Weaving their way to friendship

Through weaving, the artists in China have been exploring how chance can be an element in their artwork. By using recycled newspapers and colored papers, the weaving has helped give a hand in creating a story. The artists then wrote words on the artworks to enhance the meaning of the images made from the weaving process.

Everybody seemed to enjoy the art technique and made wonderful artworks!

The 13 year old artists at Shenzhen High School in Shenzhen, China are making and sharing with 7c, 13 year olds, from Helsingin yhteislyseo in Helsinki, Finland.

The friends in China and the UK are "Hand in Hand"

In this activity, the teacher first talked about the form of weaving. Then the teacher presented some pictures of weaving artworks, which made children understand it well. Next, teachers and children had a discussion on how to do weaving artworks. Children said there were two pieces of paper that were horizontal and vertical. They could be weaved with one press and one pick. The art teacher Miss Liu Chunjuan and her students demonstrated at the front of the classroom, and students worked in groups to make it out. Finally, the teacher encouraged the children to give a name of the book. Some students said, we want to express our friendship between the two schools, so he took the name of ‘ Hand in Hand’.

Best wishes,
Lisa

The artists in Grade 3 (9-10 years old) at Taizhou Pheonix Primary School in Jiangsu, China are making and sharing art with the artists in Class 4 (8-9 years old) at Sneinton C of E St Stephens Primary School in Nottingham, England Both groups are aged 8-9 years old.

"My friends are trading together"

What a day it was with The Explorers! When I told them that the idea today was to come up with a unanimous title for our collective book and to weave using recycled materials, everybody was so open minded to try new art techniques and to work together!  As always, I am deeply impressed with these young artists with how respectful and imaginative they are!

So how are ALL of us going to come up with one title when we ALL have such amazing ideas?  The Explorers came up with excellent suggestions such as, 1. to mix the ideas together, 2. we can vote, 3. we can take turns.  Being the kind and diplomatic group, The Explorers combined these methods and off we went with spouting out title ideas!

The top three titles were:
- Together my friend trading
- My friends are trading together
- Friends trading places

And the winner is, "My friends are trading together"!  This title really encapsulates Dear You art project and the process of exchange. Amazing how these 5 year old artists understand so clearly the heart of friendship, sharing, and creativity!

This was the first time The Explorers tried weaving and they all did a fantastic job as they took their time, asked for help when needed, and persevered when faced with a challenge.  Everybody could choose what they would like their base or loom to be.  They then played with colors, patterns, and happy coincidences that arose when weaving images together.

We hope our friends in China like our artwork!

With love,
Arlene & The Explorers

The Explorers, 5-6 year olds, from International School of Helsinki in Helsinki, Finland are making and sharing with the artists aged 6 years old at Shenzhen Primary School in Shenzhen, China.

"Banana Sonic Jellyfish Turkey"

Hey Tigers,

Please enjoy our covers. We greatly enjoyed weaving our old mural work into primary colored
foundations. We cut our first mural (the shadow one) into strips.

While we weaved we looked at woven baskets and pondered titles. In the end we all agreed to call the book, Banana Sonic Jellyfish Turkey.

Here is how we came to our title. Everyone who had a suggestion, suggested. Then we read off the suggested titles and collectively voted on our favorites. There was a three way tie for Banana, Sonic and Jellyfish. So we decided to have all three/ to make it fair, we rearranged these words in a variety of combinations.

Sonic Jellyfish Banana.
Jellyfish, Sonic, Banana.

Everyone, aside from three friends, thought Banana Sonic Jellyfish was the best title.

To accommodate, we asked our three friends what word they liked. One said, Turkey! (Because
we are celebrating Thanksgiving tomorrow), everyone got excited, so it was added to the end.

Everyone loved it, it was unanimous.

Here were our other choices:

We are grateful to have this art pal friendship and the opportunity to share our work with you,
Johnny Buckley and the Full Moons

Moonstone Full Moons, 4-5 year olds from Moonstone Preschool in Philadelphia, PA, USA, are making and sharing art with the Tigers, 4-5 year olds from Your School in Espoo, Finland.

"Our Nice Monkeys"

As usual, when I visit the Monkeys we start by reviewing what have made together so far to give context and understanding. This time, their memory continued to last year when we were making art with our friends in Mexico and United Arab Emirates! They recalled all the art projects we had made together. Amazed and heartfelt that they remembered all those details!

The November project, Weaving environments, is about putting the first two art projects received from our friends in Australia into a book. But what will the title of the book be? The first challenge of the day is to come up with a title together! So how will we do that? The Monkeys suggested we do rock paper scissors or listen to everybody.  We did a combination and took a vote! They thought this could be a fair way to proceed. 

