SAD 1 Pre-K students
create aquatic masterpieces
Staff photo/Scott Mitchell Johnson
LOCAL ARTIST Heather Harvell taught four different watercolor techniques to 64 SAD 1 pre-K students last Wednesday as the children created aquatic masterpieces. Here, Harvell watches student Ben Willey use the straw-blowing technique. Harvell will be coming back in the spring to do another project with the children using a different medium.
By Scott Mitchell Johnson
PRESQUE ISLE — Sixty-four SAD 1 pre-K students pictured themselves under the sea last Wednesday and — through the help of local artist Heather Harvell — created their own masterpieces.
PRE-K PICASSOS — Cassidy Carlisle and Alex Boyd,
pre-kindergartners at the SAD 1 Skyway Education Center, employ the straw-blowing technique to their watercolor creations. Heather Harvell served as an artist-in-residence last Wednesday and taught the children aquatic life through watercolor techniques. She said the straw blowing helps get children’s imagination going and also works with fine motor skills like mouth movement.“I taught aquatic life through watercolor techniques,” said Harvell. “I showed the children four different techniques for watercolor that they can use — wax resist, wash, salt and straw blowing.
“With the wax resist, for example, the children used a white crayon and drew a picture and then they used the watercolors to wash over it,” she said. “Since wax resists water, the picture they drew with the crayon really stands out. It’s my magic art trick; it works well with 4-year-olds.
“Adding salt makes a really neat texture; it makes it look like bubbles which is great for doing an underwater unit,” said Harvell. “The straw blowing technique is something I learned when I was teaching at Spurwink in Portland with kids who didn’t always have great fine motor skills. The straw blowing technique helps get their imagination going. When you blow the watercolor around it’s a little bit easier than using your hands sometimes, and it also works with fine motor skills like mouth movement.”
Staff photo/Scott Mitchell Johnson
DYLAN WILCOX and Kaelyn Post 
were among the 64 SAD 1 pre-K students who learned hands-on watercolor techniques — wax resist, wash, salt and straw blowing — from local artist Heather Harvell last week. Here, the children begin to wash, or cover, their paper with the watercolors.
Harvell spent one hour each with both Amy Daniels’ and Enola Boyce’s morning and afternoon classes.
“I’ll be working with 64 preschoolers over four hours,” said Harvell. “They originally wanted to do 32 at a time and do a bigger block, but I asked to do a smaller, more intimate group. An hour is a good attention span for a 4-year-old.”
Boyce said the underwater theme tied in nicely with what they have been reading in class.
“Our book this week from our reading series was called ‘Fishy Tales.’ It’s factual and had real photographs of underwater plants and animals. That helped get the children thinking about today,” said Boyce. “We also read a fun story called ‘Way Down Deep in the Deep Blue Sea,’ so we’ve been talking about the sea and ocean life all week.”
Noting that in pre-K much of the children’s artwork includes things that are colored, cut out and glued together, Boyce said the watercolor session was “a little more detailed with different techniques that we haven’t used yet.”
KATELYN BUCK
puts the techniques that she learned from local artist Heather Harvell to the test as she works on her aquatic watercolor painting. “The great thing about this was that the kids were learning from a true artist,” said Boyce. “Heather did a great job with them. They were attentive, they enjoyed what they were doing and were having fun with their painting. Plus they were excited to be able to take their finished product home.”
Harvell was equally pleased with how well behaved the children were.
“They did a fantastic job. Mrs. Daniels said she’d never seen them use so much imagination. Sometimes when an artist comes in it’s almost permission to do what they want to do,” she said. “We had a racecar underwater and an elephant underwater. They were very creative.
“They applied most of what we learned in the practice session to their final piece. With younger kids you have to make things very simple and it helps if you can make up little songs,” said Harvell. “For example, in trying to get them to wet their brush, wipe the excess water onto a paper towel and then dip the brush into the paint, I tell them, ‘Dip, dip, tap, tap, paint.’ They remember that and sing it when they’re doing it.”
Staff photo/Scott Mitchell Johnson
KAYMEN SARGENT, 
a pre-kindergartner at the SAD 1 Skyway Education Center, works on his aquatic watercolor painting after learning techniques from local artist Heather Harvell last Wednesday.
Boyce applied for — and was awarded — an Aroostook Partners in the Arts grant that was used to purchase the necessary watercolor supplies for the project. Harvell donated her time.
“Mrs. Boyce is my daughter’s (Jayden) teacher and she asked if I would be an artist-in-residence and come in and teach the kids an art class,” said Harvell. “I hope the children had as much fun as I did.”
Aroostook Partners in the Arts, which organized in 1995 to work cooperatively with local schools to develop, support and sponsor high quality performing arts, visual arts and humanities experiences for school age children, typically meets at 11:30 a.m. on the second Wednesday of each month in the Mark & Emily Turner Memorial Library community room. Anyone interested in joining the group is invited to attend a meeting. Community members should contact the library or Martha LaPointe at 768-6311 for exact meeting time.
