Meri Cherry - Play, Make, Create, A Process-Art Handbook: With over 40 Art Invitations for Kids

Play, Make, Create is a wonderful invitation to childrens art, combining tried-and-true favorites with creative new ideas. Kids will love doing these fun, process-art activities and parents will love Meri Cherrys simple, no-stress approach to bringing more art and creativity into the home.

Jean Vant Hul, author of The Artful Parent book and blog

This book is so full of invitations to create with your children that, while reading it, you will feel a need to jump up and look through drawers to find all the materials you will needmost of which you probably already have around. Meri is encouraging, generous, and clear with her ideas. Even the most novice artist will find confidence in this book to make art a part of their everyday lives.

Samara Caughey, blogger & owner of Purple Twig art studio for childern in Los Angeles, CA

For the past nine years, I have been soaking in Meri Cherrys passion, knowledge, and ideas for process art. She is a master at combining simple materials to produce rich and meaningful art experiences. Process art inspires young children to think critically, develop self-regulation skills, and believe in their own creative ideas and abilities. Meris influence in my own thirty-year teaching practice has given me courage and insight to keep the childs experience at the center of planning for art in my own classroommy students, and I, absolutely love it.

Deborah J. Stewart, M.Ed., Teach Preschool, LLC

2019 Quarto Publishing Group USA Inc.

Photography 2019 Meri Cherry

First Published in 2019 by Quarry Books, an imprint of The Quarto Group,

100 Cummings Center, Suite 265-D, Beverly, MA 01915, USA.

T (978) 282-9590 F (978) 283-2742 QuartoKnows.com

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission of the copyright owners. All images in this book have been reproduced with the knowledge and prior consent of the artists concerned, and no responsibility is accepted by producer, publisher, or printer for any infringement of copyright or otherwise, arising from the contents of this publication. Every effort has been made to ensure that credits accurately comply with information supplied. We apologize for any inaccuracies that may have occurred and will resolve inaccurate or missing information in a subsequent reprinting of the book.

Quarry Books titles are also available at discount for retail, wholesale, promotional, and bulk purchase. For details, contact the Special Sales Manager by email at specialsales@quarto.com or by mail at The Quarto Group, Attn: Special Sales Manager, 100 Cummings Center, Suite 265-D, Beverly, MA 01915, USA.

Digital edition: 978-1-63159-717-6
Softcover edition: 978-1-63159-716-9

Digital edition published in 2019

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Cherry, Meri, author.

Play, make, create, a process-art handbook : with 43 art invitations for kids creative activities and projects to inspire free thinking, mindfulness, and curiosity / Meri Cherry.

ISBN 9781631597169 (flexi-bind) | 9781631597176 (eISBN)

1. Handicraft. 2. Creative activities and seat work.

LCC TT157 .C424 2019 | DDC 745.5--dc23

LCCN 2018054133

Design: Allison Meierding

Photography: Meri Cherry, except Neil Apodaca (pages )

A PROCESS-ART HANDBOOK

With over 40 Art Invitations for Kids

MERI CHERRY

Hello! Im so thrilled youre here. It means that youre curious about the magic of process art and interested in bringing the power of creativity into your home or learning environment. That makes me really happy.

I started learning about process art about twenty years ago when a teacher came to visit my first-grade classroom to talk about Reggio Emiliainspired art making. I remember she had an art portfolio filled with photographs of the most incredible child-created art I had ever seen. I saw wire, nuts and bolts, tubes, and all kinds of unusual materials in the photos. I saw drawings of monkeys that looked more like references from a book than the identical construction paper cutouts I saw from most kindergarteners or first graders. Those images made an imprint on my brain I couldnt shake. I wasnt quite sure what it was that attracted me to the photographs. I just knew it was something totally different than anything I had seen children do before, and I was deeply intrigued.

Over the next fifteen years I had more and more opportunities to learn about the Reggio Emilia approach to learning, a child-focused philosophy that homes in on self-driven practices and relationship-driven environments. I took workshops, read books, and visited many schools and classrooms, all while teaching kindergarten through second grade. Then after the birth of my two daughters more than seven years ago, I began doing process art and invitations to create based on all my years of learning.

As a working mom, I wanted some way to connect with my girls in the limited time we had together each day. With process art, I found my answer. Almost every night before bed I would set up an art activity for my girls to work on in the morning before I went to work. I remember one morning in particular, as they ran to the table to see what mama had set up for them, my oldest, Gigi, who was three or four at the time, said, I dont really care what it is. I just like knowing you thought about us. And from that moment on, I was hooked.

Process art is about the journey. It is about listening, connecting, empathizing, and wondering. Process art honors the individual in all of us. It values critical thinking, exploration, thinking outside the box, and the developmental process of each individual. Simply put Process art is all about the making and the doing, rather than the finished product. Whats not to love about that?

Ive packed this book with all of the important things I have learned over the past twenty years of making and creating art with children. Since my fifteen years as a K2 teacher, I have pioneered a Reggio Emiliainspired preschool atelier (a.k.a. art studio); taught enrichment classes, private process-based art classes, and sensory play groups to hundreds of children throughout Los Angeles; opened Meri Cherry Art Studio, a thriving process-based art studio in Los Angeles; and learned many a trick or two about how to teach and engage children in art making in a way that honors each individual and their process.

I hope you find a tremendous amount of inspiration here, as well as concrete tools to use in your home or classroom. Most of all, while making art, I hope you experience joy and connection with the children in your life.

There is no right or wrong way to use this book. You can read through the whole thing and highlight the activities and ideas that speak to you. Or, maybe just dive right into the Invitations to Create and try one tomorrow morning. No matter what your pace or strategy, I hope you enjoy the process.