Blog

Art Classes at OI Lead to Summer of Fun

Children Explore Aboriginal Dot Painting, Paper Quilling, Navajo Weaving and More in Art Classes at OI

Andy is sitting across the table from me, and I have to give him credit: he’s the only kid in this class whose mother is beside him. In another two years he’ll probably be mortified to be seen in public with me, but for now, at this wonderful age of nine, he enjoys my company. I’m here with him to observe his participation in one of the many art classes offered at Oglebay Institute’s Stifel Fine Arts Center.

Arts & Crafts Around the World, taught by Jes Reger, meets on Monday evenings for six weeks during the spring session of art classes. I’ve recently noticed that Andy has an affinity for art, so I’ve signed him up for a class that will allow him to explore a variety of techniques. Sometimes he likes to draw; other times he prefers painting. This class, in particular, gives him the opportunity to create unusual art from different cultures, pieces that he might not otherwise be exposed to.Oglebay Institute art classes for kids.

Miss Jes starts the first week with aboriginal dot painting, but it’s the second week when Andy really finds his stride. They’re paper quilling, an art form that originated with monks and nuns during the Renaissance. The kids use rolled strips of paper to create designs, and the technique requires a bit of manual dexterity. Andy spends the class creating an underwater scene, paying special attention to his crab and jellyfish. Other children create trees, flowers, and animals. In the coming weeks, Miss Jes will introduce her students to Navajo weaving, Mexican repujado metal art, and Japanese sumi-e ink wash painting.

After the first few sessions, my son asks me if he can continue to take these kinds of art classes. We’ve always enjoyed tumbling at Oglebay Institute’s School of Dance, and now that he has grown into a human with the ability to sit still for more than thirty seconds at a time, I’m excited to let him explore the art classes and other offerings at Oglebay Institute.Oglebay Institute art classes for kids.

Fortunately, Andy won’t have to wait until the fall session to continue. With the arrival of summer comes OI’s summer day camp program. Camps are offered not only in art but also in nature, theater, music, and dance, and these categories should cover just about anything your child might be interested in. I remember taking an art camp every summer at Stifel a generation ago. Today’s kids still have the chance to attend the Art Sampler camp, or Yay Clay!, both of which offer children a chance to explore things like painting, printmaking, drawing, and sculpture. But if your kids are anything like mine, they’ve also got more contemporary interests.

I’m talking about Minecraft. You’ve been listening to your rugrats chatter about it nonstop for quite a while, right? They’re completely obsessed. Thankfully OI offers a Minecraft camp where they can connect with other children who are equally obsessed. Similarly, young ones will find camps like Monster High, Hogwarts, Pokémon, Legos, and Dr. Who. This isn’t their mother’s traditional art camp any longer.

Young performing artists will enjoy camps at Oglebay Institute’s Towngate Theatre like Tim Thompson’s Improvisation and Acting Camps. Walt Warren offers Musical Theater Camp and Children’s Chorus Camp. All of the performing arts camps conclude with a performance: a play, or a musical, or a fable. Dance camps cover everything from classic pointe to hip hop to acrobatics. I’m particularly intrigued by the Wizard of Oz Musical Camp led by Cheryl Pompeo and Kim Kafana.In addition to art classes and camps, OI offers topics in theater, dance, music and nature.

OI’s Schrader Environmental Education Center offers a nature camp series. Kindergarteners can participate in Superhero Science or Finding Nemo, among others; older children can go Crazy for Cicadas during this 17th year of the famous insects’ life cycle, or celebrate the world of Tom Sawyer’s imagination. OI offers camps for every age, from preschoolers to high schoolers.

We look forward to the arrival of the Oglebay Institute camp brochure each spring. In fact, my boys are so determined to attend area camps every week of the summer that I have to create a spreadsheet to keep track of it all. My younger son, Benjamin, jumps at the chance to attend Miss Jes’s Star Wars camp while Andy leans toward a week of pottery work. As of the writing of this blog, they still cannot decide which nature camps to attend. In fact, on the day when his brother was born, Andy spent the morning happily sifting through owl pellets at the Schrader Center. We have a long tradition of camp attendance.In addition to art classes and camps, OI offers topics in theater, dance, music and nature.

But here in Miss Jes’s art class, Andy is still focused on his paper quilling. By the second class, the students have become friends. They encourage each other and offer suggestions and enthusiasm. “We love your crab,” his new friends tell Andy. He beams.

“I’ll definitely be back,” he tells Miss Jes. “What else are you teaching?”

