A New Hampshire art teacher, Sarah, is “building a sense of community” with a collaborative project that has students teaming up to create monsters. The unique project has second graders illustrate monsters that are then transformed into ceramic statues by high school students. Pupils also write short poems to introduce the monsters. These works are then showcased in a “community exhibit where everyone’s invited.”
The monster collaborative project is a source of inspiration that has students of different ages working together. The project begins with second graders drawing “characters from their own imagination.” The New Hampshire teacher then has high schoolers create “sculptures of those drawings in their hand building ceramics class.” The project received a lot of love online, with one comment reading, “Why is this literally making me cry?” Another reads, “Please never stop, these are my fav videos.”
New Hampshire Teacher Introduces Monsters
The New Hampshire teacher introduces a few of the creations in the video posted on her TikTok. The first monster’s name is Chucky, and he is a zombie bird. She reveals that “on first glance you might not notice” that he is a zombie. She points out that “you might think that that is a cute little beret.” It is not in fact a beret, but are brains. She shows off the sculpture, where you can see the bird has “a zombie thing going on.”
The next character she introduces is Bubblegum, who “loves music and will dance to any beat.” The illustration shows a character that is primarily pink with big eyes. It’s important to note that “he is also the kind of friend that can cheer you up no matter what kind of mood you’re in.” Next, the New Hampshire teacher shows off a two-parter monster that is both spicy and sour, although they “do not know how to ride a bike.” The sculpture has two faces, one is yellow with banana skiis, and the other is red.
The last monster in the video is Onda, and “he likes to water plants.” His favorite thing to do is “share his candy with others when they are sad.” The monster’s love of tacos can be seen in the sculpture with two of his wire arms holding tacos “for later, in case he gets hungry.” The New Hampshire teacher shares these videos in hopes of giving everyone “a little bit of simplicity in [this] complex world.”
She has recently shared a video with four tips for starting a Monster Collaborative Exhibit at other schools. The New Hampshire teacher’s primary goal is for “the project to spread like wildfire.” She describes the project as “the best community building possible” and encourages everyone to do it.
