“Complicating is easy, simplifying is difficult. To complicate, just add whatever you want: colors, shapes, actions, decorations, characters, environments full of things. Everyone is capable of complicating. Few are able to simplify. To simplify you have to remove and to remove you need to know what to remove. ” THE BRUNO MUNARI METHOD: HOW TO CREATE THE GAME OF TILES

Bruno Munari

Let’s find out how to make a simple instrument inspired by the Munari method!

Bruno Munari was one of the most important Italian artists of the last century. With his books and games he has been a source of inspiration for teachers, educators and mothers of all generations.

Bruno Munari’s teaching is based on the idea that the child needs to be stimulated and not guided (or in any case only minimally). To stimulate, for Bruno Munari, means providing the child with very simple tools that allow him to “unleash” his innate creative spirit and his brilliant imagination.

One of the activities that the artist has conceived in the course of his life is that of stackable tiles: it is a series of tiles made of transparent plastic material on each of which a detail of an image is represented. By overlapping the tiles, the child can create different designs from time to time.

The game of tiles is suitable for children of all ages : it can be used by the little ones to create simple landscapes or faces, it can be used by children who are learning the concept of time by representing the hands and the face of a clock or by children at school age to learn geometry or math.

Making Bruno Munari tiles is very easy! We will only need:

• Plastic tiles (we used acetate sheets ).
• Plastic markers of different colors.
• Scissors.

We cut out the acetate sheets by making many squares of the same size and… wide to the imagination (you will certainly be better at drawing than me :)).

On each of the tiles we draw a different element: a flower, blades of grass, the sun, numbers, symbols, a dial of the hands, a mouth, the shape of a face… we can draw anything we want! The more tiles we make, the more stimuli we will offer our children!

You will be amazed to see how such a simple activity will involve children of all ages!

On her Blog “La Scuola in the Soffitta” , Daniela Poggi created Munari’s famous game using plastic cups. We can see the result in this video, also made by Daniela.

With acetate sheets or glasses … we just have to try! 🙂