Stirring the imagination!

Artworks from the artists at Кепская школа им. Ортье Степанова (Kepa School) in Karelia, Russia

We received wonderful works from Russia and many of the class in SVK were inspired by them. This time we did the environment and the means of transportation. Children made their means of transportation and the environment. The work from Russia ( underground mine and diamonds) stirred kids imagination. Many did the imaginative diamond world as their destination.

The artists from 2B at Suomalais-venäläinen koulu are making and sharing art with the artists from Кепа школу (Kepa School) in Karelia, Russia.

Artworks from Suomalais-venäläinen koulu

Hip Hip Hooray!

Hooray! We got a school in India and we sent our 2 projects today, we look forward to see our friends’ work in India.

Children were surprised to see the Pop-up cards and when we introduced them that they will make their own places for their puppets which they did before, they immediately start to think and ask questions about it. Some of the children wanted to choose 1 or 2 different house(s) and did their own decoration for the place. Some of them remembered that they made an animal as an imaginary friend so they preferred to do designed it by drawing the animal houses and the details.

We enjoyed making pop-up places for our imaginary friends and we hope you’ll like them as much as we do!

We wish you a “Happy New Year”.

Warm regards,
Dynamic Dinosaurs.

he 4-5 year old Dynamic Dinosaur artists from Açı Preschool in Istanbul, Turkey are making and sharing art with the young artists from Praxis Foundation in Mysore, India.

Super Imaginary Me Puppets from the Smart Squirrels !

We are very excited to join in DearYou Project as the teachers, so do children :). 

When the teachers introduced the Project from the website of “DearYou” Project, they got excited and wanted to start quickly. They were happy to create their imaginary friend and talk about the features and the abilities they have. They used art materials and their own drawing to finish their work.

We hope you’ll like the products as much as we do.

Warm regards,
Smart Squirrels

To see more of The Smart Squirrels Imagine Me puppets, please click here.

The Smart Squirrels are a group of 4 year olds from Açı Preschool in Istanbul, Turkey. They are making and sharing art with the 4 year olds from Kita Felix and Friends in Berlin, Germany.

"IMAGINE ME" India and Finland are friends!

 "Imagine a friend, a counterpart to you in far away Finland, Imagine the looks of this friend, the things that she/he likes, where she/he studies, with whom she/he lives, where she/he studies, how she/he spends free time and so on and so forth. Now we need to recreate this FRIEND in the materials provided."

Initially there were questions as to how big the creation should be and depending on the materials we decided to make masks of the FINLAND Friends and improvise on them at a later point in time.    

Project Implementation: Each student paired up with one teacher for assistance and worked on the masks. The discussions during the process of making the masks were quite interesting and revealing the thought processes of children involved. There were a lot of questions about Finland itself, how far it was, how big it was, and was it a cold country? And how tall were people etc, etc,.  As a response to the queries, one teacher browsed the net for information on Finland andshared it with students. Students started to relate the conditions to their own context here and started the project on that note. 

To read the full report on the workshop and to see pictures of the amazing artworks, please click here.

Leena Pascal and her talented group of artists and teachers at Praxis Foundation in Mysore, India are making and sharing art with Eliisa Sorvali and her artists at Annantalo in Helsinki, Finland.

Imagining our friends

I asked to try to imagine a friend. Imaginative friend could be a person or an animal. The materials for the workshop were old magazines, paper, crayons and glue. Since my son is in the same group, almost all kids new me already so they were not shy and asked me many questions. Some kids needed more guidance than others. After everyone was done with their work I placed all the imaginative friend images on the floor and invited all the kids to come and see their work together. I told them that these images will be sent to another group which, by the way, has the same name: Siilit.

All best,
Kristina Laine

Kristina Laine and her 4-5 year old artists at Kalinka Päiväkoti in Helsinki, Finland are making and sharing art with Evelyn Müürsepp and her 4-5 year old artists in Mooste Preschool in Mooste, Estonia.

K1 and their adventurous imaginary friends!

What fun K1 had making our Imagine Me puppets for our new friends in Vietnam!  We first looked at the map of the globe and came up with all different ways of how one could travel from Finland to Vietnam. Aashrit was so thoughtful and said we could spend one night in his home in India. India is a bit of a detour from Finland, but we can make it happen!

We then thought about what kind of companion we would like to go on our adventure with. This friend would then be developed into our Imagine Me puppet. From the looks of these artworks, K1 is a creative bunch who are ready an exciting journey! As you can see, collaging came quite naturally for them too.

