Students at Montessori Country Day School in Plainsboro are learning about applying faux-metal paint to relief sculptures they assembled. Their art teacher Heidi Monteleone, who has been teaching at Montessori Country Day, Montessori Corner at Princeton Meadows, and Children’s House of the Windsors for six years.##M:[more]##
In honor of Black History Month, the young artists, ages three to six years-old, created their own relief sculpture by gluing pasta, bits of twine, bottle caps, and puzzle pieces to a cardboard base. They selected copper, silver, brass, or gold, for the patina. One lesson is based on African-American artist Selma Bank whose likeness of President Roosevelt was used to design the dime. “A dime is essentially a tiny relief sculpture,” says Monteleone. “They’re aware that someone designs the coins at the mint.”
“I love the creative freedom I have as a teacher,” she says. “For the 500th birthday of Leonardo Davinci, we had `An Evening with Leonardo,’” says Monteleone. The students dressed in renaissance costumes and displayed their art. They also wrote Aesop-like fables, which they read.
“I can get into art history with the elementary school students (ages six to eight),” says Monteleone. “I can give more details about the artists’ life and what inspired them when they were the children’s age.” Her creativity also takes the form of after-school cooking and visual arts classes, and a year-old performing arts program.
This spring, with music teacher Sandy Philips, the children will present vignettes from well-known Broadway plays. The students will choreograph, act, dance, and be responsible for props and scenery.
The students at all three Montessori schools have put their artistic talents to good use. Each class submitted colorful drawings by every student, which were arranged as a patchwork collages and made into note cards. Proceeds from the sale of the cards will go toward adopting a manatee, an endangered species, as well as risers for musical and dramatic productions, graduation, and other ceremonies. The fundraiser has yielded more than $700 to date.