(Author, Laura Jackson Roberts)

 

Youth Acting Classes Inspire Imaginations

Kids Gain Self-Confidence, Explore Creativity and Discover Unique Talents in Youth Acting Classes at Towngate Theatre.

By Laura Jackson Roberts

On the average Saturday morning, you’re probably drinking your coffee, reading the paper or planning your day’s yardwork. It’s what we do on weekends–we unwind. But if you’re one of the third-through-fifth graders in Tim Thompson’s youth acting classes, you’re doing anything but relaxing.

The performing arts are foreign to me. I usually prefer the invisibility of the pen, which is why I was so impressed by the kids who have chosen to dive into this world of drama. Thompson has been teaching Saturday youth acting classes since he began working at Oglebay Institute’s Towngate Theater 12 years ago; he says it was the first thing he did when he was hired and has always had a good response. Many of the children who take classes with him continue to do so as they grow, going on to participate in Towngate Theatre productions like the annual Christmas play. In addition, Oglebay Institute’s Summer Performance Arts Camps are very popular and tend to sell out quickly. This summer at Oglebay Institute, children will participate in Musical Theater Camp, Acting Camp, Improv Camp, and Children’s Chorus Camp. At the end of each week, campers put on a production such as a fairy tale, a musical review, or a play.Towngate Youth Acting Classes

Thompson teaches youth acting classes at many local schools, and both of my boys rave about what they learn. (Ben once came home from school, threw himself face-down on the ground and excitedly told me that Mr. Tim taught him how to be an alligator.) This Saturday group of older kids mostly got to know him through his visits at their schools, and he says that once they take an acting or improv class, they tend to continue.

While we talk and wait for his students to arrive, we watch a group of K-2 kids in a Theatrical Play class led by Karissa Martin. At first, it looks like organized chaos, but upon closer inspection I can see that these little ones have chosen costumes and props, and what appears to be rowdiness is instead a series of scenes they’ve imagined, and they put their who hearts into it. Thompson tells me, “It’s a real freedom. It’s teacher-led play based on a fairy tale.” The children don’t realize that, as they create these scenarios and act them out, they’re exploring their natural creativity and discovering their unique talents, skills they will hopefully develop and enjoy as they age.

Towngate Youth Acting ClassesUp in the theater, Thompson and Walt Warren assemble the class. Warren has a background in music as well as theater and will be teaching the Children’s Chorus Camp this summer. They gather the kids to warm up their bodies and their voices. They practice working together to move a hula-hoop around the circle, and they do mirroring exercises. For the past several weeks, Thompson and the kids have been working on improvisation. He prefers improv for the first half of the six-week session because it encourages creativity and freedom.

When I ask him if kids come by improvisation more naturally than adults, he thinks about it for a moment and then says, “I think kids especially are natural creators, if you don’t negate them. That’s why I do a lot of the stuff early on with improv. Everything’s okay. Whatever hat you choose, whatever name your character has, wherever they’re from, that’s okay. It’s their creation.” These abilities seem to be within all children. Thompson usually only has to work with them on the fundamentals of performance such as enunciation, slowing down, and volume. They key, he reminds me, is to always be positive, and never to limit or restrict their imaginations.

The American Alliance for Theater and Education reports that students involved in the performing arts outscore non-arts students on the SAT. Drama activities improve reading comprehension and communication skills as well as school attendance. Children with learning disabilities, too, have demonstrated increased success with the addition of drama to their curriculum. And while not every child will take to acting—Thompson says that sometimes kids take his classes and find out that performance isn’t for them—the experience will still encourage self-confidence and cooperative group dynamics.Intelligence Having Fun

Today the kids are rehearsing their production of Charlie Brown. Although none of them are old enough to have seen many Peanuts cartoons, they seem to nail their characters’ famous attributes. Thompson steps in as they rehearse and helps them to think about their scenes and their reactions. I laugh hysterically at some of their performances. Also, several parents and grandparents are sitting in the audience watching, too, and this really adds an important element to the rehearsal: it helps the young actors to feel the presence of an audience.

We lose our imaginations as we grow. Sometimes when my youngest son asks me to play superheroes, I feel sad because the inherent joy he finds in his fantasy escapes me. No matter how hard I try to be The Joker to his Batman, I still feel exactly like a 36-year-old woman with lipstick smeared on her face and dinner to prepare. And I wonder when, exactly, my ability to pretend withered away. When I was 10, I had it; by age 18, it was gone. I’d give anything to get it back.

But performing artists keep this creative spark, and teachers like Tim Thompson and Walt Warren spend their Saturdays encouraging our children to do the same. I think my boys will really enjoy youth acting classes. Perhaps there will be room for me.