J made a Micky Mouse bumblebee. 
KS likes to surprise his puppet by saying, "boo!". His friend likes to jump and drive a car.
A said, "this is my happy face!".
S's friend can read everything and do what people can't do like twist his legs, take his hair off and put it back on. Oh, and he has sharp teeth.
Dsri gave hers a purple dress.
W named his friend Mark. Mark likes to read ten-ten books, has a beard, glasses, hands, feet, and is good at running.
F's new friend, Sarah, is happy! She likes running around, jumping, skipping, and puzzles.
AA's friend is named Nosey. Nosey is good at connecting the phones and also playing with legos and cooking.
N's bumblebee transformer can transform fast cars and motorcycles!
M's is called No Name.
K's imaginary friend is a boy.
D created a baby.
R's has a happy face and her name is Happy.
AN's is called Baby Andreas and he likes playing with toys.

We can't wait to meet our new friends from Vietnam!

With love,
K1 artists, Arlene, & Lydia

K1, 4 year old artists from International School of Helsinki in Finland are making and exchanging art with the Tigers, a group of 4 year olds from Just Kids School in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Crazy Good Friends from Vienna coming your way!

The children had lot of fun with creating a good friend and they made really funny pictures!

A good friend should be lovely and funny. They want to do crazy things with a best friend. And it is very important to play with each other.  As you can see on the pictures, friends also have animals.

Hope, you are fine and wish you the best,
Simone Zobl and her group of super creative 2nd graders

The 7-8 year old artists from  Evangelischen Volksschule am Karlsplatz in Vienna, Austria are making and exchanging art with the 8 years from Mooste Põhikool in Mooste, Estonia!

The Tigers are great artists and friends!

The Tigers have taken the Imagine Me project to a new level!  They were mixing reality and imaginary worlds together making a giant playground for all of us to be together in.

It was great talking with them about their puppets!

K's puppet is Amos.  Amos is a good friend because "he helps me when I am resting."
Ai's puppet is Veeti who "likes to play Viking and Her Factory with."
P's puppet is named Kasper.  "He likes to go on the boat and like trash trucks!"
V says her puppet Akseli likes to fly, play, and cars.
C's puppet is called Mommy <3.

These playful bunch of Imagine Me puppets are in the air to our new friends at Just Kids school in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Thanks for the great afternoon!

Xarlene

The Monkeys have made great travel companions for their friends at Moonstone Preschool

Ask the Monkeys for some travel advice and they will offer every kind of possibility! From buses to trains to rockets. This all came about when we were figuring out how our Imagine Me puppets are going to reach our new friends at Moonstone Preschool in Philadelphia, USA. Finland is quite a ways from there, but we are up for an adventure!

As we were creating our puppets we thought about what makes a good friend and here are some things the Monkeys said about their imaginative artworks. Meet Seek. Seek is a good friend because "he helps me when I need help," says J. N's puppet's name is Elsa. "She's a good friend because she's nice to me." I's Stella is "fun and playing with everybody. Listening to the teacher and doing everything herself." E called her friend Rosey. "Rosey is nice. She helps me get the way out." A's puppet Super Savior "saves me when I'm in danger!" M's puppet is a boat named Oh No. When I asked M why Oh No is a good friend, she said, "She makes me laugh." I think that's one of the most important characteristics a friend should have too!

Thanks for the lovely afternoon, Monkeys!

With love,
Arlene

The Monkeys (6 years old) from Your School in Espoo, Finland are making and sharing art with the Full Moons (5 years old) from Moonstone Preschool in Philadelphia, USA. 

Who wouldn't wanted to be art pals with the artists in Canada?!!

Kaarina Losey, the 6th grade teacher at Pioneer Park P.S. in Ontario, Canada shares with us how they approached 'Imagine Me' project. 

"I had talked briefly a day or two ahead of time, that we would be "art pals" with another class about the same age as us in Finland.  They were encouraged to bring in any materials that they wanted to use specifically. 

The morning of we talked a bit about imaginary friends, kind of following the outline in the project and I had this at the beginning of a short Google Slide show I had created a showing images of different styles and forms of puppet making (bags, sticks, tubes, etc.)."

The slideshow Kaarina created is quite impressive and an art piece in itself! Please have a look by clicking here.  Thank you, Kaarina!  I know that the 5th graders from The English School in Helsinki, Finland are very excited to meet their new friends!!

I want to be friends with the Puppies from Vietnam and their puppets!

I introduced the project to my students using a map and a world globe. I spent some time explaining to them about their country, Vietnam and my country, Australia. 

