Día De Los Muertos Thaumatrope

I recently got to bring a craft to the Museum of South Texas History's Los Muertos Bailan event, and I had so much fun! As someone in STEM education, I wanted to bring a craft that would be fun and represent the event, but also have an extra twist (literally, in this case!).

So, when I was told about EPiQC's informal quantum computing resources, I knew I wanted to adapt something for this event. The Art in Superposition: Exploring Superposition with Measurement and Thaumatropes activity was perfect because they already had an idea for a "spooky" theme. I just had to make a version for this event! (You can also find the lesson plan on the National Q-12 Education Partnership website).

Thaumatropes are optical illusion toys that, when spun fast enough, bring two images to one in your eyes.

Based on the EPiQC example, I decided to make a calavera template that would look like the sugar skulls commonly decorated as part of Día de los Muertos celebrations. The skull illustration I used is from Art Projects for Kids.

This instructable may be helpful if you want to run this lesson with the Día de los Muertos context, but will also work as a stand-alone crafting activity!

For this project, you need:

1. Wooden dowels (I had 1/4" x 12")
2. Tape
3. Markers/coloring utensils
4. Print-outs of the calaveras on cardstock. There are three calaveras per sheet. (I've attached the file I used for the event)

To start, you'll want to decorate both ends of the template (face and skull outline). This is all creativity; it may help to look at examples of sugar skulls online!

Once it has been decorated, you can fold it in half (on the short edge). You should only be able to see one side (the face or the skull outline).

Take the dowel and tape it to one side (doesn't matter which) on the inside of the paper. To close the whole thing, place one piece of tape on the open edge, closing the sides together.

Now you are done! To see how the images form one image, all you have to do is spin the dowel, and the images start to look like they are together!

Feel free to take this in many creative directions. Two people even collaborated to decorate the body and hair!