Glitter & Razz Blog

Gianna and Gus create artistic gifts for each other.

It’s a small group but sweet at pumpkin pie.  6 girls and 4 boys all making art and exploring the practice of gratitude during this Thanksgiving week camp.

“What are gratitudes,” I ask the group.  Blank stares all around.  It sounds kinda familiar to most but they can’t quite put their finger on the meaning of that big word.

“It’s like when you have a lot of feelings,” Gabriel, age 7 ventures a guess.  And I really wish that was the answer because I love that answer.

“Well, this is the week of Thanksgiving so I guess that it something to do with being thankful.” Madeleine, age 7, nails it.

So, all day we talked about these gratitudes.  Here are some of my favorites – Being Active, Carrots, My mom, my dad, my donor, kindergarten, movies, pink, blue, and – my number 1 favorite – Glitter & Razz.

In Move & Groove class, we created partner dances based on our gratitudes.  In Magic Messes (art class with a brand new teacher to us this time, Shanel) we created pieces of art for a partner.  I loved this activity.  Each partner had to talk about what he or she liked while the other partner had to listen.  And then, each person had to create a piece as a gift for their partner.  They shared it with teh full group before giving it to their partner.  At the end of the day, Sabine, age 5, said that she was grateful for being able to make a gift for your partner.  I loved hearing that.

In drama class, we began making up our play to be performed tomorrow.  We brainstormed as many gratitudes as we could think of and then created a bunch of little stories based on gratitudes that we picked randomly from the list.  Then, we put all of our ideas on one big piece of paper and attempted to take the best ideas and make them into one play.  We did a pretty good job and we are on our way to creating a play that involves a talking Tootsie Roll who is grateful to have her job at the zoo because, you know, “not very many people want to hire a tootsie roll” (says Sara, age 9).  She is so grateful that she will do anything to keep her job and she won’t let the vampire, the zombies, and the shape-shifters get in her way.  Intrigued?

More tomorrow…

I'll Lead The Way...Follow Me!

The mood was calm and excited.  One of these special Play in a Day Camps where each and every 4 year old makes it all the way through the long day and no one says “I don’t wanna do the play.”  Perhaps it was because we had a great mix of new and returning campers.  Perhaps it was because the camp was lead by the Glitter & Razz Dream Team of Cassie Powell, Martin Brecht, and Cinda Russell.  Perhaps because it was a rare mid-week camp and kids are just more mellow on Wednesdays (whatever happened to Veteran’s Day being observed on a Monday, by the way?).

Or perhaps, it was a theme…Love ‘Em & Lead ‘Em is all about leadership.  What does leadership look like and feel like from the perspective of young children under 10 years old?  Well, from what I have observed, it looks a lot like learning the importance of following directions.  I think the roots of more complex and sophisticated leadership (Obama-style) start with young children learning how to control their own behavior when someone asks them to do something that they don’t particularly want to do.  And, on the flip side, learning how to use words and actions in a positive way to get others to do things with and for you.

Yesterday, there was a lot of focus on leading and following in creative movement through eye-contact; following the movements of the teacher and trying to match her as best as possible; cleaning up and helping others clean up; and older kids setting positive examples for the younger kids.

We will continue to refine this theme because I believe there is a lot more there.  We’ve done this theme 3 times now and I continue to learn more about teaching leadership to young children.  Please let me know if you have any suggestions!

Here are a few more images from camp…

The 'English Dragon" who's looking for a party

I wasn't kidding when I said we did a lot of cleaning up!

Railey, age 9 is one of our Glitter & Razz All-Stars and was our oldest boy of the day. This reluctant leader finally managed to assume his role and wound up actually enjoying it by the time he sat down for mouse facepaint with Martin.

Some of our younger girls are trying to figure out "what's next?" as Cinda takes them through the schedule of the day.

Our very last day of summer camps was on Friday and today was the first day of school here in Oakland.  I sat in a very empty dramatic play space wondering why it was so quiet.  I actually miss all of those kids.  Very much in fact.  And the teachers.  And the parents.  All of it.

But, thanks to Animoto, we can have the memories with us all year long…

And, our fall classes start in just a few weeks…

Tomorrow is it.  The last day.  It’s the last day of this camp.  It’s the last day of all summer camps in fact.  And I can’t believe the time has flown by so quickly.  And, for the last time this summer, we spent today getting ready for the “big show.”

