This weekend is the celebration of Culture Days with free, interactive arts and cultural activities all across Canada. According to the Culture Days website, the purpose is “to raise the awareness, accessibility,participation and engagement of all Canadians in the arts and cultural life of their communities.” It’s a volunteer movement which allows community members to see artists, musicians, historians, curators, architects, designers and more at work on their craft and in many cases gives “behind the scene” access to their creative worlds.
I decided to get involved and presented a workshop at the Lambeth Branch of the London Public Library today. It was presenting a choice of Aboriginal arts for parents and their children: an Inukshuk, a totem pole, or a dream catcher.
Of course, it was not only a fun thing to do for my community but it was a great way to spread the news about Creative EdVentures as well!
I provided posters and samples at each of the stations so that if I became tied up with assisting someone with their artwork, parents would have some guidance in helping their children get started.
For the Inukshuks, I gave them a variety of river stones along with Aleene’s Tacky Glue for the younger children and cool glue guns for the older ones/ones with close parental supervision. It’s just a matter of picking your stones and stacking them, gluing as you go, into a human figure-like structure!
One of the finished Inuksuit (plural of Inukshuk/Inuksuk) made today!
The Dream Catcher station was the most popular one!
I provided rings for the form of the dream catcher, faux suede lacing to wrap the rings with, string or faux sinew for weaving the web, and beads and feathers for adorning them. For smaller children, I gave them colourful yarn that they could simply wrap around and around the ring if they weren’t able to do the weaving stitch.
Some happy participants at work on their dream catchers – they were concentrating so hard they were pretty much silent the whole time they worked!
Lots of the younger ones, though, preferred to make totem poles.
I’m sure all the paints, glitter, and colourful pompoms, feathers, and other such materials had nothing to do with attracting them to the totem pole station!
Look at this cute little totem pole! He painted it red, yellow, and blue and then drew on Bliss symbols for pets, home, and family. We cut slits in it so he could put feathers in and then he adorned it with pompoms and rhinestones. I didn’t get the chance to take a picture of the back – it was covered in glitter and bling!!!
I had so much fun today – teaching, interacting with the kids and their families, and watching their creativity unfold.
Tomorrow, I’m attending some Culture Days events – this time as a participant myself! Come back then for an update. And, if you’re in Canada, check out the Culture Days website, search for your city and see what events are going on in your area!
Vidette Benn says
This is so cool Cyn. It’s great that you participated.