How to Make PEOPLE PROJECTS

I’m all about Open House this week!  If you were to see the thoughts inside my brain, all you would see is Open House Open House Open House Open House Open House . . . 

I just got my Pioneer People Projects up on the windows and they make me so happy!!

LOOK!

I kept the blinds down in this picture to protect the privacy of my kiddos.

And, this is off topic, but do you see that one desk that is higher than the other?  My aide sits there!

And yes, the height difference makes me CRAZY!  Ha!

One of my sweet teacher friends gave me permission to use her child’s picture on my blog so you can see a close up of the People Project!  He’s in my class this year and he’s a twin!  😉  Look how cute he is with his missing teeth!

SO CUTE!

The primary teachers in my school love love love to make PEOPLE PROJECTS with our kiddos!  When we used to teach habitats for Open House, our People Projects were Explorers!  And our Kinder teachers have Entomologist People Projects when they’re studying insects and, more recently, Kiddos in Swimsuits because they’re studying the ocean!  Those People Projects are hilarious!!  🙂  Our third grade team studies space for Open House and they have Astronaut People Projects!

Here’s what you do!

Find the clip art people you need.

For example, I used the people in Melonheadz Pioneer clip art pack (which I begged Nikki to make, and she did, so it’s called Kristin’s Pioneers).  But maybe you need an astronaut or a kid singing into a microphone or a kid in a military uniform . . . I don’t know!  Just search on TpT for “such and such clipart” and you will be amazed at what comes up!

I inserted the clip art into Power Point and cropped out the head (boy pioneers pictured here, but I also used a girl pioneer).

You double-click on the image and then you’ll see “Crop” on the Toolbar.  Just put your cursor on any of the black lines to crop!

This poor Pioneer boy.  I took off his head! 🙂

Then I just increased the size of the cropped image so that it would be big enough for my project.

Next, you take pictures of your kids and get them onto your computer . . . however you do that.  I used my fancy camera, inserted my memory card into my Mac, and then imported the pictures into iPhoto.  That’s just how I do it.

Once my kiddos’ pics are on my computer, I insert each one into Power Point and do my best to judge the size of their head in comparison with the Pioneer body.

I’m kind of a freak (who, me?) when it comes to perfection so I tend to waste a ton of ink when I work on this project because sometimes I feel like the heads are way too little and sometimes I feel like the heads are out-of-control-gigantic.  So I resize and reprint a lot.  If you are less of a freak than me, then you should be totally fine.  Or, if you have HP Instant Ink (like me), you don’t care how much ink you use.  And, even still, if you’re like one of our Kinder teachers, you think gigantic heads on small bodies are sort of art-sy and cartoon-y and just the way you like them.

This project will totally make you realize that your kids have a huge variety of head shapes!

I let my students color the clothing any ole way they wanted AND I HAD THEM CUT IT OUT.  That saves a TON of time, let me tell you.

Once I had all of the bodies and hats (clip art hats required no cropping), I glued the heads on and laminated them.  In the past, I’ve had a parent volunteer cut out the laminate, but my aide did it for me this year!

My favorite part is how these People Projects look from the back!!

My kids love their Pioneer People!!  🙂  They keep asking when they will get to take them home!  And every year, whichever People Project I end up doing for Open House, it tends to be the most popular with the parents, too.  I mean . . . IT’S THEIR CHILD ALL DRESSED UP!

AND NOW FOR A PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT:

You cannot take this idea and make it into a product on TpT.  These clip art images are copyrighted and belong to the clip artist.  This is a project for fun classroom use only and it’s not for sale!

Okay, I feel better now!  🙂