Peace!

The younger students made peace necklaces during Octobers month of Peace while the older students finished out the month with their favorite activity: grafitti letters!

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Peace Mandalas

October was the month of Peace at Camino Seguro and we celebrated it with mandalas in the Creative Expression room.  Mandalas represent internal balance.  Each student was given the opportunity to look for their own inner balance and inner peace.

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Art Against Violence

This year the dance club was invited to present at San Carlos University during their, ¨Art Against Violence¨festival.  Shannon Moyle, the dance club teacher, along with 12 kids presented two dances in front of hundreds of college students.  As we entered the University, the excitement began to rise as one 15 year old student declared to the rest, ¨this will be us in a few years!¨ The day was a success as Anderson Chuc, a diversificado student, introduced the dance and explained to the public how art and dance has helped him avoid the daily violence on the streets.  This field trip helped to improve self esteem, communication, and give a voice to the dance club.

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The Power of Imagination

On September 28th, the Creative Expression program closed out this years morning program with a grand final presentation here at Safe Passage. This year, we have been working with the theme Imagination versus Reality. In each class, we discussed what their reality is like and how it interacts with their dreams, and the most important question of all, ¨can we use our imagination to transcend our reality?¨ Each student had a different response. The event was a reflection of their responses, expressed through their art work, photography, poetry, music, monologues and dances.

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The event began at 4pm as families, donors, and staff entered the main building. They were greeted with flowers, candles, music, and food. The volunteer staff assisted the kitchen staff as waiters, serving the families in order to give them a chance to relax and enjoy the show. The presentation kicked off with a dance by the children of the Escuelita, who interpreted the theme by alternating between a waltz and break dancing. This was followed by three monologues and a scene written by the older students, expressing the daily struggle between their dreams and the real struggles they face in reaching their goals. We then moved locations to the outdoor gazebo, where the music presentation took place. Six music students were selected to present based on their dedication, grades, and behavior. Through music, we witnessed huge strides in confidence building as one of our star students sang for her very first time in front of a crowd of 200. The music presentation was wrapped up with a beautiful Spanish version of John Lennon´s ¨Imagine.¨ The night continued with an adaptation of ¨Where the Wild Things Are” and finished with a final dance that explored the contrast between reality and imagination in the lives of our youth.

The final presentation was an exploration of the power of Imagination. The event raised funds for materials, introduced donors to our program, and most importantly, offered the 50 participants the opportunity to build their confidence and leadership skills while learning to express their complicated emotions in the most positive way possible: through art.

Imagination Fair!

Saturday, August 4^th was a morning filled with joy in the park Nuevo Amanecer, a location that connects multiple communities that we work with in Zone 3. This year, the Creative Expression Program hosted an Imagination fair that brought families together in the park for a fun and exciting few hours of art and music based activities.

We had a full morning schedule of music, including our very own Camino Seguro music students accompanied by Guatemalan musicians, as well as a Guatemalan Break Dancing crew. Our main project of the day was a community mural designed by our very own students and art volunteer, Sami Dardas. The mural design was inspired by values from our peace program and typical Guatemalan stencils. We had 6 Junior Leader art students helping us lead the mural project. Each leader chose a value-based word and outlined it in their own personal style a day before the event. During the event, the leaders (along with 6 volunteers) helped the younger children in the community paint inside the words and the stencils. In total, over 100 community members partook in the creation of the mural which is now a permanent piece in the main park of Zone 3.

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Our library coordinator, along with a group of volunteers, also led a chalking activity where the neighborhood children were able to write out their future goals on walls and sidewalks around the park, as well as cover up any negative drawings that already existed . We also collaborated with Ludi Club (part of the sports program) who had their stilts club participants running around the park dressed up as clowns and on stilts, adding to the positive, fun energy of the day. Ludi Club also hosted a face painting station and a balloon animal station which was run by our Junior Leaders. The morning was finished off with a 400 person snack donation made by Roterac and handed out to the community.

The day was, by all accounts, a great success, a true celebration of the positive power of imagination and its ability to inspire and motivate change!

Strength from within

July represented the month of strength here in the Creative Expression room.  We focused on how to use art to expose our inner strengths and confidence.  The 4th, 5th, and 6th graders all had the opportunity to create their very own, personalized art journals which are used almost every week in class now.  We worked on creating self portraits with the younger kids, how they viewed themselves and how they want to be viewed.  They also created mini doll versions of themselves using clothing pins.   A big focus this past month was looking for our ¨power¨words or strength words.  We were surprised and delighted to see what the students came up with!

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Learning how to collaborate with the month of June

The month of June was heavily focused on teaching the afternoon classes about collaborative street art.  We started the month out with an informative slide show about Guatemalan and International street artists and the ways multiple artists collaborate to create amazing, large scale pieces.  We then introduced different activities that allowed the students to discover their own personal style of drawing.  The final project was a collaborative piece created by the whole class!