A Very Merry Caribbean Christmas!

Hello dear readers, Please do enjoy my Caribbean Christmas Holiday slide show ! these are all photos that I have taken in the last few months--including the ones of students and teachers and the art they have created and it is my pleasure to share them with you so you may see a glimpse into my life here. I am traveling to the US for a nice long visit this month, so will resume posting in January.

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A Multi-Cultural Celebration

At St. Luke's Primary School we had a wonderful Multi-Cultural Celebration to honor all the various nationalities we have attending and working at our school.

Parents, teachers, and students from the many nationalities attending the school created displays about their country of origin. We have about 17 nationalities at our school, and many of them had nice displays. Each class went around in a group to each display while the parents or students or teachers talked about their country of origin.  It was a really fun and educational day for all the students, parents, and visitors who attended.

I helped one of the parents--whose children have dual US/Dominican citizenship---with the US display. Most people cooked food from their country to go along with the display--I baked an apple pie  for the American display. I was really pleased to also hang up the Postcard Project and explain it to all the parents and visitors to our Celebration; the US map and US postcards got plenty of great attention from everyone. The Dominica Public Library: Roseau also brought books by American Authors courtesy of their "American Corner" which is maintained by the U.S. Embassy on Barbados. At the end we (the presenters & teachers) all shared the great food from all the countries.

Here are few highlights from the event...

The US display : the students & parents from the US made informative displays about US Holidays, Native Americans and the Statue of Liberty.

I drew this turkey for the US display, and talked about our Thanksgiving Holiday.....

I baked an apple pie with imported apples...

Students looking at the US display....

Some students enjoying the Postcard Project. Awhile ago I started this project : I asked my FaceBook Friends and family, and e-mailed friends and asked them to send me postcards from their town in the US which reflected something about where they lived. I promised that if they included their address on the card, I would send them a postcard from Dominica made by my art students. I received quite a few postcards--and they are  still arriving! I then made a display in my art classroom with a big US map----with lines to the town or city where the postcards are from---and I placed the postcards in pockets on the wall so the students can take them out and read them.

Island of Gaudeloupe display.

 

Island of Gaudeloupe display.

Canadian display.

Island of St. Lucia display.

Island of Jamaica display

Painting from Jamaica.

Island of Antigua display.

Island of Barbados display.

Swiss display.

Venezuelan display.

English display.

English display.

 

Island of Dominica display.

Island of Dominica display.

French display.

Netherlands display.

Belgium display.

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Birds and Fish

At St. Luke's Primary School the past few weeks--in grades kinder through 3,  I have been doing some guided drawings. First,  I led the 1st graders through a guided drawing of simple birds, then I just let them paint them with the liquid watercolors. I only cautioned them to wash out their brush before changing to a new color. We drew the birds with black oil pastels so the outlines resist the water colors. They did great !

I always love how each drawing/painting is so different!

 And with the 3rd graders I did the same with tropical fish--we used an oil pastel resist, then painted blue watercolors over the guided drawings. The oil pastel resist makes the fish pop out--the kids just love that! Again each fish is so different...

This little guy reminded me of "Finding Nemo"....

And here is where the magic all happens...the entrance to my art classroom!

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Crafts at CAMP GLOW

The Peace Corps and the Dominican Love One Teach One Foundation sponsored a Camp G.L.O.W. (Girls Leading Our World) on Dominica last week. Peace Corps volunteers worldwide lead GLOW Camps to help young women become better leaders, and to create stronger communities. The first GLOW Camp was established by Peace Corps volunteers in Romania in 1995, when three volunteers and four Romanian teachers took 80 young women to a mountain campsite for a weeklong leadership camp to help the young women improve their self-esteem and develop life skills. Since 1995, Peace Corps volunteers in more than 60 countries have established similar programs to promote the empowerment of women. You may read more about these worldwide Peace Corps camps for girls here.

This is the second year Peace Corps volunteers and our local counterparts have held Camp Glow on Dominica. 22 girls, ages 12-15 from all over the island participated in camp sessions on topics such as: self esteem, conflict resolution, diversity, sexual health, and HIV and Aids prevention, etc. Mixed in were fun sessions with riddles, games, and of course arts and crafts. I taught the craft sessions and we sure had fun!

On the first day I taught the girls how to create a journal ---so they had a nice booklet to write and draw in for the whole week.

Here I am showing the girls how to sew the booklet together using a needle and embroidery floss.

after they sewed their journals together then they decorated the journal's cover...

I love how each journal is unique.....and we did some more art in the journals with foam stamps later in the week. The girls also used their journals to take notes from the sessions, and write their own ideas down.  The first day I asked then to write 5 things nobody else knew about them in their journal.....

The big hit of all the crafts I shared with the girls during the 5 days of camp was making friendship bracelets with colorful embroidery floss. The girls caught on quickly to the simple knotting technique we used and one evening I counted about 16 (out of  22) girls busy making the bracelets during their "free up" time.

she asked for colors to make a "rainbow" bracelet....

soon I noticed the girls had branched out and were making rings, and connecting the rings to their bracelets!

Near the end of camp we all tie dyed t-shirts to take home and to wear on our camp graduation day....

Peace Corps volunteer Abby and the girls from her village of Calibishie model their tie dyed shirts....we all wore our colorful tie dyed shirts to our graduation celebration.

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