Imagine That!
Early Years students have been very busy over the past few weeks engaged in a creative and artistic themed IEYC unit of learning called ‘Imagine That’. The unit of learning invites children to get creative and to explore different ways to express themselves through learning about techniques used by famous painters.
By Jessica de Porto, Early Years Milepost Team Leader
The children began the unit of learning with a messy and colourful immersion into different painting techniques. They used fabric paints to design t-shirts using paint splatters, patterns, swirls and stripes. The Explorer Room hosted a collaborative project where all children were invited to work together to make a large painting on a sheet. Working collaboratively is integral to work that we do in Early Years as young child can connect and develop linguistic links with others and enjoy sharing a team project.
They then ventured into a more abstract type of art included paper ripping in the style of Henri Matisse and led into an exploration of two famous Dutch painters Mondrian and Van Gogh.
Students used sand and beads to create 3D versions of van Gogh’s famous ‘Starry Night’ painting and used coloured shapes and Lego blocks to make Mondrian inspired compositions.
Across the school we continuously celebrate our diversity and explore each others own talents. This unit of learning really allowed students to recognise their own strengths as artists and to understand that everyone is in fact an artist and all art is open to interpretation.
Art of course is not simply restricted to painting but also encompasses self-expression in music, dance and drama. In the role play areas in class, students enjoyed exploring puppet theatres and performed shows for each other. Teachers also enjoyed performing shows for the children covering many social and emotional themes. This opened up lots of rich dialogue centering around celebrating diversity, ‘being yourself’ and working with others.
We have been really impressed with how open and willing our young students are to engage in working with new materials and in different ways. They have started to connected together and found their inner magic, passion and a new love of messy art materials!
To conclude the current unit of learning and to set the tone for our upcoming ‘My Toy Shop’ unit of learning, students will enjoy having a professional puppeteer Janet Cratchley visit the school. She will talk to the children about her own handmade marionettes and will give performances to Group 1 and Group 2 children. We are really looking forward to the show.