How do you turn number stories into comics?

Einstein Sherwood Forest

5th Grade Math & Visual Arts

Ms. Chiarizio / Ms. Thompson

Ms. Thompson’s 5th grade math class students have enthusiastically tackled our essential question: How do you turn number stories into comics? We’ve learned a variety of visual arts skills over the last few weeks, including creating different line types, exploring color theory, incorporating features of comics such as word balloons and captions, and working with colored pencils, watercolors, and pen and ink. At first, students were encouraged to turn existing word problems into single and multi-panel comics, but for this activity, they created their own stories to correspond to math problems from their classwork. Using characters, settings, and actions that they brainstormed in a Four Square activity, students sketched and chose a color palette to prepare to tell their number stories in comic form. While there have been challenges, including feeling stuck in creating a plot to not feeling confident as artists, all students have tried something new, increased their visual art vocabulary, and persevered in developing new skills. While we worked on these comics, the class hummed with a calm energy as students created independently, asked questions, made mistakes, experimented with new skills, and shared their work with partners, teachers, and the class.