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Backyard Drama
by Kit Bardwell

As a baby boomer, I remember those good old days when the neighborhood kids would get together and do a play in someone’s backyard. We did the classics. Sleeping Beauty and Little Red Riding Hood were some of our big hits. The only requirement was that there was a clothesline tall enough to hang a bedspread for a curtain. Today you will find the neighborhood kids inside playing video games where they digitally act out the fantasies of wizards, warriors and imprisoned princesses.

What follows is a step by step approach to creating a “Backyard” theatrical production through the use of structured improvisation. With this approach children of all abilities can participate since there is no script to read or memorize. The spirit of structured improvisation allows for changes that make it possible for everyone to participate, regardless of ability or talent—and it comes with a guarantee!

Providing Structure
First things first! It is vital to have structure for improvisations. For example, if you ask a class of first graders to act like monkeys, it would create chaos. However, if you ask them to act like monkeys eating bananas or act like monkeys while moving forward four steps and then back two, you have created a structure for their improvisation. The structure of the improvisation is how you will accommodate various disabilities. Herein lies some of the most creative work.

The Process
Select and Tell the Story: Be sure to select a story that has enough parts for everyone. Instead of reading the story from a book, try telling it from your own memory. It will make the story seem more immediate. Purpose: Introduce tale to participants and engage their imaginations.

Introduce Concept of French Scenes: The use of French Scenes is a convention where you divide the story into sections based on when a character enters or leaves a scene. In Little Red Riding Hood, the first scene begins with her mother asking her to go see Grandma and ends when Little Red Riding Hood leaves to do this. Using pictures and words, have the children help you divide the story into French Scenes. Purpose: Reviews tale and, by dividing the story into small segments, you create a form of structure that will allow the students to work on the story in smaller segments.

Musical and Movement Explorations: Explore the opportunities to add music and movement into the story. Purpose: To provide additional opportunities for children to express themselves through other art forms.

Scene Improvisations: Have the participants divide into groups to experiment with an improvised French Scene from the tale. Purpose: Develop listening and presenting skills and to further engage in ‘make-believe.’

Select Roles: There are a number of ways to do this. Since the script is improvised, the students can take turns playing different parts. Usually they gravitate to one role and keep it. If there are two or more children who want the same role, then rewrite the story to accommodate this. Purpose: To help develop consistency and ownership by the children.
Add Narrators: Write short narratives to be read at the beginning of each scene.
Purpose: To provide opportunities for individuals who enjoy reading aloud. Provide clarity for the audience.

Process to Product: Bring group improvisations together to present the entire tale. Purpose: To provide a sense of accomplishment as well as the experience of fun and engagement in ‘make-believe.’

The Guarantee: After spending the past twenty-plus years working with children and engaging them in this form of theatrical ‘make-believe,’ I have never had a student shed a tear or even get the least bit nervous. The children participating have always had complete ownership of their play and through their eyes the audience could see only what the children saw, the beauty and magic of theatre.

A Visual Reference
by Kit Bardwell
Before coming to Accessible Arts, I had limited experience working with children who were blind or visually impaired. Since I have an adventurous spirit, I found the prospect of teaching visual arts to the students at the Kansas State School for the Blind an exciting challenge. Now, one and a half school years later, I realize I may be learning more about being sighted than I am about being blind.
Allow me to share with you two of my erroneous assumptions. My first assumption was that students who are visually impaired or blind would be very dexterous and have superior use of their hands and fingers. What I found was a culture that used heightened audio/verbal connections. When given a choice, the students prefer to sit with their hands in their laps and talk than to engage in tactile projects. I also found that using their hands to make things and operate tools such as hole-punchers could not be something I took for granted.
My second assumption was that all I needed to do in order to make an art process accessible was to make it tactile. An example of this would be to make 2D pictures using yarn and grains or 3D objects such as animals and cars molded out of clay. You would think this was a safe assumption until you consider the challenge of making an image without a visual reference. This would be similar to asking a sighted person to make a clay model of an alien using only verbal descriptions that refer solely to tactile experiences. My first awakening to this came when a young student was making a bird out of Model Magic and when I instructed her to put a beak on the bird, she asked, “What is a beak?” I had a visual reference to the bird and its beak. She only had her tactile experiences that probably did not include touching a bird’s beak.

