After visiting the Wonders of Learning exhibit in Vancouver last month,
I was inspired to make a permanent spot for the overhead projector in our room.
It is placed on a low riser and illuminates on to the wall.
The children have been experimenting with how it turns on and off.
What parts move? How does it work? What will reflect on the wall?
They have been exploring with a variety of materials.
Coloured blocks, rock mats, clear paper weights, old slides and more.
Making the connection between what they put on the projector, what they
see on the wall and describing it.
This week I added black outline pictures printed on transparencies.
I was a bit surprised that the children wanted to colour them.
I don’t provide colouring sheets in the program as I feel that they
don’t offer much for creativity but I was surprised how attractive
this is for the children.
And surprised that it is mostly girls that are attracted.
Driving home today I thought back to my experience with colouring books
and fondly remember colourfully filling in each page.
I felt like an artist.
I talked to my daughter, who is now 24, about this and she remembers colouring
and enjoying it too. She felt that it did offer her creativity because she could
decide if she wanted the tree to be pink or rainbow or whatever colour she desired.
So by not providing colouring sheets in my program am I missing
an element of creative art for the children?
I would love any opinions on this.