Talon Marks Online Arts

Inside the Child Developement Center, children get to explore a huge array of paints, chalks, crayons, construction paper, glue, beads, seeds and just about anything imaginable that kids could use to create art.

“I’ve got the best job on campus,” Debra Gonzalez, atelierista for the Child Development Center said, “I get to play most of my day and watch these children learn and grow. It looks like all fun and that’s what we want it to feel like for the children. It’s actually well planned out.”

Each child is given brushes, paper and a collection of paints with the challenge of mixing the right colors to make gold.

“Children explore with all five senses,” Gonzalez explained. “They smell, touch, even taste the paint. But it’s so much more than that. Here, we’re helping their cognitive skills thinking, making decisions and solving problems.

“It looks like play but it is how they learn not just about painting. They learn to socialize, share, compromise, take turns, and communicate with each other,” Gonzalez continued.

“We’re here to guide them but they teach themselves a lot.”

The CDC also uses art as a foundation of language and communications skills.

Children draw events, feelings and abstract subjects, discuss their works with the staff and provide insights to their development.

During a tour of the facility, Gonzalez pointed to a very busy orange, yellow and red painting which included a self portrait of the boy who painted it standing next to a dragon.

“We had a great talk,” she explained about her talk with the boy. “It turns out the dragon is the boy’s imaginary friend.”

The teachers use their observations to track the children’s development in many areas.

A challenge that the children are left with is to discovered that yellow and red is not golden and purple and brown does not make golden.

One of the children, Yanine Kotb, shouts, “I made golden!”

Everyones eyes turn to see the swirled pool of gold colored paint on Yanine’s paper. “How did you do it?” Gonzalez asked.

The children listen as Yanine shows them the orange and brown mix. Gonzalez paints notes on construction paper for the class as they get busy with their mixtures.

Taking the opportunity to mix victory celebration with hand-eye coordination and fine motor skills development, Gonzalez suggested the children write their names in golden paint.

They went straight to task carefully guiding their gold dipped paint brushes across the papers to sign their works.