On July 28th, 2003, The New Yorker Magazine published an article by Oliver Sacks titled, A Neurologist’s Notebook, The Mind’s Eye: What the blind see. In this article Sacks reflects on the experiences of a number of individuals who lost their sight at different times in their lives. Each individual experienced their adaptation to the loss of sight in varying and unique ways. With the exception of one person, they all continued to use visual memory to construct visually rich mental images. One of the more impressive examples given was an Australian psychologist named Zoltan Torey.

Torey is the author of The Crucible of Consciousness, Oxford Press, 1999. At the age of twenty-one, he lost his sight in an accident at a chemical factory. With the onset of blindness he was advised to develop an auditory mode of adjustment. Instead, he worked to develop what he calls his “inner eye” where he has the remarkable ability to generate and manipulate images in his mind. His sense of orientation is so strong that he is capable of doing things never imagined possible for a man who is blind. For example he writes, “I replaced the entire roof guttering of my multi-gabled home single-handed, and solely on the strength of the accurate and well-focused manipulation of my now totally pliable and responsive mental space.” He later explains that his roof repair caused much alarm among his neighbors when they saw a blind man up on his roof in the dark of night.

This New Yorker article with its numerous tales of adaptation to sight loss made me very aware of the differences between children who are born without sight and those who have limited sight or who were once sighted. Now I approach each art project with the two questions, what visual references am I assuming the student will use and how can I make adaptations to avoid using them?

It is an ongoing experiment but recently I had success in engaging a young student, who has been blind since birth, to make a clay model of a car for me. Cars are his favorite subject to talk about and he can mimic all the sounds from the motor to the seatbelt alarm. Previously he has made model cars by digging holes out of a log of clay and talking about the various features of the make and model of his car. It occurred to me that he would have greater success if he used functional references as a guide.

We began with a canoe shape of clay that Blue ceramic police car was to be the body of the car. I asked him to put seats in the car and from that point he was off and running. There soon was a steering wheel and a dashboard. Next came the hood and the trunk. He asked for assistance with the roof because he was afraid of crushing his creation. Once the roof was on he fitted it with four tires, a grill and headlights. And since this was to be a police car, two big lights were added to the roof. The end result was very pleasing to him because it contained all the functional aspects of a police car. And, to the sighted on looker, it even looked like a police car.

I believe the act of creating art is an attempt to interpret our sense of reality. Our perceptions and the means of perceiving define our sense of reality. Having sight makes me aware of how my sense of reality is infused with visual images and visual references. We may connect with each other through art but not necessarily by the same means.

Kit Bardwell is Program Director for Accessible Arts, Inc. (Spring '04)

