| Creative Learning Programs VSA-Arts Michigan - Saint Joseph County |
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| "Back to Nature " VSA-Arts Festival Glen Oaks Community College Centreville, Michigan May 2004 |
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Highlights from "Back to Nature" written by Julie Bontrager for VSA-Arts Newsletter
On May 5th, 2004, over 250 children with disabilities from 18 different classrooms in St. Joseph County, Michigan converged on the campus of Glen Oaks Community College for a morning of exposure to the Fine Arts sponsored by VSAMi/St. Joe County. The theme for this Special Arts Festival was "Back to Nature."
The day began with art students from White Pigeon High School meeting each classroom as they arrived in their buses and escorting them to a registration area. Then the fun began! Each classroom was escorted to three separate ½ hour workshops presented by area visual artists, musicians, story tellers, and dancers - all working with the "Back to Nature" theme. In between the three workshops, the children had 10 minutes of passing time in which they could decorate newspaper hats with glitter pens and nature stickers or sign their name to a huge plastic flattened "Tube" as part of a collaborative art project which each one of the 250 children worked to create.
The various workshops varied from sing-a-longs, to playing musical instruments, to dance/movement, card stamping, to playing with rabbits and drawing them, to using spray bottles filled with watercolor to spray an art masterpiece as an adaptive project instead of using brushes. All of the workshops were distinctly different. Two of the presenting artists are visually impaired, and one of the artists is wheelchair bound. Six of the classrooms were able to fill in leaves and vines on the plastic "Tube" as part of the collaborative art project.
The highlight of the day for the children was the "Tube" which all the other children either added their names to or had a chance to actually create connected leaves and vines on. During lunch, the tube was inflated to approximately 9 feet high and 40 feet long. A handicap accessible entryway had been cut into the side of the tube, and all the children (and adults) had a chance to go inside the tube and look out at the collaborative art that had been created. This artwork was created and presented by Mr. Peter H. Middleton from Black River Public School in Holland, Michigan. Mr. Middleton is also affiliated with World Peace Art and Creative Learning Programs.
After all the art workshops, the children were treated to a puppet show presented by Joyce Davis-n-Puppets of Toledo, Ohio and ate lunch before being escorted back to their buses for return to their schools. While leaving, one of the children remarked to his guide, "This was the best day of my whole life!"
Student Report (Students attending "Back to Nature 2004):
There were 285 students expected at the 2004 festival with 234actually attending. There were 44 Teachers and Teacher Assistants who attended with the children.
The breakdown of disabilities is as follows:
Creative Learning Programs - World Peace Art Initiatives
VSA-Arts Michigan-St. Joseph County
Black River Public School - Project Term (Creative Learning)
