Creative Arts K - 6

My weekend with Pop: guide for teachers

3 / 3 available activities
Topic: 
My Weekend with Pop: Stories in Aboriginal Languages
English K - 6

Creative Arts K - 6

Download a PDF version (417.72 KB)

Students learn about the illustrator of the story My Weekend with Pop, artist and designer Lucy Simpson and create a short biography of her work. Using one of the Aboriginal languages as recorded for My Weekend with Pop, students create word art.

Student activities

Task no. 1

Lucy Simpson

The illustrations for the My Weekend with Pop story were created by a well-known Aboriginal artist and designer, Lucy Simpson. A lot of images and information about her and her work is available on the internet. Individually, or as a class, students could talk about and then write a short biography of Lucy Simpson, including infomation and images such as:

  • examples of her art and design work
  • things she makes and creates
  • materials she uses
  • techniques she uses
  • places her work has been exhibited 
  • her Aboriginal language and country
  • concepts from her culture that are represented in her art and design work
  • items from her country that are represented in her art and design work

Look at the images created by Lucy Simpson for the My Weekend with Pop story:

  • How has she created them?
  • What materials has she used?
  • What techniques has she used?
  • How would you describe the images?
  • What kind of fellings do they give you?
  • What kind of ideas do they communicate?
  • Aboriginal cultures are living. They are both past and present, both traditional and continuing. How does the artist show us this through her images?

Task no. 2

Word Art

2D word art

  1. Choose a word from the My Weekend with Pop story
  2. Design a version of it where the letters connect together using solid block letters
  3. Design the word on thin cardboard and cut it out.
  4. Trace the word repeatedly in various positions, e.g. overlaps, spirals.
  5. Make artworks of the words depicting the shape of the object or meaning of the word, e.g. Wiradjuri words, Guya (fish) and Guurrawin (flowers).
A green cardboard cut out of the word guurrawin

The word guurrawin traced and outlined into the shape of a flower

The word guya drawn in the shape of a fish on green cardboard

The word guya drawn into the shape of three fish

 

3D word art

Use the same words cut out of thick or corrugated cardboard and slot together to create sculptural forms of words. These could be painted and spray-varnished to give them a longer life. 

 

Lucy Simpson is a Yuwaalaraay woman. Her language is from north-western NSW and is closely related to Gamilaraay language. Here are some Gamilaraay-Yuwaalaraay words that you could use to make 2D or 3D art, or a bilingual class mural: mirii (star), burrulaa mirii (a lot of stars), mandaymanday (string of stars), Maliyan.gaalay (morning star / Venus), Yarraan (Southern Cross), Warrambul (Milky Way), Birraybirraay (Orion’s belt), Miyaymiyaay (Pleiades), buluuy (dark, night), baaluu / gilay (moon). 

Task no. 3

Plant Art

2D plant art

  1. Search your local area for seeds and seedpods.
  2. Look at them under a magnifying glass and draw them in giant size. Include details like bumps and ridges, hairs and spiky bits.
  3. Use charcoal or heavy black pencils (3B or 4B) to draw these and experiment with the full range of tones from light to dark in your drawings.
  4. Display them all together in a line as a wall frieze with some black paper as backing.
A pencil drawing of a plant seed

3D giant seeds

Use wire and crepe paper, or fabric and papier-mache, to create supersized 3D models of the seeds/plants in the My Weekend with Pop story or seeds/plants from your local area.