Let's Just Dance! by Kit Bardwell The Webster Dictionary’s definition of dance is “to engage in or perform a dance, to move or seem to move up and down or about in quick or lively manner.” This definition disappointed me. As a ‘living room ballerina,’ I thought dance was the use of one’s body to express thoughts, ideas and feelings that cannot be expressed by words; a fluidity of movement, poetry in motion. When working with children, I like to label spontaneous, expressive movement as ‘Creative Movement’ and set formations and steps as ‘Dance.’ In truth, it is difficult to define what dance is when considering the huge array of “quick and lively manners” in which we can move to dance anything from the Macarena to the Viennese Waltz. Nonetheless, dance and creative movement is an important part of our physical experience as human beings. What place does dance have in our education and our American culture? Since it is viewed as a physical activity it is most often relegated to be part of the physical education in our schools. Somehow, we have forgotten the social and aesthetic value of dance. Since our culture is one big melting pot of many traditions, the question may be whose dance shall we do? During his presidency, Eisenhower tried to answer this question by sending a choreographer around the country collecting dances that were to be molded into the “American Dance.” Hence Square Dancing was born. These partnered dances have a sequence of moving patterns that are called out to the dancers by a caller. The tradition of a caller comes from the British Contra Dancing. It allows people to join in a dance without needing to know the sequence of the steps.
When examining my own experience of creative movement and dance in an educational setting I have two memories. My first		memory is of the mid ‘50s where I have a clear image of Miss Smith, my kindergarten teacher, playing the piano while my classmates and I moved
in a circle depicting different animals with our arms and gait. To this day I remember galloping around and thinking, “It can’t get any better than this.” Unfortunately, this wonderful experience ended with Kindergarten. My second memory is of fourth grade where I was required to folk dance in PE. I remember loving everything about this kind of structured dance. Without the opportunity to experience self-expression through movement, children miss out on an immediately accessible way to explore their own physical presence in the world around them. Creative movement and dance gives young children of all abilities the opportunity to explore and experience some of the basics of physics and human anatomy. They learn, for example, that balancing on one foot is hard to do, twirling around makes you dizzy, and that there are many different ways to move through space. They also learn how to share space with other children. Granted, these concepts can be taught through a variety of sports but dance has both aesthetic and social elements. Children have to collaborate in order to create their own dances. They are called upon to make aesthetic judgements. What looks good, what doesn’t? Folk dancing provides a unique structure for socializing. These have always been our dances of courtship. Dancing to music also heightens listening skills. Indeed, dance is a natural kinesthetic response to music. So much so that a number of languages have only one word for both music and dance. Just like their non-disabled peers, children with disabilities need experiences in creative movement and dance. Adaptations can be made for children who use wheelchairs by transferring the movement from feet to hands. Children who have low vision or are blind can dance with a sighted partner. And children who are deaf or hard of hearing can dance to a beat that is felt through the floor. I experienced this while teaching at the North Carolina School for the Deaf where their Clogging Team has won championships against hearing groups. How can we create more opportunities for children to experience creative movement and dance? The answer to this is both easy and complex. The easy answer is to simply engage students in singing games that include dance. The most traditional examples of this are “Ring-around the Rosie” and “London Bridges.” Two excellent resources for additional singing games are 120 Singing Games and Dances for Elementary Schools by Lois Choksy and David Brummit and Step it Down, Games, Plays, Songs and Stories from the Afro-American Heritage by Bessie Jones and Bess Lomax Hawes. The complex answer is to suggest that time, money and space be provided for a visiting teaching artist. Together students and teachers can learn how to explore various subjects from math to weather through creative movement and dance. Whatever your definition of dance is, I encourage you to do it. Dance for yourself. Dance for our children to see you dance. Dance with your friends, your family. Dance because it is part of this experience called life. Dance because it feels good.

Kit Bardwell is Program Director for Accessible Arts, Inc. (Fall '03)

Exploration & Discovery
by Kit Bardwell
It is a common practice to show students an example of a visual art project and then instruct them on how to replicate it. With this approach there is often the assumption that the child is familiar with the medium, or materials to be used. Creativity is also limited to recreating the finished product modeled by the teacher. Educators and professionals who work with children of all abilities should consider providing a number of structured experiences that will allow the children to explore and discover the possibilities, as well as the limitations, of the material. Experiences such as these are referred to as “open-ended” art projects and can often produce spectacular and aesthetic results.
Finger Painting with Shaving Cream
You will need: shaving cream, tempera paint – primary colors (red, yellow and blue), and finger painting paper.
Shaving cream adds a very desirable tactile experience to finger painting. Place two or more small mounds of shaving cream on a piece of slick finger painting paper. Pour a small amount of primary color tempera paint on each mound. The students are then free to experiment with the tactile sensation of the shaving cream and paint.

