A sensory experience

For the past eight weeks, children at the Discovery Developmental Center in Kalispell have painted music, danced like color dropped in water and manipulated materials with artist-in-residence Lindsay Martin.

It was the first time the center has had an artist-in-residence funded through the Little-Kittinger Foundation.

To Martin, art is a process, a sensory experience filled with observations and experimentation in early childhood. The process doesn’t always result in a final product, said Martin, who is an art therapist and also teaches at Flathead Valley Community College.

“Children need lots and lots of time to scribble and make messes and experience the sensory piece of the material,” Martin said. “How does it feel? What does it remind you of? You’re developing a mindset of curiosity.”

Whether it’s cornstarch or oil pastels, there isn’t a right or wrong way to use them.

“If they’re pressing really hard and it [an oil pastel] breaks and smooshes — ‘oh isn’t that interesting? Hmm, why did that happen? How could that be different?’ So there’s no wrong way to do it,” she said. “When you present it in that way they’re not so afraid to make mistakes.”

This freedom to explore and experiment early on sets a foundation and a comfort level with being creative and curious in all areas of life according to Martin.

“So if we could give kids this opportunity to just experience it, explore it, have fun, be curious, then that will follow them through their life,” she said.

During the first week of her residency, Martin dropped a concentrated solution of dyes into large vases of water for students to observe.

“We observed what happens when colors are mixed together,” Martin said. “Artists are always looking at the world around them. What does it remind you of, ‘oh the curling smoke of birthday candles.’”

Music is typically incorporated during Martin’s lessons for a different sensory experience.

“I had them pretend their bodies were the drop of color and I had them move in the same way that they remembered the color moving in the water,” she said.

In another lesson, children watched a video of a cellist as light was projected onto the instrument, changing colors and line patterns.

“That day I played music and the whole time I asked them to be drawing and painting what the music felt like,” Martin said.

Wednesday marked the final day of her residency. Martin sat at a table setting up the day’s lesson. Above her and around her long sheets of paper covered in colorful designs students had created with Martin hung from the ceiling and walls.

For Wednesday’s lesson students were making felted rocks. Martin decided to switch up her process-oriented lessons so students could make something to take home.

Groups of 3- to 5-years-olds arrived and were handed swatches of wool.

“It’s so soft,” 3-year-old Hap Pemble said, stroking it against his cheek

Martin then passed around a basket of smooth rocks. After rolling the rocks in wool and wrapping them in muted blue and gray yarn, the children were asked to paint the covered rocks in soap then dip them into bowls of warm and cold water.

“Notice how it feels on the hand,” Martin said.

Four-year-old Cora Rauscher carefully dipped her rock into the warm water giving it tight squeezes, the soap sudsing and the wool flattening, adhering to the rock.

“There’s a lot of opposites today,” Martin said. “Warm water and cold, dry and wet.”

Slipping the rocks into pantyhose the children roll them around in towels that were padded underneath with bubble wrap.

As the final touch each student painted the felt with liquid watercolor in red, yellow and blue. Some students dabbed it on in sections, while others used painterly strokes and layered colors.

Holding the rocks, students gathered a final time in a circle around Martin.

“I believe really strongly that when you plant these seeds early in life that’s like providing fertile ground for our future innovators,” Martin said. “Art is as equally important as literacy. Kids need time to just explore because it’s hard to know what children are taking in what they’re learning.”

Discovery Developmental Center Director Collette Box said the center is looking into having an artist-in-resident this summer. The ultimate goal would be to fund something on a permanent basis to devote more time each day to art.

“They’re doing art all the time, but this is a little bit more directed. They’re getting to use different materials than they used before,” Box said. “It’s a special art experience they’re really getting into it.”

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.