As summer wanes and the weather cools, we have been thinking a lot about our schedule this fall. However, before the busyness of our homeschool lives begin, before our drawing liturgies are in full swing, before our fall workshop and preparations for our winter market start, we want to take a moment to reflect on our main summer event, Art Camp!
Paint and Draw with Wondern Awe hosted 2 weeks of art camp in July, and we were so impressed with our camper's ability, attitude and creativity. It was so fun for us, tiring, but fun. We design the camps with the creative kids in mind, desiring to provide time and space for them so that they can create! Plus, we love art supplies and something that we do for our campers, is send them home with great materials to use.
This year, we had a main project and theme for each week of camp.
Week 1:
Main project: "Design your own alphabet"
Main theme: Communication forms, art, light and language.
We introduced this project by sharing our process. We began with inspiration. Anne and I ardently admire ocean life, so we shared with them something that is found in oceans and that simply fills us with wonder and awe, bioluminescence. Using slides, we showed examples of bioluminescence in nature as something that is a great example of a unique and beautiful form of communication. All living things communicate, just in different ways. God is so creative! We then used John 1:1-7 to talk about language as a gift from God, and discussed how it is one of our human forms of communication. Using His gift allows us to talk with Him, read His word and speak with each other.
This passage enabled us to also connect language to light, how mysterious and inspiring! Because we are made in His image, we are creative by nature, all of us, and we can combine language and creativity in many different and glorious ways to both communicate with the world and to glorify God. Of course, the alphabet is the basic form of our language and a fabulous opportunity for graphic manipulation, so we encouraged the children to express themselves through their alphabet design! Letters to language to light. The results were spectacular, the kids all created beautiful pieces. I wish I could share every single one!
Here is a small sampling:
Week 2:
Main project: "Design your own character"
Main theme: The Hero's Journey, A story Imprinted on Our Hearts.
The second week of camp was focused on creating a character. We used interactive notebooks to brainstorm ideas for their creation, using both words and sketches. Next, the student's named their characters, answered several questions about their personality, imagined their character's likes and dislikes, and began working on what they might look like.
During our teaching/inspiration time, we introduced the "Hero's Journey" or "Monomyth", (we used Joseph Campbell's version of the theory popularized in the mid twentieth century). You may be asking, what is the Hero's Journey? Good question. It's basically a storyline "formula" that shows up over and over again in several stories on multiple continents, in various cultures and across many millennia. It's a story line that resonates with all people. We shared this theory with the kids for 2 reasons.
1. We shared it with the hope they would create a back story for their character. Because it's a great recipe for a successful story, we wanted the kids to have the tools they needed to keep creating after camp. We all love this story recipe. These very popular stories: Hamlet, Hunger Games, Star Wars, Harry Potter & the Matrix, follow this model!
2. We wanted the kids to think about this story formula in light of God's salvation plan. It is, in our opinion, Christ's story and ours. It is one that is deeply familiar.
Perhaps, we were created with this story imprinted on our hearts, so that anytime in our lives when we stumble upon it, it rings true. This is a story made for us and for His glory. It is a story written into the fabric of our existence, the enchanting tale of His plan to rescue us.
Here are a few examples of work from week 2. During our Character week, the students not only designed and drew their creation, but also sculpted it, created a 3-d habitat for it and some even had time to additionally design accessories, sidekicks or pets!
Use the arrows to progress through some of the kids work.
We were so proud of each and every alphabet, character, maker's space creation, accessories board, letter design and sculpture in our camp that were created by the kids. They all had such vivid ideas and they all worked so well together and worked hard to do their best work. We wish we could share all our pictures of camp with you, but we hope you enjoyed the few above. Every Blessing to you dear one.
-sk