"The Right Way"

"I support the arts, not the crafts!" ~Frasier, indignantly, upon learning that the new art museum he was being asked to support was a doll museum

The idea was that this was going to be a Thanksgiving-themed craft. If you know anything about our school, you'll know that "craft" opportunities are few and far between. This is not out of any Frasier-esque snobbishness, because I've been known to enjoy getting my craft on with the best of them, but rather that, by definition, crafts are art projects with a "right answer," whereas we prefer our preschool art open-ended.

Still, every now and then we give the kids a chance to try out a step-by-step process at the art table, something with at least the possibility of a pre-determined goal at the end, you know, like a puzzle: "Today, we're making spiders," "Today, we're making flowers," "Today, we're making turkeys."

We tried versions of this last week with all the Woodland Park ages, 2-5, but this was also a week in which the public schools we're not in session so we had a number of elementary school aged kids visiting us as well. I told each of the art parents, the parent-teachers responsible for managing the project each day, that despite the fact that there was an "obvious" way to interact with the glue, the feathers, and the pre-programmed paper plates with google-eyed turkey heads, we were to avoid bossing the kids around about it. (Our older students used old CD's instead of plates, affixed their own eyes, and cut their own beaks, but otherwise it was essentially the same project.) Even though there was an obvious craft going on, I still wanted the children to have the chance to interact with the materials according to their own curiosities.

Yes, I pre-made a couple of "correct" versions in advance, as "inspiration." I was also wondering if our older visitors, those 6-10 year olds, would supply some genuine inspiration by sitting down with the preschool kids and role modeling a step-by-step approach to crafting turkeys. In other words, as should always be the case with school, it was an experiment and I was curious to see if we could, by these clever, non-bossy means, guide at least some of the kids into creating identifiable turkeys to adorn their family's holiday tables.

Even though few of the children did this craft "the right way," they still created their own step-by-step processes. Here's Step 1 . . .

That said, I'm happy to report that every single 2-year-old started by covering the pre-programmed turkey eyes with a nice thick pool of glue, then covering what used to be its face with feathers. Every one of them approached it this way. And you know what I'm most proud of?  I didn't hear a single adult say, "No, no, no, put the glue around the head!" I did hear a few request that the glue be kept on the table, as opposed to chair seats or the floor, but you know, that's mostly out of courtesy to the other people who might want to later sit or walk.

. . . Step 2 . . .

A few of the 3 and 4 year olds managed to create turkeys with visible eyes, although more often than not, those eyes were again mere targets for glue and feathers, despite the best efforts of our older visitors to demonstrate "how it's done."

. . . and Step 3, which involves even more glue!

The 5's class, when it was their turn, got into making alien turkeys: bizarre creatures with dozens of eyes and extra beaks, and other deformities.

With the CD turkeys we wound up putting wax paper under them to accommodate the glue.

And at the end of the day, there might have even been a few turkeys made "the right way."

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