An “A is for Art” project
by the Giraffe Classroom
at the SDSU Children’s Center
Mrs. Serafine - Master Teacher
Exploring music has been an everyday occurrence in the Giraffe classroom. There has been a wide variety of music that has made it into our library. We have Lily’s favorite, “Grease,” from the movie soundtrack, Mia’s choice, “Ballet,” that includes a variety of recordings from Beethoven and Mozart, and a number of rock and roll songs burned on to a CD by Mr. Justin, one of our volunteers, for the rock band created by the Giraffes, “The Alien Eye Ball Surfboard Rockers.”
Another love, the love of painting, has also emerged in the Giraffe classroom. We create paintings daily with vibrant tempera and watercolor. A
routine of mixing tempera into various hues, to set at the easel is now a part of our culture. Could the two be combined somehow? A blending of creative
endeavors became a magnificent display of the children’s love of
the arts.
We brought the idea of our canvas dance to a small group of children who love both painting and music. We discussed with them our idea about having them dance to their favorite music on the canvas — stopping the music and having us trace their bodies wherever their body touched the canvas. The children were eager to try.
We discussed the music we would use. Lily decided on rock and roll. Mia decided she wanted “Ballet.” Bergen picked up his guitar and said, “I don’t need any music. I’m just going to play my guitar. That makes music. I don’t like ballet. My guitar doesn’t do ballet.” The children even decided to dress for their performance, using the dress-up clothes from “home living” area of the classroom.
But who would dance first? We noticed that Bergen was on the canvas, eager to start. We decided that he should go first. The children negotiated their turns at dancing on the canvas without help from the adults. There was a quiet, unspoken negotiation as to who should go next. Even as each child took their turn dancing on the canvas “stage,” the children who were waiting their turn danced around the canvas. This showed us that the children respected the individuals’ turn while still enjoying the dance.
We started the process of tracing the children’s body when we stopped the music. The first thing the children noticed about stopping in the middle of their dance has how hard it was to maintain their balance. Because a lot of their dance involved standing on their “tippee toes,” balance was imperative to catching that movement on the canvas. Katie exclaimed, as she noticed Julianne shifting to steady herself, “She had her tiptoe here first.”
Eventually the tracings started to overlap. Julianne noticed and said, “Katie, you kind of got on my foot - you accidentally got on my print. Ha, Ha, Ha, look what happened.” She smiled widely and pointed to the overlapping prints. Katie noticed another place in which the tracings overlapped and said, “My hand is over her foot.”
I noticed that as Bergen danced, his tongue was thrust out the side of his mouth. I wished out loud, “Too bad we couldn’t get that tongue on the canvas.” Instantly, Bergen bent down placing his tongue on the canvas, allowing me to trace it with my pencil. The children’s eyes were wide with disbelief and excitement that Bergen could be so “crazy and silly.”
This act inspired Julianne to be spontaneous as well. During her dance music, she laid her head down so that we could trace her hair. Lydia noticed that “her hair looked like little waves.”
The children were proud of their ability to produce such graceful movements. Julianne called out to me, “Look at my Ballet.” Katie said, “Look at me. My skirt goes up like a ballerina.”
The children observed the dance movements among themselves and tried to learn as well as teach each other. Lily noticed how Julianne was standing. She said, “She is kind of standing like this,” (Lily tries to stand in a “ballet stance” like Julianne). She then shifts to her heels and said, “I can walk like this. I can run like this to.” Some of the children attempted to walk on their heels also. Lily turns to Sofi and said, “Let me show you how to stand like a ballerina.”
We decided to work on the canvas the next day by revisiting our work with pictures we had taken during our dancing and tracing. As the children looked through the pictures they reflected on their experience.
Ava looked at a picture of her dancing on the canvas and said, “I was very stylish!” Lily looks up and smiles, “Do you remember when Bergen put his tongue on the canvas?” Julianne said, “Yes, and I remember when I laid down.” We all smiled as we remembered the fun time we had together.
We asked the children if they thought it would be a good idea to show how fun our dance was by adding some beautiful, bright colors to our tracings on the canvas. Because I knew how much these children love to paint, I knew the answer would be a resounding “YES!”.
Before we started adding watercolor to the canvas, Quentin and I showed the children how to use the watercolor and how to clean and dry their brush. Mia and Lydia both had experience with mixing watercolor at home. Lydia said, “If you mix all the colors together, they will turn black. My sister does that. I don’t like that.” Mia had a similar experience with her sibling, “My baby sister changes my orange to green.”
As the children start to paint the canvas, they start to remember where their traced body parts were. Katie said, “I’m beginning with Bergen’s tongue.” Ava follows with, “I’m beginning with my hand.” Julianne scans the canvas for her body. She exclaims, “This was my leg part!” Mia makes the connection of using color to represent the energy of the dance and said, “We are dancing again.” Julianne replies, “We are good dancers.”
The more paint we added to the canvas, the more we realized that we were losing the lines from the pencil tracings. Julianne observes, “There is so much paint that I can’t see the lines. I can’t see where the lines were.” We could see how important it was for the children to be able to see their bodies in motion on the canvas and to make that connection with the color. So we decided that we should use oil pastels over the pencil to create a crayon resist effect so that we would still be able to see our bodies.
The following day, we decided to add more paint. Because the children are very experienced with painting and mixing paint, we decided to add a wider variety of water color hues. This prompted a higher level of participation from the group and even from those who hadn’t originally been part of the project. The children worked intently on covering the canvas with color. Koa scanned the canvas for “white spots” and then placed color carefully in the small spaces. Brendan said to Koa, “Can I have the blue please? That is my favorite color.” Julianne asks, “Why don’t we add black or brown paint? I would like to use those.” At her request, black and brown were added to the choices of color.
Our “musical canvas” was an experiment in blending two art forms, dance and painting with watercolor. The children were able to use the bright, beautiful colors of the watercolor to represent the energy of the dance session on the canvas. Because the children love both of these forms of art, the connection was easy for us to make.
