Kinder Treehouses

4th Wire jewelry

4th grade Wire Jewelry

4th Grade:  Wire Jewelry Necklaces

4th Grade learned about traditional Native American Jewelry, as well as, modern style wire sculpted jewelry. It was interesting to compare the two. Native American jewelry is well known for it's beautiful sterling silver and turquoise. Modern artists use a variety of materials including stones, glass, ceramics and wire. Hand crafted jewelry is many times one of a kind and very creative. In this project, my students combined traditional Native American jewelry and modern jewelry to create their one of a kind pieces.

The first step for this project involved rolling out air dry clay into beads. Students then poked a hole through each one with a small size wooden stylus. (the kind for scratch art). Each student put the beads on a 1/2 page piece of card stock with their name written on it for storage. I'm sure something more like a little tray would of worked better for this. I plan to order something like that for next year.  On the next art day (6 days later..by this time the clay was dry), students painted the beads. I had metallic silver, gold, copper and turquoise available. Students also began sculpting 14 gauge metal wire. ("silver" in color). I'd ordered a 350 ft roll for approximately 120 students. And this was just about right. Students twisted and shaped the wire into a pendant. Any design was accepted-hearts, crosses, free from, circles, etc. Next class (3rd art day), students varnished the beads. It was important that students put beads on the table to dry after varnishing because beads stuck to the paper like glue. Students also began adding detail wire to their main pendant. I gave out pieces of gold and copper colored 24/22 gauge wire for this. Students could twist the colored wires around the pendant in imaginative ways. Students then assembled all their pieces together on a black jewelry cord string. This took 4 art days (1 hr each day) to complete. However, I think for the time involved, these came out really wonderful. Students absolutely loved making these and could not wait to take them home. It's just as well..I did not have time to display many pieces in the hallway because our hallways are going to be painted soon. Students wanted to take them home anyway, so I guess it all worked out. I did take many pictures though..as these are so fun and creative!!

I did not have time to rotate these pics before uploading them..so many of them are sideways..but sometimes that is just the way life is!

Great job 4th grade!!