As the students do this, there is the potential for them to create dramatic blends of secondary colors through the mixing of the

primary colors.
This exploration has worked well with students who have low vision or areblind and has also been highly successful with

individuals who have developmental disabilities. When dry, the finished painting has three-dimensional depth created by the shaving cream.

Printing with Found Objects
You will need: a large piece of paper (white or colored) for each student, a tray containing a variety of objects (paperclips, keys, key rings, cups, leaves, etc.—objects do not necessarily have to be flat), a variety of colored tempera paints in shallow pans, pieces of scrap paper, paint brushes and water for cleaning the brushes, large bowl of water and paper towels.
Students place objects into the pans of paint to coat them and then lay them on the big piece of paper. Or they can coat the object with paint by placing the object on the piece of scrap paper and painting the object with a paintbrush. Encourage them to explore rolling or dragging the object as it places paint on the paper. After each printing the object can be wiped off with a paper towel or placed into a large bowl of water to be dried off by the next person to use it. Students can also paint their hands to include handprints in their design.
This exploration uses the fine motor skill of using the fingers to pick up and place objects. For children who have difficulty closing their hands on small objects, take a short dowel or pencil and create a comfortable handgrip by adding Model Magic™ around the grip area. Next, place a small piece of modeling clay or Silly Putty™ on the end of the pencil. The modeling clay will stick to the objects and permit them to be lifted in and out of the paint.

Kit Bardwell is Program Director for Accessible Arts, Inc. (Spring '03)

MY EXPERIENCE
WITH ART ADAPTIVE AIDS
by Sondra Horning

When I plan a visit to a classroom for an art lesson, I try to find out about the class. Our district mainstreams students with special needs as much as possible. I start my lesson by determining the objectives or outcomes for the lesson. Then I try to keep my art adaptive aids as simple and direct as possible. The tool I use the most is masking tape. I use it to secure newspapers to cover table surfaces, to secure art paper, to fasten art smocks or hold sleeves up out of the way. With a sticky ring of tape, I keep paint cups from moving, and even use it to pick up glitter and small pieces of paper. I also use Velcro. It makes a great strap to help hold materials in the hand and to a table top surface.
The next tool I use the most is Crayola brand Model Magic. It is lightweight and air-dries. I use it

For painting, I sometimes use a child’s tipsy cup. Since it has a weighted bottom, it is less likely to tip over. For printmaking, I have used sponges mounted on large handles, spools, or even empty film canisters. There are commercially made mounted sponges also. You can use them directly on paper, on top of a

to make custom grips for brushes, crayons, markers, and pencils. Starting with large handled brushes, crayons, markers, and pencils will help students who have difficulty gripping. Another way to make a grip is to use foam or foam insulation for pipes. The foam insulation for pipes comes in different sizes and already has a circular hole for the writing or drawing tool. You can also use a large rubber band and a lark’s head knot on both ends to secure the band to the tool. Then slip the hand under the band. Be sure the band is large enough so that the hand is secure, yet doesn’t pinch.

stencil, or the positive cut from a stencil secured down with masking tape on the printing paper.
The tracing wheel (a seamstress tool) is used to outline raised shapes or objects for a student with a visual impairment. I also use a dried glue line, a hot glue line, or a waxed line commercial product called Wikki-Stix.
For cutting, there are many different kinds of adaptive scissors; hand over hand, spring loaded, loop scissors, or even mounted varieties. I use a pair every day with a cord attached

to prevent them from dropping and quite often loan them to a student with a need.
There are many ways to create adaptive art aids. These are just a few that I have used that were successful. If you discover a difficulty, think about what you can do to make the process more successful for the student. Then it’s just a matter of trial and error. Good luck and have fun!

Sondra Horning was Accessible Arts’ 1999 Educator of the Year in Arts and Disabilities. She is currently an Elementary Art Instructor in the Hutchinson Public Schools. (Fall '02)

Shall We Dance?
	Should We Dance?
		Can We Dance?
			by Kit Bardwell

“There are many different kinds of dance but at their source within us they are one. They all exist for the purpose of filling a basic human need, the need to create forms of body movement which are satisfying.”