A very informal poll has shown me that “doing the play” is the favorite part of camp for most Glitter & Razz campers.  Here’s what I mean…

And, let’s hear from a couple of boys…

To better prepare us for both practicing and performing this play we love so much, we played a focus game this morning where the kids had to put on their “focus goggles” (a phrase created on the spot by Maera, age 5) while we teachers did everything we could think of to try to distract them. It was quite successful, actually. Afterwards, Maya said, “even though I really wanted to look up, I didn’t!”

I guess we’ll see tomorrow if it made any difference.

Just 2 more things…I am not sure I gave the proper celebration of our youth intern, Nora.  She is such a gem with these younger kids.  So fun and so responsible at the same time.  I mean, just look at how much fun she is having in those pink gloves with our assistant teaching artist, Cinda.  Cinda, by the way, is also a superstar.  She drives up everyday from Santa Cruz and still has the best possible energy and attitude!  The aftercare she runs is like a masterpiece in and of itself.

And, speaking of masterpieces, I can’t wait until you see the books your creative kids have produced.  Not only are they imaginative and cool looking, it is also quite outstanding for this age group to have the focus to work on an intricate, multi-step project, over the entire week.  This project included drawing, printmaking, painting, collaging, and writing.

I guess those focus goggles really are working.

As we know, at the heart of every good story is a good conflict.  What is hard for many of us to understand is that conflicts, in and of themselves, are not bad things.  They are a natural part of life.  It’s how many of us handle conflicts where we can make the choice to make things better or worse.

This is what we are attempting to teach 4-6 year olds in the next 2 days.  Wish us luck.

Today, we introduced the concept and definition of a conflict in the context of a story – when one person wants something and another person wants something else and these get in the way of each other.  As I explained, “Raise your hand if you ever wanted ice cream for dinner and your mom wanted you to eat vegetables.  This is a conflict.”

We then got into small groups and talked about examples of conflicts:

• “Playing too rough on the couch with my brother” -Eli
• “Stealing toys from another person” -Reed
• “Me and my brother fight over my marbles” -Ruby
• “When we graduated my teacher told one of the boys to get off the stage because he was being too naughty.” -Alyssa

We encouraged the kids to notice conflic’ts all day.  Most importantly, we asked the kids, “Do all conflicts have to end in a fight?” We heard a resounding “NO” and then I gave them their directive…”Your job as Glitter & Razz kids is to always figure out how to solve conflicts without fights.” And we practiced all day.  Especially on the playground.  We look forward to getting into more peaceful conflict resolution tomorrow.

Do you really want to know what we do in camp? Well, let me show you. This first video is a clip from our morning Move & Groove class?

Take a look at the warm-up that actors do at the beginning of the drama class.

And finally, here’s a taste of the Magic Messes class. This one is a bit long (about 6 minutes) but it’s worth it to watch all the way until the end. Especially if you are Heather (Jasper’s mom).

As I write this, Shoshana is on the stage in aftercare singing her own made up song, “Puppets, puppets..oh yea!” as she claps her hands and shakes her groove thing.  This, I am sure, is because it was all about the puppets today.

Cassie, Martin, Cinda and I performed an impromptu puppet show after Kids Choice when tempers were high on the playground.  You see, there are all these cool riding toys on the playground and lots of the kids want to play with them.  So, when Cinda went to open the gate, she was crowded by a dozen kids just dying to be the first one to get the toy of their choice.  We tried to control this madness and did a pretty good job.  For awhile.  Until the sharing problems really bubbled up.

Our puppet show addressed these issues.  3 puppets ran and screamed and fought over a toy while Cinda, the teacher, explained a very important rule here at Glitter & Razz – If you want to play with toys, you have to share.  If you don’t feel like sharing, that’s okay…you just can’t play.  As a result of our play, the kids totally got that:

• “If you don’t share, it makes other kids sad.”
• “It’s really important to take turns.”
• “We have to be careful to give other people room and not crowd them.”

