March 21, 2001
One-room school house days focus of art project
By GARRET LEIVA
Herald editor
Out of the shadows of the past, fifth-graders at Central Grade School are creating a future project on the one-room school house.
Using silhouetted figures crafted from clear vinyl, the elementary students are retracing school house history. These images- brought to life through online research and transparencies- will be displayed in May at the new Discovery Grove located inside Michigan Legacy Art Park at Crystal Mountain Resort in Thompsonville.
Central Grade School art teacher Cherie Correll noted that the silhouette project brought together aspects of Michigan history and elements of art. Students worked in pairs to trace, color and cut out silhouettes of school house children. They also started outlining two murals of indoor and outdoor scenes from 1800s school house life.
"The students are very involved with the project. They have even brought in photos of relatives at school houses in Kalkaska and Traverse City, "Correll said.
Pat Innis also helped students draw from the past to create future works of art. The Iowa artist and educator served as an in-resident adviser on the silhouette project; having previously created lumberjack figures in the Michigan Legacy Art Park. The involvement of Innis came courtesy of a Northwest Michigan Arts Council grant.
"These kids are just amazing. You tell them something once and they're off and running with the idea," said Innis, who normally teaches art on the college-level.
Creating silhouette images required both historical research and overhead projectors. After making enlargements of photos, students used transparencies to trace images of school house children. These vinyl figures will be tacked to tree trunks and outlined in chalk. A natural black walnut stain will create the illusion of a person's shadow clinging to the tree.
Innis said that each of the 24 figures will be applied to Michigan Legacy Art Park trees in May. The end result will create realistic images that may last upwards to four months. The impact of the project, however, is much more permanent.
"The idea is that the spirit of Michigan school house children still lingers in the landscape," noted Innis, whose father taught in a one-room school in Alden. "Children today are very adventurous and they can relate to that pioneer spirit."
Another important aspect of the project was researching that pioneering spirit. Using books and online websites, students found images of school house days that spoke to them- even two centuries later.
Fifth-grade teacher Jaye Lynn Trapp said that students will compile a documentary comparing and contrasting one-room school houses to schools of today. "It will not be as much paper and pencil as auditory and visual filming," she noted.
Between the art projects and history lessons, students have a greater appreciation of what going to school meant in the 19th century. Trapp said her students can't image being hit over the knuckles as punishment, heating the school with a wood stove, or being excused to use the outhouse.
"Those are things I don't think they would want to go back in time and experience," she said.