This quote from Barbara Mettler’s Dance as an Element of Life has a simple and profound message for all of us. We need to dance and so, we dance or dream of dancing. Like so many of our art disciplines, dance has been given qualifiers so that most people feel unable, untalented, or awkward with the idea of dancing. It is left to the professionals or to young couples as part of a dating ritual. Even our traditional folk dances are left for rehearsed groups to perform. So if the average person feels intimidated by dance, what about the individual who has a disability? Can they dance without the use of their legs, their arms, their sight or hearing? Of course they can.

This past summer I was fortunate to attend the International Association of Creative Dance, (IACD), Congress held at Kalani on the Big Island, Hawaii. The IACD is an organization that promotes the development of creative dance founded upon the free approach to the art of body movement pioneered by Barbara Mettler.

At this Congress dancers of all shapes, sizes and abilities came together. We stretched, twisted, jumped and ran through space filling a need to dance. We danced alone, we danced together but we did not all dance with our bodies in the same way. In particular, two dancers (who joined the Congress as a part of a group from Korea called ‘Women with Disabilities Arts and Culture Network’) showed us new ways to participate in the dance. One used a powered wheelchair and the other was deaf.

Including these two dancers was easy and effortless. The young woman who used the powered wheelchair explained the limitations of her wheelchair and requested that fellow dancers stay clear of the control stick and the back of the wheelchair. The dancer who was deaf, required no accommodations other than a physical cue to let her know when a sound from a small gong had indicated the end of a piece. Indeed these challenges were small compared to the challenges of communicating through Korean and sign language interpreters.

Mettler-based dance, with its clear improvisational structures, lends itself well to the inclusion of dancers with disabilities. Through experimentation and dialogue the dancers at the Congress learned to give the electric wheelchair more room to move around within a group and not to make the wheelchair the focal point of each dance. Many times this dancer chose to dance sitting or lying on the floor without her chair.

My participation in this dance experience inspired me to begin a new After School Arts Club dedicated to movement and drama. I also began teaching a movement class as part of the P.E. curriculum for elementary students at the Kansas State School for the Blind. What a thrill it is to see young children who are blind master skipping and galloping. It is impossible to describe how gratifying it is to see and hear their expressions of joy as they explore moving through space.

Barbara Mettler’s approach to creative dance is limitless in its capacity to include dancers of all abilities. How fortunate we are to have a form of dance that allows us “to create forms of body movement which are satisfying”.

For more information on Mettler-based dance go to www.dancecreative.org

[Later note: If you would like information about joining a group doing wheelchair dance in Kansas City, please call us at 913/281-1133. (Fall 2005)

Working with Materials that are Close at Hand
By Tina Blatter

When working with students who are blind or have low vision, you don’t need a lot of fancy materials in order to make a project tactile and accessible. Just take a trip to your local hardware store or grocery store and you will find almost everything that you will need.

Spackling compound is flexible, inexpensive, and quick drying. It can be rolled in a ball and used like clay, or applied to a firm surface with a palette knife or other tool. Into this surface students can place various objects creating a relief sculptures.

Papier-Mache is simply strips of newspaper coated with a mixture of flour and water that has been mixed to form a paste. Anything with a firm structure can be covered with papier-mache, as long as the structure (or armature) is sturdy and balanced. If you are concerned about the papier-mache sticking to a structure, then apply a generous amount of petroleum jelly to the surface that will come in contact with the papier-mache.

A fancier version of papier-mache is Fast-Setting Plaster Gauze. This wonderful medium can be bought at art-supply stores or at medical supply outlets. All you need is a pair of scissors and a large bowl of water. Cut the gauze strip to the desired length and then place into the water to activate the plaster. Remove from the water and remove any excess water. The wet gauze strip is then draped over an armature. It is best if the gauze is overlapped. This technique can be used to make a cast of someone’s face.

