Imagine six months of planning and a stream of emails getting more & more excited as the day approaches. Imagine walking into the back door of a gymnasium -- having traversed around the playground outside. Imagine opening the door and seeing this incredible, one-of-a-kind labor of love. To say I was breathless, to say I was speechless, to say I was over-come, to say I was impressed, to say that I was in tears -- would at least get you into the right hemisphere of my response.
What you see here is a community quilt created by over 300 PreK & Kindergarten students under the direction of Melissa-the-Art-Teacher as coordinated by Tina the library-teacher/early literacy specialist as authorized by Mrs. Collins the principal. Those of you who have followed my travels for any length of time know that I am often met with "love" on my visits, yet this day was superlative in every possible facet of it's expression.
What you're witnessing is passion-in-action. A committed team approach to literacy. My own work was the focus of Tina's library study for the entire month of November with all her classes of children. Each week they 'worked' on and became familiar with another one of my books and or songs. Wow!!!
To see the culmination in this community project set my pulse racing at a gazillion miles an hour, before I met the first child. WOW!!!!
Melissa explained that each child was allowed to select their own 3 squares in the colors of their choice to anchor & construct their individual & unique quilt square. It is obvious that she supplied oodles of foamie 'shape pieces' and there was obviously sufficient glue available to affix the foamies in a collage arrangement. The individual quilt squares were then applied to the classroom's backdrop of butcher-paper-on-the-roll with some simple tape.
Did you follow that? Are you impressed?? Overwhelmed??
These squares were created by our miniature Picasso-Nevelson artists in response to the quilts that I created for the illustrations in my first picture book, "You're Wonderful." Let me just go on record and say: "Northeast School, students, staff and administrators -- I think YOU'RE WONDERFUL!!!" Thank you one and all for this amazing wall of color, of creativity, of energy, of enthusiasm -- of JOY. What a well spring of ideas for others to inspire others.
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