Week #3: Pop-up Book Page Making with FTH Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred

This week’s lessons introduce you to the pop-up book page making led by Flushing Town Hall Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred. Spica is puppeteer and Karen is a theater artist.  You may have seen them at Flushing Town Hall’s partnering senior centers where they offer programming in The Memory Project, storytelling through visual arts, theater and puppetry.  But we join them at their apartments in Manhattan as we practice safe distancing. They don’t use many supplies, just recycling materials that you can find at home --- they’ll show you how to improvise with what you have.  

>>Click HERE for a pre-lessons family activity sheet 
>>Click HERE for the step-by-step instruction of this week’s lesson 

Day 1 

Flushing Town Hall Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred introduce you to pop-up artistry with easy-to-follow instructions, perfect for young and old. Instead of the usual cardstock, they recycle materials to make all the parts of a pop-up book page or card. Step-by-step, they show you how to make the base book page with a paper shopping bag and household tools.

>>Click HERE for a post-lesson family activity sheet

Day 2 

Flushing Town Hall Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred share their unique, simple to make mechanism for adding movement to the book page. They have simplified the process with their pre-made V-Fold hinge, which encourages beginners to build their own pop-ups. They will also guide you in making an easy to assemble pocket, into which you can add your special surprise object.

>>Click HERE for a post-lesson family activity sheet

Day 3

Flushing Town Hall Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred bring family photos to life through easy to follow activities. Through the simple technique of tracing, they show you how to transform photos from the two dimensional to three dimensional pop-ups. Demonstrating how to recycle magazines and newspapers, they tear colorful and curious shapes to collage characters’ clothes, build scenery and construct objects. 

>>Click HERE for a post-lesson family activity sheet

Day 4 

Flushing Town Hall Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred teach you a new technique for using photos as a resource for your pop-up book page. Recycling a plastic bag, they use it to protect the photo and draw a grid over the image to be transferred which will allow you to enlarge an image by hand so your completed drawing will be just the right size. Glue it to the hinge and watch it pop-up when you open the book page. 

>>Click HERE for a post-lesson family activity sheet

Day 5 

Now let’s enjoy some stories told by Flushing Town Hall Teaching Artists Spica Wobbe and Karen Oughtred using the pop-up books they made about themselves! Let us know how you like these stories. Or start to create your own pop-up book page and share with us on Facebook and tag our page @flushingtownhall!