Three-dimensional collages can be made on cardboard by gluing materials such as shells, pine cones, beans, seeds, dried leaves, twigs, rope, prickly-seed pods, small pieces of carpet, wallpaper or fabric, feathers, prickly dry starfish, coffee grounds, sand and imitation fur.

Regardless of the materials you choose, allow the students time to explore the various mediums. Through this kind of exploring they will quickly learn what the material is best used for. They may even come up with some ideas that are new to you.

Tina is an accomplished artist who has been blind since birth. She presents numerous arts workshops for children, and was AAI Program Director for several years until a traumatic brain injury necessitated her resigning. Following her recovery, she has resumed her workshops and also teaches art for our After-School Arts Club. She was also the recipient of the 2005 Distinguished Service Award in Arts & Disabilities. (Spring 2006)

Accessing Information ~ A sensory Experience
By Ann Cunningham

Five years ago, I decided to write, illustrate and publish a book. I wanted to create a picture book that children who are blind or visually impaired could share with their friends and family. Sadie Can Count - a multi-sensory book is our first of what I hope will be many books. However, my journey toward this goal started when I was a kid myself.

I remember I was four and my aunt was getting married. Even though I would not be at her wedding, I knew it would be magical. I had dreams about it and I wanted to make drawings of the church and the beautiful bride! The bride walks in her white beaded gown. The long veil trails after her. Her eyes are steadfast on her waiting groom. Her nose points true north, her hair is held high upon her head…ears, this could be a problem. She needs ears and I am not sure how to draw them. I try one shape, erase as unsatisfactory and try another, repeatedly until at last, success! I have learned how to draw ears! What a day. I will apparently never forget that success, it is now 53 years later, I am an artist and still thrilled by that lesson.

What exactly happened? I was very young, I couldn’t read or write, I don’t even think I could talk very well, but I could dream and I wanted to share my dreams and thoughts with my family. I wanted to hear what they thought about the wonderful things I was imagining. I could do this through art. It was not easy and I did need to learn how. However, it was a skill even my little hands could master well enough to share some of my thoughts satisfactorily.

Fast forward to 1991, I am a stone sculptor and I am hanging a show of low relief slate sculptures. They are pictures of people and I suddenly wondered, “Could anyone who is blind figure out these pictures?” It was an idea I had tossed around for years until one day I finally took action and connected with the Colorado Center for the Blind (CCB). I brought artwork to the Center for a tactile critique. I quickly learned that some things I was doing actually did communicate my ideas and many other things did not. I also found out why. It wasn’t long before I was not only creating large bas-relief artworks of tactile fairy tales but I was also teaching art classes at CCB.

Each fairy tale features a variety of materials; slate, marble, limestone, ceramics, bronze, wood, gold and silver leaf. Large print and Braille text accompany each sculptured panel, and personal tape players with original music and narration are available. Additionally, a taped American Sign Language telling of each fairy tale is shown on TV monitors, which accompany the exhibits. We wanted to open the doors to as many people as possible so that they could share the experience with their friends and family.

For years, we hauled literally tons of artwork and displayed exhibits in dozens of venues, including conventions focusing on blindness. I also completed a commissioned exhibit depicting Erik Weihenmayer’s historic ascent of Mount Everest, which is now on permanent display in Baltimore, Maryland at the National Federation of the Blind.

One day I asked some parents of blind children, “What do you need?” They answered, “We need books.” Five years later, we finally have a book. I started out working on this project alone but along the way, my husband Charlie jumped in to offer his help.

I now dream of children, who are blind or visually impaired, being able to express themselves through their own pictures. Pictures can easily express emotions, relationships, complex ideas and designs, things that are frequently hard to put into words.

Our kids need the tools to make drawing accessible and we need the pictures to teach them how to interpret graphical information.