SO many good ideas for the title to choose from! The possibilities were: 'Our Sweetheart', 'Our artwork', 'Our objects in the park', 'Our nice objects', 'Our nice Monkeys', 'Our nice friends in Australia', 'Our nice group', and 'Our nice toys'.

And the winner is...
Our nice Monkeys!!

Weaving was a new art technique for most of the Monkeys and they did a great job! They started to play with patterns and colors after they got the hang of the technique. Also, we talked about the symbolic aspect of weaving and the usage of recycled materials. I think our friends in Bulli can pick up a little on Finnish language from the papers we chose to weave.

Thank you and we hope you like our artwork!

My best,
Arlene and The Monkeys

The Monkeys from Your School in Espoo, Finland are making and sharing art with K1HT class from Bulli Public School in Bulli, Australia. All artists are 5-6 years old.

"Ladybugs"

When I got to Your School I was so happy to hear that another magical package from Moonstone Preschool in USA had arrived!! We opened it and pondered over the amazing questions the Full Moon artists posed to us.  In short, YES! We like Halloween too!!

For this next project, Weaving Environments, we thought about how the art technique can support the idea symbolically, but also practically.  Since the aim of this month's project was to  make a book cover, we first talked about the title of our story.  How do we unanimously decide on something when there are so many of us?  For example, when our friend wants to play a different game from you, how do we come to a peaceful conclusion?  The Tigers had so many lovely ideas such as take turns.  Seeing that we are such a big group, we thought to take a vote, which is something the Tigers do in the classroom too.

Here are the many different ideas that the Tigers came up for the title of their story. 

Everybody could have one vote. And the winner is Ladybugs!!

This was the first time the Tigers had a go at weaving. They all did an amazing job taking their time and making sure that they are going under and over when needed.  They got very good at seeing where things need to be corrected, which is a big part when one is weaving.  The artists could choose if they wanted to write the title 'Ladybugs' or draw ladybugs on the book cover.

I am so proud of them and they are of themselves, which is the most important part!!

We hope the Full Moons like our patterns, weavings, and book covers!

With love,
Arlene, The Tigers, Iveta, and Atefeh

The Tigers from Your School Espoo, Finland are making and sharing with the Full Moons from Moonstone Preschool in Philadelphia, USA. Both groups are 4-5 years old.

"This is us"

Year 4 have had another fantastic art project with Heather on Friday. The children started off by discussing the artistic journey they have been on so far and the relationship they are creating with the children in China. Lots of pupils suggested titles for their work which revolved around the idea of a team identity, and the title we have decided upon is 'This is us'. As a class, we felt this showed how all of our art work is a representation of our characteristics, personalities, likes, dislikes and artistic talent. 

After having chosen the project's title, we then had a fantastic session with Heather where the children created a book cover using weaving. We used all recycled material, and some children even used practice pages from previous Dear You art projects to incorporate within their weaving. I hope you will agree that the woven book covers they have produced are excellent! They have all used lots of different colours and types of papers. 

We are all looking forward to creating the next piece of artwork! 

Many thanks, 
Alice Wilby

What I noticed about this session was that the pupils really started to think for themselves and to make connections with the other projects they had done, they had really enjoyed receiving and looking at the work that their partner class had sent and integrated some of their ideas into their weaving, introducing hidden flaps for their title – so the dialogue becomes evident in the art works they are producing. The children said that they used the visual clues in the work that they received to imagine the questions they had asked when they couldn’t read the Chinese text, I wonder whether they would have done this had they not answered the same brief. I am also impressed with  how thoughtful the children are and concerned with how they can communicate their ideas to those in China.

Best wishes,
Heather Connelly
Dear You Workshop Leader

The artists in Class 4 (8-9 year olds) at Sneinton C of E St Stephens Primary School in Nottingham, England are making and sharing art with Grade 3 (9-10 year olds) at Taizhou Pheonix Primary School in Jiangsu, China.

“over” or “under”?!

Dear Monkeys and Arlene,

We really enjoyed doing this book cover activity but we did find it a little hard to remember whether to go “over” or “under”! It took some practice but we think we got there!

We did this project with a teacher intern who was with us for 3 weeks practising to be a teacher. She loves art and craft and is very artistic! Her name is Ms Harris.

She suggested that, in the little squares that were created between the woven strips, we should draw some little pictures about things that were important to us in our lives. 

We hope you like our book covers for you!

You'll be HEARING from us soon when we finish the next project!

Best wishes from us all in K/1HT. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

P.S. We’ll be answering all your wonderful questions soon! Keep an eye out for another letter from us!

The K1HT class from Bulli Public School in Bulli, Australia are making and sharing art with the Monkeys from Your School in Espoo, Finland. Both groups are 5-6 year old artists.