Workshops for Kids

Well I've just had another exhilarating afternoon at Stanley's Nursery.  This time I was invited back to do a Workshop for the Holiday Club during half term.  The age range was from 5 to 11 so it was a pretty varied bunch, but they all did a brilliant job.  I'd already done a day there with Stanley's group.  That time it was kept very simple and we based it on Autumn leaves.  I did a bit of prep work beforehand and photocopied loads of leaves of varying shapes and sizes.  The days leading up to it, the key workers got the children involved with cutting out the leaf shapes so that when I came in there was a nice selection box of leaves.  They all chose their own and made a little collage on their bags, then one by one I got them all to print.  We had a red, blue and green team and amazingly we managed to print 20 bags in one morning session.  Stanley, 'the pro', was first in line to print of course, but then disappeared off to play, which was good news.

 

This time we chose Halloween as it seemed the most appropriate subject matter for kids of all ages in the lead up to the 31st.  Plus you could get a very similar effect to hollowing out and carving a pumpkin face with cutting out a 2D stencil for a bag.  As before, I did some photocopying and drawing of the most obvious themes and had a couple of 'mood boards' up from images I'd grabbed off the internet.  This was really just to get the kids inspired to do their own drawings.  Even though there's a signature with everyone's cutting out skills anyway, I hoped that they could expand on my initial ideas.  They really went for it!  Quite a bit of cutting out was done before I arrived so we could get straight at the printing.

I was in the main room this time, which was pretty full on, with kids flying here there and everywhere, tons of questions and a bit of juggling with turn taking, but it was just nice to be in such a lively enthusiastic atmosphere. The staff were so helpful and supportive and I felt like a very welcome guest as well as immediately being part of the team. Thanks to Kim and Marie Anna, all the prep work was brilliant and gave the whole thing an instant take off.  Loads of boys joined in as well as the girls and all the 'watch this it's magic' and 'wow look at that' responses, really made me smile.

I have an aching back and twinging knees, but it was well worth it!

Happy Halloween!

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