If you’ve been following this blog for awhile you know about our interest in Fairies and that we used a path in a local forest to create what we called Fairy Lane.
Last fall I was approached by another Early Childhood Educator from Roseberry Preschool to collaborate on a project. Every year her centre puts together an art exhibit at our local art gallery. This year she invited our centre and one other to take part.
We met a couple of times to discuss what interests were happening with the children in our centres and together we decided to call our exhibit “Pathways”.
We started last fall by exploring the forest close to our school looking for signs of fairies. We collected materials and practiced building fairy houses using play dough to help them stand.
Then we spent some time building real fairy houses.
We listened to a story about flower fairies and then made our own.
Each child was encouraged to create a story about their fairy.
This spring we spent a week making clay doors and imagining about who might
live behind each one.
After they were fired we spent a couple of days painting them.
The week before our show was to open we created backdrops for our doors and fairies. We painted trees on an old roll of transparency film (from an overhead projector).
We decided to install our Fairy Project on the windowsills of the gallery.
The see-through trees gave it a playful feel.
Photos and the children’s stories were displayed on the walls.
Here's a glimpse of the other centres' work.
Tigger Too Preschool Pathway was following the salmon that they raised at
their centre and released in the creek.
Roseberry Preschool followed the path of a slug that emerged from a carrot
they found in their garden.
Opening night brought families from all three centres together to celebrate and
learn about each others' projects.
Putting an art exhibit together has been a great way to follow a project through to an end. Thinking of how it will be shared with others who know nothing about it. Will they be intrigued? Will they create their own pathway that takes them on an adventure? I hope so.