The Needs of People from the Child's Perspective

Food without it we will die.  Food helps you grow because it makes you healthy.  Fruits (blueberries, strawberries, grapes, watermelon), vegetables (carrots, salad), soup, meat, drinks like milk to stay healthy, bread, pizza, sandwiches, smoothies

Clean Water to be healthy; to drink and clean with it and sometimes you want ice with it

Drinks water so you don’t chapped lips, lemonade so you get enough energy cuz sugar gives you

 energy but too much sugar is not got.  Salt is bitter sugar.  Natural sugar is gooder like in orange juice, raspberry juice and then hot chocolate to keep you warm and green juice.

Protection:

• Shelter/Houses because it protects us from rain and snow and all that stuff.
• Clothing because that protects your body.  Like when you’re at the beach you need swim suits like that
• Transportation- It gets you from one place to another place: cars, airplanes, sleds, walk, ski, gondolas, pogo stick, jump rope, jump, helicopters, flying suits, super-jetpack, rocket ship, skip, dance,

Bodies

• skin because that protects, teeth to eat,
• tongues to talk, to move around in, 
• organs and a brain to think, 
• feet and toes to balance and walk

Play and FUN Toys- because you need to be happy

Movement, Music and Dance- the need to move and express yourself

Other humans, parents, family and friends… we get to feel happy.

To Learn at school, camps, home, outside, nature, by ourselves, friends

Sleep and a place to sleep

To do ART like coloring and drawing and painting and making clay … YEA we need to express ourselves.

Communication- talking and telling the truth, if you like telling the truth, hugging

To Feel: happy, safe, loved, good, and to be able to feel mad, sad, or whatever you feel.

Love we really need LOVE

HAPPY!! Happy is a need.  YOUR THOUGHTS MAKE YOU HAPPY OR SAD.  SO IF YOU NEED TO BE HAPPY YOU NEED HAPPY THOUGHTS 

Exercise to keep your body running good.

Sun because sun gives you energy, sun has energy doesn’t it.

Energy because it makes you so you can do stuff.  If we didn’t have energy we would die.

Light and Wire Explorations in the Studio

This week has been a beautiful continuation of our exploration of light, shadow and color.  Amy joined our studio team for the week and together we are investigating wire as a sculptural media.

 The children have made some great discoveries: wire can act as a line, create letters, shapes and more, it can also act as an infrastructure for other materials to create three dimensional sculpture.

The children made connections to the existing materials in the studio and began exploring shape and structure in new ways.

These creations found their way onto the light projector and there was a collective "aha" about the interaction of light with transparent versus opaque materials.

 These wire studies were on display for mother's night and continue to emerge daily.

I'm sure this new language of expression (wire) will continue to develop in the months and weeks ahead.

snow and light and toddlers

What better way to approach a snowy day in winter than through a spirit of inquiry alongside some of my youngest friends.

 The toddlers are some of the best researchers I have ever met.

 They bring a level of enthusiasm and fearlessness seldom seen in adults.

As they work they navigate complex social expectations, like working together with limited materials and space while negotiating the paradox of relationship and independence.

They tend to leave me awed by the aliveness of their experience, whatever it may be.

I am reminded again and again of something I heard Carlina Rinaldi say earlier last year,  "Childhood is not a phase of life.  It is a quality of life".
I am so grateful to these young teachers for reminding me again of our inherent human qualities: curiosity, joy, enthusiasm, bravery and presence.  They can teach us so much about being human when we take the time to learn.

Have I said lately that I LOVE MY JOB/JOY?  I do.

the exploration continues....

These two ladies noticed that the colored shapes on the light projector could overlap to form new colors.  They experimented with the properties of color using oil pastels and acrylic paints.  As they worked they made several key discoveries. 

Here are a few:

red and blue make purple,

yellow and red make orange,

green and yellow make light green,

orange and green make tannish blackish, brownish,

green and blue make teal,

dark blue and red make purple,

yellow and dark blue make a brownish greenish,

purple and white make sparkly whiter purple.

let there be light...

Before winter break I presented a slide show of the children's work to my young collaborators.  They were interested in the photos but were more interested in the light projected on the screen.  After some conversation, I agreed to add light explorations to the studio environment in the new year.

They were ready!  And began their investigations with an eagerness and curiosity that was contagious.    (I just ordered more tools so stay tuned for future developments).

As they worked with the projector they noticed the light reflected in a mirror above and the same image projected on the wall.  The lens could be adjusted to project the image in other places, even the ceiling.

These images could be traced and recorded in large.  The color of the light itself was changed when a student used a transparent colored block to interfere with the light source.

Their spirit of inquiry and wonder inspires me.  I often wonder how many discoveries of this kind we rob our children of, in our rush to pass on information, maintain control and hurry through life.
Children are always reminding us to slow down, get curious and have fun.  
That's a motto to live by!

Portraits

With so much interest in self portraits we asked ourselves how to deepen the process.  One of my colleagues had the wonderful idea of introducing figure drawing with the children and inviting different children to model for the artists.

 This was a total success and we will keep exploring this idea with the children after the break.

Toddler stories

The toddler teachers and I can often be found with our heads together, generating ideas on how to best involve toddlers in studio projects that are emerging from my work with the primary and extended primary children.  After some discussion we decided to explore story telling since so many children have been making story people and using drawings as a point of reference for telling tales.

Knowing that toddlers are not yet motivated by representational drawing, we asked families to send in photographs as story telling prompts.

The day was amazing!!  Both Rose and I were humbled by the eagerness with which the children shared their pictures and the memories contained in them.  As is often the case when researching alongside young children, we discovered how much they can teach us.

We will continue working together to discover questions and topics of interests to further our understanding of toddler-tale-telling, child development and the beautiful children in our care.

How does a project develop?

One of the XP boys came to me with an idea: 

"Angelina, I want to make instruments and have a holiday band.  We can play Christmas songs together!"  

So we made a plan.  

He chose 4 friends that he wanted to begin working with and we set a date.  I gathered up a bunch of potential supplies: tubes, boxes, gourds, beans, wire, etc. and readied the study for their arrival.

When the day came, the boys began by drawings plans for their intended instruments.  Next they brainstormed which supplies were needed and then they set to work bringing their visions into form (I worked as a fulfillment factory...hot gluing, cutting and supporting as necessary.

When all instruments were complete the began to play.  We recorded several of their songs and Dag-nab-it... I can't figure out how to post them on the blog, but if you want to hear them in person, please swing by the studio or I can happily text the mp3 if you let me know you want to listen.  The songs are wonderful!!!

We shall see if music continues to take off after the long winter's break.

emerging interests

Observational drawing continues as a thread of shared interest amongst the children.  L. arrived in the studio and stood before the easel, expressing an interest in drawing our resident guinea pigs.  We agreed that drawing them from life was easier than drawing from memory.  We set her up with the necessary supplies and she joined Kirsten and several of her peers on the landing.  Soon she was joined by a host of inspired artists recording their observations and discussing their findings with one another (the guinea pig "poo" was of particular interest).

 Here is L.'s finished piece.

 And here is another child's creative interpretation of the "guinea pig's poo".

 While the guinea pigs were observed another child noticed this truck outside the studio windows and began drawing his observations.

I will continue to offer creative ways for the children to explore this interest in a variety of ways and extend their thinking and learning as we do.  Stay tuned!