In the fall, we start with introducing watercolor, how to use water and mix color on the paper! We made a lot of paintings about our beautiful stories. We read Flower Boy, Fat King…and so on.

Designing our Fun Spooky Character!

In October, we created many unique and spooky characters for the Halloween season. We’ve talked about some of the essential elements including personality, emotions, and appearance to build a lively character. The young artists have presented their creativity in making their spooky characters, and the teachers are proud to see such an amazing outcome!

We learned about an American artist called Louise Nevelson…

Louise Nevelson, she was originally from Russia, but her family moved to the United States when she was six years old. Louise’s sculptures aren’t made in the traditional classical way! She would collect interesting objects that other people had discarded, arrange them together, and paint them all black!

Our children have created many unique mix-media artworks inspired by Louie Nevelson's artworks. We used many surprising materials that children often don’t think they can use for art. Such as spaghetti, spoons and forks, paper rolls, and recycled paper. These materials mainly aim to enlarge their thinking that everything can be something in the art world. Everything is possible! Ms. Amy was excited to see the outcomes including everyone's artistic soul!

Art is MESSY!

For our younger group, this semester we explored many types of ways in art. We STICK things, PAINT all over big cardboard, and Ms. Amy’s STORY TIME! We focused on sensory exploration for toddlers. During the semester, Ms. Amy found that everyone starts getting interested about paint with their hands, getting over their fear of using unfamiliar materials, and finally everyone gets excited when we start painting. I see many toddlers have improved their fine motor skills, such as grabbing small materials, putting on in the right spot, or holding the paint brushes…etc. Ms. Amy is thrilled to see they most enjoyed painting with their fingers.

From 2D to 3D

Our younger classes made a coil pot like the fat king in the story. We rolled many coils and built a big belly. Finally we decorated the fancy clothes for the king.

The older kids did a clay project as well. We made a wide-mouth creature! Everyone can decide what features they want to add. Some children made animal creatures, some made imaginary creatures. This semester, Ms. Amy also found that our children put their expression more into their creative process. They love sharing what are the special things they added to the project.

Special Introduction to Chinese Calligraphy Materials, we drew our first Chinese style painting…

It is fun to learn how to create different shades of ink and our children successfully made their own gradation! 

We paint our magical forest with these ink and finally decorate it with watercolor. Ms. Amy is proud of their creative way of using the ink!

At the end of the year, we read a beautiful book called The Midnight Fiar by Gideon Sterer!

This is a book with no text, just pictures. When night comes and the fair is empty, something unexpected happens… While reading these books, we are not just focusing on the story, but also observing every detail in the painting. By asking children questions, they are also thinking about what will happen next! After we read the book, everyone created a painting by designing their special rainbow rollercoaster! We wrap up our semester by mixing fun watercolors. Our children had a lot of fun exploring colors this year!

Last but not least… We are officially offering older kids’ Fundamental Drawing Classes! In this class, we focused on skill training and the theory of drawing.

Our older artists made a big effort in their drawing skills by building their fundations!

Here are some wonderful acrylic paintings made by our artists this year!