or bullet point form of the myth
- Responsibility reflection worksheet


It was awesome- I got to talk about oral history, comic books, fate, tyranny and compromise, and why ancient Greece was freaking awesome all in one day. I'll post pictures when the glue is dry.