Sadie Can Count is a good place to start teaching picture recognition; it has pictures of common objects that you can easily gather. Sadie Can Count features spot pictures, which are clearly defined objects on a plain background. Our next books will continue the learning process so that children will build the skills, step by step and learn to interpret pictures of greater complexity. At the same time, children should be encouraged to create their own artwork expressing the ideas they want to share.

If you need help getting started with ideas about materials and techniques for your children, Accessible Arts is a great resource. If you would like guidance using our book, Sadie Can Count, please visit our website and review our free Parent Teacher Guide at www.sensationalbooks.com

Access to the arts can give your children access to information and the ability to share their ideas with the world, a thrill that can last a lifetime. (Fall 2006)

Now Parents Can Sing to Teach Babies to Sign
By Carrie Kent

Have you ever listened to a baby’s intensely spoken babble and realized that even though you had no clue what the child was saying, you were certain the child knew exactly what he or she was trying to communicate?

Do you remember how frustrating that felt...for both of you?

Anyone who has helped raise a child knows that a baby’s desire to communicate precedes his ability to do so by many months.

Sign language bridges the communication gap between toddlers and their parents and music helps build the bridge.

Too often valuable minutes are wasted in a parental guessing game while the infant or toddler grows increasingly frustrated and distraught.

One way to bridge the communication gap is sign language, an increasingly popular method of teaching hearing babies to “speak their minds.” Long before babies can verbalize, they can use their hands to gesture.

“Teaching your baby to sign is giving them the means to express themselves,” explained Anne Meeker Miller, a music therapist, Ph.D. and author of Baby Sings & Sign, a new book detailing her program of teaching sign language to hearing babies through music and play.

“Language requires reciprocal interaction,” Miller said, and sign language is something both babies and their caregivers can do. The benefits are numerous, according to Miller, including not only the ability to understand one another, but also the ability for babies to begin to understand the structure of language. The experience of signing enhances the bond between child and parent as well.

“Plus they can get their needs met, which is the big payoff,” Miller added.

Miller developed her program after collaborating with a colleague who taught a sign language class for babies. Miller wrote songs, chants and finger plays to assist in capturing a baby’s attention while the signs are taught.

“We found that music consistently engaged the babies in the learning of sign language,” Miller explained. “We use a play-based approach. It’s important that the music be a focus as well as the sign language.” Miller has recorded a compact disc of thirteen folk-based songs as a companion to the Baby Sing & Sign book that introduces over 40 core vocabulary words featured in the book.

“Singing a song prompts the context for the sign and provides an opportunity to practice,” Miller said. “Kids love repetition and routines are so precious to them...even if families don’t end up signing a lot, they end up singing a lot, which is also very important.”

Baby Sing & Sign classes are now available at two hospitals in the Kansas City area, where she lives and works as a music therapist for a suburban school district. Parents learn how to sign the words to the songs while also reinforcing the signing through hands-on games and play.

The fact that it’s fun and gives parents a special time and event to share with their babies is just icing on the cake.

“Play is the baby’s work. Play is important,” Miller commented. “We engage the babies with activity and song. By getting them in touch with our ‘inner baby,’ we’ve noticed that the babies respond well to our energy, animation and humor.”

Miller describes her approach as equal parts music, play and sign language for babies. “Babies deserve rich musical lives and lots of playful exchanges with the people they cherish the most.”

And that spells love and contentment in any language.

More information about Anne Meeker Miller’s program and her books, CDs and classes can be found on her web site lovelanguageforbabies.com (Spring 2007)

