Last Class of Session I!

 What a fantastic last class for Mind Move Make's first session!  At the beginning of the class I asked the students to share the thing they liked the best about the class, along with an improvement that they would make.  In art class we called these Stars (positive comments) and Wishes (constructive comments).  Each student got to ring the singing bowl one last time as they announced their Star and Wish for the class.

I came away understanding that the students truly enjoyed working together over the past ten classes.  Some students liked the yoga portion of the class best, and others loved creating the artwork.  It was wonderful hearing all of the students' ideas about the class!

After that, I explained that I created a large piece of artwork and cut it into ten different pieces.  Each student would receive one piece of the artwork along with a note that I wrote especially for him or her.  I told them the only way the artwork would be whole again was if the students worked together to reassemble the pieces to create the whole.  The artwork is a symbol of our shared experience during the classes we've spent together.  I gave them five minutes to reassemble the artwork; they busily collaborated and got to see what the whole piece of artwork looked like.

Here are all the cards that I created by cutting up a larger piece of artwork.

These are the same cards from the view of the notes I wrote to the students.

Here the students are working together to reassemble the artwork.

The students were appreciative of the mini pieces of artwork I gave them, along with the notes.  One child even made me a thank-you card when she was finished with her own artwork!

We had to scramble to complete the sock puppets we started.  One class was missed due to a snow day, so the children had less time then I planned to finish their puppets.  They worked really hard and everyone got finished, except one student who needed to leave class a little early.

After finishing their puppets, many of the students began putting on an impromptu puppet show!  They used chairs from the art room to construct a miniature stage, and fabric to decorate it.  When parents arrived to pick up their children, two girls began pulling chairs out for them to watch the show.  It was so fun for me to see them use their imaginations and develop a performance.

I am extremely grateful to each child who participated in Mind Move Make's first session, and I'm really looking forward to starting Session II!