The idea for this activity came from Anne Farrell's blog "Use Your Coloured Pencils". You can see it here.
Day 1
After reading Edward the Emu, we scrunched up a couple of pieces of aluminium foil to make the base shape. Sort of an oval with a skinny neck. Then we bent the end of the neck to create the head. Next we covered the whole armature in papier mache. They took a long time to dry but being under a heater and turning occasionally helped.
Day 2
Next we painted the head and while it was drying we plaited the legs.
6 strips of fabric, about 4cm x 25cm were needed, 3 for each leg. Each group of three fabric strips were tied together as close to the end as possible, then taped to the table to be plaited. When the plaiting was at the end of the strips we just tied the two outside strips together which made three "toes". These were then trimmed to size.
Fortunately I had a work experience student this day so she used hot glue to glue the legs onto the bodies.
I had wanted to buy the fluffy/hairy wool often found in $2 shops and have the students wind this around the body to create the feathers, but apparently this yarn is not available anymore in the shops. So, I bought a large, black, fluffy throw-rug and cut that up into rectangles to be glued and wrapped around the emu bodies. It was soooo hairy, the carpet looked like we had been attacked by emus and hairy cats, black fluff EVERYWHERE! Luckily our cleaner is such a fantastic and kind person. Thank you Glenda.
Some goggle eyes completed these fluffy emu sculptures.
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