We also talked a lot about finding our own calm and quiet.  We start every Glitter & Razz camp day with a moment of silence.  We talk about how important it is to find our own calm and silence so that “we cannot be too crazy” and we can be calm and relaxed for the day.  Today, we talked about actual strategies to get calm if we are feeling too cranky or overwhelmed and are about to take that mood out on others.  Some of the ideas we came up with “lie down and try to take a nap,”(Maera) “take a deep breath,” (Kealia) and “yoyo” (aka yoga via Benjamin).  The coolest thing is that I did follow up and ask them in our closing circle to share what they noticed…and they had a lot of cool stuff to say!  Here are some that I remember and, I’ll admit, these are paraphrased…

• “I was getting frustrated when I was waiting for it to be my turn so I took a deep breath…”
• “On the playground, a lot of people wanted me to pull them on the wagon and they were annoying me so I breathed…”
• “I almost said some bad words to my sister, so I did some yoyo (guess who said that?).”

From my perspective, this is some of the most important work that we are doing here at Glitter & Razz.  Sure, they are also getting great instruction in creative movement, drama, and visual art, but, the social/emotional skills that they are developing from being part of a creative process are the skills that are going to benefit them in every aspect of their lives.

Oh, and back to the puppets.  Cassie also used puppets today in drama class to introduce kids to some famous characters from famous stories as inspiration to create their own original characters.

Martin did not use puppets today but they did create covers to their storybooks. 

Itty Bitty Quote of the Day: “Why is there so much having fun here?!?”

We have reached our last week of Glitter & Razz camp for the summer.  It’s been a long and GREAT summer and we are wrapping it up with our final Itty Bitty Arts Camp.  The theme…”Onceuponatime & Ever After.”  This is a fun one.  It’s a week where we are inspired by our favorite stories and books to create stories of our own.  As the week goes on, we will talk about what stories are, how they are structured, why they important, and what we learn from them.

Today has been a day a day of introductions.  In our Move & Groove (creative movement class) with the extraordinary teacher, Spring Berlandt, we played a lot of games that helped us learn each other’s names and explore different storybook characters with our bodies including Pegasus and Darth Vader.

Our Drama Classes with Cassie Powell are already beginning to create the plays they will perform at the end of the week.  Each creative kid was asked to think about their favorite stories and where those stories take place.  Then, they gave each other “tours” of those places on stage.  This was a great way to practice leading and following at the same time teaching young actors what a set is and how they are created on stage to help the enhance the story they are acting out.

Just a brief word about Cassie.  Cassie has been teaching with us since Dec 09 and she truly is a “creative genius.”  She is very successful in giving each kid an opportunity to contribute their own creative voice while at the same time, always insisting on a high standard of collaborative skills.  This is not an easy feat with this age group as they are just beginning to learn the skills associated with generosity, forgiveness, and peaceful conflict resolution.  Cassie will be moving down to San Mateo in the fall to be a full-time drama teacher during the school day (lucky them).  But she will be back for some of our Play in a Day Camps.  (If you know anyone in San Mateo, let us know.  We are working to hook up an afterschool class down there.)

In Magic Messes (our art class), Martin Brecht dove right in with having each kid create their own story books.  They talked about how books contain both words and stories and each kid, even the ones who can’t yet write, were supported to add at least some words to their books.  And there were, of course, lots of pictures.  Cool ones.  Today, they started with pencil but, knowing Martin, I am sure there is lots of color in store for tomorrow.

I definitely want to celebrate Sara, our Junior Junior Youth Intern today.  Sara might win the award for most Glitter & Razz camps attended (if we had that award).  She is almost 9 and was most recently in our Go Girls! Theater Camp.  Her moms really needed a place for her to be this week before school starts next week and asked of if we could take her.  We are so glad that we said yes.  Sara has been one of the best helpers we have had.  She knows exactly what her role is this week as she plays with the kids and helps the teachers hand out materials.  At Kids Choice, she was even witnessed coaching a couple of Itty Bitties through a dispute.  One of the kids even called her “teacher.”  Very cool.

Sara and Martin in conference during Magic Messes class

In addition to our classes, we were very lucky to be able to use the playground of our good neighbor, Rockridge Little School.  The school is on a break so our after lunch Kids Choice will be outside all week!  Hooray!

Another favorite time of day is storytime with our Assistant Teaching Artist, Cinda.  Today’s story was the very popular, “The Patch.” By the way, if parents ever want to come in and read a story to us during this time, you are very welcome.  Sign-ups are at the sign in/out desk when you come in.

The day before our “big show” and these creative kids are pretty psyched. Yesterday, we had to focus on sharing. Today, it was all about how important it is to pay attention and follow directions as we prepare for the show. We talked about why practice is important (”So we’ll know what to do!” -Maera) and how, even though it’s fun, it’s also work.