I told them that I have some new friends, who are the same age as them and they live in a country called Finland. I told them the name of the class and the name of their school. 

I told them that we are going to make a piece of art and then we are going to put it on an airplane to go to our friends in Finland and then we will also get some art from our friends in Finland! They were so excited!

Our first project was about imaginary friends. We discussed things that are real and things that are not real, that are in our heads. They are from our imagination. We spent some time describing our imaginary friends. Are they tall or short, big or small, do they have wings or maybe they can run very fast. 

I showed them a puppet that I had made. And explained to them that we can make a puppet that is like the friends we can imagine! 

I gave them a small paper bag each and a bunch of other paper and materials to create their puppets. And I left them to it! 

I set up the camera and my laptop and I also involved them in the photo taking process. They loved it. A few of them made friends from their imaginations, others made characters that they love. We even have a minion, and an Incredible Hulk! 

In the next few months we will be learning about our town. So I will take that opportunity to teach them about the post office when we send our artworks. 

The children are so excited to receive their puppets from Finland! 

We also look forward to our second project!!

Thanks a lot. 

Love from Vietnam, 
Steph, the puppies and the tiger cubs.

Below are pictures of the Puppies's Imagine Me puppet! 

The 4 year old Puppies from Just Kids in Hanoi, Vietnam are making and sharing art with the artist Tigers at Your School in Espoo, Finland.  The 4 year old Tigers at Just Kids is starting a new friendship with the K1 artists at International School of Helsinki in Helsinki, Finland. Exciting!! 

Below are pictures of the Tiger's Imagine Me puppet! 

The creative buzz at Viertolan koulu

When the students from Maija's class at Viertolan koulu started to draw their ideas of"imaginary friends"  all of them were really quiet and concentrated! Ooh that silence meant creativity was busy! The students were thinking of their friends in Denmark and of how they will react when they get Finnish imaginary friends in the mail!

During the artistic process the students noticed that their idea was developing and changing while they were starting to build their puppets. "Game man" got hair to puppet and one of the puppets even turned out to be a mask and a puppet!

Eliisa

The 3rd Grade artists from Viertolan Koulu in, Vantaa, Finland are making and sharing art with the 3rd Grade artists from Korsholm Skole  in Hinnerup, Denmark.

Excitement is in the air!

I introduced the project to my students by showing them the Dear You website. My students were very excited and became even more excited when I told them exactly what their 1st project were.

One of my students said: "Wauw are we really going to mail it to another class, and will they mail to us as well?"

They were so motivated and couldn't wait to get started. I told them what kind of materials they could use and before I could look around my students were already creating their own little imaginary friend. Each and everyone with a unique expression. 

As a teacher it was so nice to watch my students "grow" during the process, and it was even more wonderful to watch them write what kind of superpowers their imaginary friends have.

Right now we are all waiting to receive mail from our new friends in Finland.

My Best,
Tatjana Knudsen

The 3rd Grade artists from Korsholm Skole in Hinnerup, Denmark are making and sharing art with the 3rd Grade artists from Viertolan Koulu in Vantaa, Finland.

Imagination gone wild and furry!

The 'Imagine Me' puppets that came from the 4th Grade students at Amy Parks Heath Elementary School were extraordinarily furry, friendly, and funny! Yes! Seeing them immediately put a smile on my face.

Kathleen Finan, the artists' art teacher, said, "I was given a box of faux fur and knew the kids would love it. We talked about having imaginary friend when we were young and the ways the helped us. Students chose materials from an assortment of goodies and started creating their imaginary friend. They named their  I-friend and wrote on the back how their I-friend helped them."

I am sure their friends in Viertolan Koulu in Vantaa, Finland will be amazed by their new friend's creativity! Oh the amazing things that come out of Texas :).

Imagine Me Puppets from Vantaa, Finland are on their way to Heath, Texas!

Today went really well!  We had so much fun and they all loved it!  We looked at the map to see where Texas is and had such a good time that we lost track of time.

The kids were making sketches in their notebooks and were so happy with their drawings, that we ended up photocopying them from the notebooks and then cutting them out from the photocopy, and then adding glitter and buttons.

The teacher, Riitta-Liisa at Viertolan Koulu is just amazing!

Anastasia Artemeva xx

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Anastasia Artemeva is the Dear You Workshop Leader for the 4th grade class at Viertolan Koulu in Vantaa, Finland.  This group of Finnish artists will be making and sharing art with Kathleen Finan's 4th graders at Heath Amy Parks Heath Elementary School in Heath, Texas.