Exploration & Discovery by Kit Bardwell It is a common practice to show students an example of a visual art project and then instruct them on how to replicate it. With this approach there is often the assumption that the child is familiar with the medium, or materials to be used. Creativity is also limited to recreating the finished product modeled by the teacher. Educators and professionals who work with children of all abilities should consider providing a number of structured experiences that will allow the children to explore and discover the possibilities, as well as the limitations, of the material. Experiences such as these are referred to as “open-ended” art projects and can often produce spectacular and aesthetic results. Finger Painting with Shaving Cream You will need: shaving cream, tempera paint – primary colors (red, yellow and blue), and finger painting paper. Shaving cream adds a very desirable tactile experience to finger painting. Place two or more small mounds of shaving cream on a piece of slick finger painting paper. Pour a small amount of primary color tempera paint on each mound. The students are then free to experiment with the tactile sensation of the shaving cream and paint.
As the students do this, there is the potential for them to create dramatic blends of secondary colors through the mixing of the		primary colors. This exploration has worked well with students who have low vision or areblind and has also been highly successful with
individuals who have developmental disabilities. When dry, the finished painting has three-dimensional depth created by the shaving cream. Printing with Found Objects You will need: a large piece of paper (white or colored) for each student, a tray containing a variety of objects (paperclips, keys, key rings, cups, leaves, etc.—objects do not necessarily have to be flat), a variety of colored tempera paints in shallow pans, pieces of scrap paper, paint brushes and water for cleaning the brushes, large bowl of water and paper towels. Students place objects into the pans of paint to coat them and then lay them on the big piece of paper. Or they can coat the object with paint by placing the object on the piece of scrap paper and painting the object with a paintbrush. Encourage them to explore rolling or dragging the object as it places paint on the paper. After each printing the object can be wiped off with a paper towel or placed into a large bowl of water to be dried off by the next person to use it. Students can also paint their hands to include handprints in their design. This exploration uses the fine motor skill of using the fingers to pick up and place objects. For children who have difficulty closing their hands on small objects, take a short dowel or pencil and create a comfortable handgrip by adding Model Magic™ around the grip area. Next, place a small piece of modeling clay or Silly Putty™ on the end of the pencil. The modeling clay will stick to the objects and permit them to be lifted in and out of the paint.

MY EXPERIENCE WITH ART ADAPTIVE AIDS by Sondra Horning When I plan a visit to a classroom for an art lesson, I try to find out about the class. Our district mainstreams students with special needs as much as possible. I start my lesson by determining the objectives or outcomes for the lesson. Then I try to keep my art adaptive aids as simple and direct as possible. The tool I use the most is masking tape. I use it to secure newspapers to cover table surfaces, to secure art paper, to fasten art smocks or hold sleeves up out of the way. With a sticky ring of tape, I keep paint cups from moving, and even use it to pick up glitter and small pieces of paper. I also use Velcro. It makes a great strap to help hold materials in the hand and to a table top surface. The next tool I use the most is Crayola brand Model Magic. It is lightweight and air-dries. I use it	For painting, I sometimes use a child’s tipsy cup. Since it has a weighted bottom, it is less likely to tip over. For printmaking, I have used sponges mounted on large handles, spools, or even empty film canisters. There are commercially made mounted sponges also. You can use them directly on paper, on top of a
to make custom grips for brushes, crayons, markers, and pencils. Starting with large handled brushes, crayons, markers, and pencils will help students who have difficulty gripping. Another way to make a grip is to use foam or foam insulation for pipes. The foam insulation for pipes comes in different sizes and already has a circular hole for the writing or drawing tool. You can also use a large rubber band and a lark’s head knot on both ends to secure the band to the tool. Then slip the hand under the band. Be sure the band is large enough so that the hand is secure, yet doesn’t pinch.	stencil, or the positive cut from a stencil secured down with masking tape on the printing paper. The tracing wheel (a seamstress tool) is used to outline raised shapes or objects for a student with a visual impairment. I also use a dried glue line, a hot glue line, or a waxed line commercial product called Wikki-Stix. For cutting, there are many different kinds of adaptive scissors; hand over hand, spring loaded, loop scissors, or even mounted varieties. I use a pair every day with a cord attached
	to prevent them from dropping and quite often loan them to a student with a need. There are many ways to create adaptive art aids. These are just a few that I have used that were successful. If you discover a difficulty, think about what you can do to make the process more successful for the student. Then it’s just a matter of trial and error. Good luck and have fun!