Little Art Moments

Nothing like a bunch of children hanging around the house!

Each age that I work with approaches art making in different ways.  My older children have been really focused on drawing, making intricate paintings, tracing around shapes, and some really wanting to write and do letters, in short they have been working and developing their fine motor skills.  My younger children have been loving broad paint strokes, playdough manipulation, art projects that have movement such as marble runs or paint blowing, and being able to put their whole body into the experience.  They too have been working fine motor skills, but I have been noticing they seem to want to engage their gross motor skill as well.  To help offer them a way to do this, my first thought is that they should be able to work big, and with lots of room.  So, why not trace their bodies and let them paint and draw all over them.

It was interesting because both my assistant and myself could see the personalty of each child in their simple outline.  After all their bodies were traced, we moved the table and chairs off to the side so the children could use the floor to spread out and start to color with crayon and paint with liquid watercolors.

It definitely kept us on our toes having 8 children all over the floor doing various art activities with spills and running around thrown into the mix.  I know the children were using their gross motor skills with their movements, but I think Irina and myself had the opportunity to use ours more on that day.  

The following week they went back to the figure paintings and began using more gross motor skills by walking across the paintings, bending over and using their hands, slipping and sliding in the paint and on their paintings, and having a ball doing so.  I also love that this added more of a personal touch to the outline of their little 2.5-3 year old figures, now they have their footprints and hand prints to add to this keepsake.