Our question of the day: “What can you do to stay safe on an adventure” yielded some cool responses:

• “When you lose your suitcase or shoe you can go look in the lost and found.  If you don’t find it you can ask, ‘Have you seen a shoe or suitcase?” -Rachel
• “You can have a pillow in case you fall.” -Audrey
• “Ask an adult for help.” -Shoshana
• “Swim faster than the sharks.” -Ben
• “You should stop yourself from being slippery because you lose things when you are slippery.” – Zachary

We also had an interested thing happen at the very beginning of our day.  Each day, we begin with a moment of silence to calm our bodies and minds and set the tone for the day.  They usually LOVE it.  Today, however, a giggle fit started for the very first time.  This hasn’t happened yet this summer, actually, and I am not sure what started it.  But, once it started, it was very hard to stop.  We used it as an opportunity to discuss what it means to find our own inner silence and calm.  They really listened as I explained how important it is for all of us, no matter our age, to take responsibility for ourselves to find our calm, even when other silly things are going on around us.

I think they got it.  I really do.  I swear that everyone felt a little bit more self-reliant and grounded today.  Which is amazing since we had cupcakes at lunch…thanks Pippa for turning 5 today!

Here are some more highlights of our second-to-last day of camp…

Spring leads the kids as they Move & Groove. She is quite magical, using all kinds of music (jazz, classical, folk and world dance) and a myriad of activities. It's fun for the rest of the staff just to be in the room, let alone the kids who are participating.

They really loved when they were able to play a Follow The Leader dance game. Everyone got their turn and they were quite successful being followers as leadership moved around the circle.

The young artists made postcards in Magic Messes of their favorite places. It was also a lesson in the postal process.

Play rehearsal is always hard work. Knowing where to go and what to say and when to do it all is a challenge for all of us, especially Itty Bitties. But, it's all worth it when the get to bring their characters and stories to life in front of their families.

Clean up after Kids Choice. Clean up time is just as important as our classes at G&R. Everyone is supported to do their part to care for the camp.

More cleaner uppers.

After Kids Choice, we line up for the neighborhood walk. Fresh air is very welcomed after a full morning of art making inside.

The adventure continues…We have continued talking about Adventures.  Yesterday during our community circle time, we started our small group discussions (approx 6 kids together with a teacher) where we talk about the question of the day.  This is a great way for us to explore our theme and have a little practice sharing and listening in small groups.  At the end of each circle discussion, I ask the kids to look the other members of their group in the eye and say, “Thanks for talking to me.”

Yesterday, the question of the day was, “What do we learn from adventures?”  Here are some of the brilliant responses:

• ” We see cool animals and explore them.” -Shoshanna
• “Sometimes there are people who are going to be there that you don’t know.” -Rachel
• “We get a new backpack.” -Oliver
• “We learn that everybody has an adventure sometimes.” -Frances

We do everything in a circle at Glitter & Razz

Today, the question of the day is “What problems can go wrong on an adventure?”

• “A blizzard.  You could get lost, buried in the snow.” -Gus
• “If you got sick.  To sick.” -Jade
• “You get poked with a nail.” -Elias
• “You might run off and get lost.” -Sequari

Wednesday is always, what we call, our “problem day.”  It is the day that we discuss the function of problems and conflicts in a story.  It is also the day that tends to actually have the most conflicts.  Our theory is that, in a week long camp, it takes 2 days for the kids to feel comfortable enough with each other and the structure that, by the 3rd day, they are ready to test all of it.  Today, so far, so good.  This amazing staff is working very hard and is on top of everything.  The only thing we have encountered so far is an issue of sharing toys where we had to explain, “If you want to play with toys, then you have to share.  If you don’t feel like sharing, that’s okay, but that means you have to do something else like find your own quiet spot and read a book.”

For some more highlights of Tuesday and Wednesday, let’s let some pics tell the stories…

When kids finish their art projects in class, they can play with toys on the turtle mat.

...or, they can do a whole other art project...

Cassie introduced her "friend" Debbie to interview our characters in the play.

In Kids Choice, dress up is definitely the most popular activity. Connect 4 is a close second.

In Magic Messes, Martin leads young artists in "making waves" with pastels and paint.