On Saturday, I helped set up one of the activities for Free First Saturday in the Cargill Lounge, and assisted Hibaaq with the activity. We were doing a season-based activity, where participants would make either summer or winter scenes or city elements using construction paper cutouts, and add them to a collaborative neighborhood (or take them home). So many kids were really excited about the activity, and we even got a few adults participating with their friends! Everyone’s pieces were incredibly creative, one adult made a house with steps to the front door made of paper folded back and forth, so they were 3D. Everything was so colorful, and both the summer and winter sides of the collaborative town were bustling by the end of my shift!
Having had very little experience working in education settings with younger children, I learned a lot about kids on Saturday, especially in terms of body language. Some of the kids didn’t talk a lot or at all when their adults asked if they wanted to participate in the activity, but I noticed that the adults could usually tell by their child’s body language if they did or didn’t want to join in, and for some kids it was more straightforward than others. Some of the younger kids were so excited they just walked right in without waiting for their adults; one baby kept pointing at my pom-pom earring and smiling. I feel like I gained a lot of insight about what kinds of things excite kids about learning and about art while assisting with the activity! A lot of artists write about this, but I can only agree that the parts of creating that children like really aren’t too different from what many professional artists enjoy about making art as adults.