Art Club 1.04: Goodbye Graduates

THEME OF WEEK 1:04: Goodbye Art Club Graduates

11th and 12th February 2015

Art Club with Fundación Junto Con Los Niños - JUCONI 

facilitated by the Charlotte Miller Art Project in Guayaquil, Ecuador

IDEA AND AIMS:  To have a fun final session with the children where they make puppets representing themselves and respond to two questions designed to invite them to reflect on the positive things they have learned in Art Club and the positive things about themselves:

1. What have you learnt in Art Club?

2. What makes you special and unique?

PROCESS: 

1. Puppet: Roll up a ball of plasticine and mould it onto the short end of a wooden clothes peg.  Add details of eyes, nose and mouth by sculpting the plasticine and adding other colours.  Add hair with wool or curled ribbon. Cover the clothes peg with a scrap of cloth.  Wool can be woven around the legs if desired.  Twist a pipe cleaner around the body for arms, winding wool around them if desired. 

2. Label: Stick a coloured post-it note to each side of a cardboard ticket.  Write the answers to the two questions above, one on each side.  Tie to the puppet's wrist with wool.

MATERIALS: wooden clothes pegs, plasticine, wool, ribbon, pipe cleaners, cloth scraps, carboard labels, post-it notes, glue, scissors, silicone, felt pens

MEET THE PUPPETS FROM NUEVA PROSPERINA:

22 puppet friends from our final session with our Nueva Prosperina children.  Because JUCONI works individaully with only very few children in this area now that this group has closed down we will no longer be working in Nueva Prosperina.  We'll be opening a third group in Socio Vivienda instead where there is far more demand for JUCONI's services.

(left) "I am unique and special in sharing with people and offering help" (right) "What did you learn in Art CLub?  What I most like is to draw and to paint"

(left) "I learned in Art Club that sharing is the best and I made new friends" (right) "What did I learn in Art CLub?  In Art Club I learned to draw and to paint and to draw with plasticine"

(left) "I learned to share with others" (right) "In Art CLub I learned to play and to paint and the last, to draw"


          "I am unique and special because I have a special imagination."

                                  MEET THE PUPPETS FROM SERGIO TORAL:

"In Art Club I learned to lots of things in groups"

(left) "I special because I like to help my friends and to be friendly" (middle) "I am special because I help my friends" (right) "In Art Club I learned to help my friends"

(left) "In Art Club I learned many things, like drawing and much more" (right) "I learned to draw and to cut out.  Thank you."

"I am special because I am an artist.  I feel happy in Art Club"

As this session was our last in each of our groups the priority was for the kids to have a positive and happy experience.   In Socio Vivienda, before making their plants and answering the questions, this meant playing with the kid's favourite, the parachute: 

In Sergio Toral we had a spontaneous story-telling session instigated by the kids when they asked us about "duendes" (goblins or elves) and if we had ever seen any, then told us their stories.  As Emily said afterwards, the nicest thing about this was seeing the child in some of our older kids who can be pretty tough and 'adult' at times. 

Having observed in Socio Vivienda and amongst ourselves as facilitators that it is pretty tough to think of a reason why you oneself are 'special and unique' Emily, Ronald and I took the time to write down a reason why each of our children in the Sergio Toral group are special.   After the storytelling we read these out for the children and it was a really lovely moment, where Ronald revelaed an amazing comic ability that had the kids and Emily and I shaking with laughter.  Time didn't allow for a repeat of the same in the group in Nueva, but we were able to voice our observations individaully with the children throughout the session.  Just as it was lovely for us as facilitators to hear what the others had to say about why we were unique and special, (Emily to me: I'm stronger than a bus, Ronald to me: I care hugely about everyone around me and consistently give the most of myself to them, and live searching for my freedom, me to Emily: she learned a language in 3 weeks and works magic with paint, me to Ronald: he has an amazing abillity to animate and motivate those around him, Ronald to Emily: a being with an urge to live) we hoped that it would be a moment of positive reinforcement for the children to hear what we had to say about them, and it certainly seemed to provoke a lot of pensative and pleased agreement through the various sessions. 

Our facilitaor's examples a little te worse-for-wear after being played with in 2 sessions of Art Club.  (left - me, with a squashed nose and missing feet) "I'm unique and special because I care about others and give a lot of myself" (far right - Emily, squashed face, feet back to front) "I am unique and special because I make magic with colourful paint.  I am a being with the urge to live"  (Centre - Ronald, ticket missing, so this is a rough quote) "In Art Club I learned to observe the awakening of the creativity of the children who come to these workshops, that come out of the imaginations of these cmap volunteers that come from so far away to work with JUCONI and these children." 

We also finished in all 4 groups by handing out goody bags of sweets and biscuits along with an invitation to the JUCONI-cmap carnival exhibition in April.  Although it has been an unwanted and abrupt end to these 4 groups that we have shared so much time with, these were fun last sessions and we're glad to be able to look forward to seeing the children again in April.