Tastefully Childish

I love living in New York City with my two girls.  Although, I could definitely live with a bigger space, I love that the city offers so many wonderful child development classes to get your little ones out of the tiny apartments.  I recently tried Shine NYC, an amazing children’s program offered in the beautiful Freshmade NYC space.  Shine will offer two drop-off classes this semester:

• Lights Up: Wednesdays from 4-5pm.  A series of weekly workshops for children 7-10 years old that explores dramatic play through puppetry and mask work. Students will explore imagination through storytelling and performance utilizing different styles of puppetry and theatrical mask work used in cultures around the world. In addition to crafting their own puppets, from the classic sock puppet to marionettes, children will engage in teamwork while building confidence and cultural awareness. 
• Little Luminaries: Fridays from 3:30-4:30pm.  A class for 3-5 year olds that combines yoga, discussion, art/journaling, music, movement, and books all centered around a weekly theme. With themes including Roots, Cycles, Friendship, and Memory, each class will explore the different meanings of the word and how we relate to them, both creatively and critically.

My youngest, 3 in April, and my oldest, 5 in September attended the Little Luminaries class together.   The class was led by Aaron Goldschmidt, founder, with Misty Foster assisting.The theme for the class was colors: mixing and shades of color.  The class started in a  circle with color shakers to play with, showing two colors mixing together to make another.  For example: half of one shaker was yellow and the other half was red and when shaken, they made an orange color.  Color plates were also on the floor to play with.  When you took two primary color plates and placed them on top of one another they made another color.  My oldest LOVED this theme because she just finished a color mixing unit at school.  After talking about colors, they read Pantone: Colors, a book for children showing that a basic color like red may have a variety of shades.

After circle time, Misty, led yoga time.  Before beginning, Misty, explained to the kids what yoga was and asked if they had done it before.  They began with a simple wiggle, pinched fingers, shook sillies to serious, acted like a shark, went to a plank and then into downward dog.  After they stretched with yoga they read another book, What Colour Is Your World?, to lead into the art segment.

During the art segment, they used paint chips to create a collage… such a great idea.  I never thought about going to the paint store, getting paint chips and letting the girls get creative cutting them up and gluing to make a masterpiece.  Some of the kids decided they were finished way before others.  Aaron told them they could go look at the books and let them go look at the color shakers and books while he set up for an experiment and others finished, making a point to tell the kids that he would leave the projects out if they wanted to finish or add more.  Of course at the end of class my girls decided they wanted to do more and Aaron let them take some paint chips home to finish.

After creating art collages, everyone participated in the “milk experiment“.  My girls are still talking about this experiment and had to show their dad the following day.  We have also done this experiment with their friends during their play dates because they absolutely LOVED it at Shine NYC.  During the experiment the kids used milk, soap, food coloring, and a q-tip to make an explosion of multiple colors.

Next up was a game in which colors were matched with feelings: happy was yellow, blue was sad, red was angry, and green was surprised.  A color was called and kids ran to a colored circle the expression that matched the feeling.  The kids in the class had a great time during the game and it made them have to think quickly.  There was a lot of laughter when they ran to the wrong circle.

The class ended with Dr. Seuss’ color book read in a circle, similar to how the class began.  Throughout the entire class both teachers were full of energy and kept the kids engaged.  I loved that there were a variety of activities during the class to keep the kids from getting restless.  One of my favorite lines was when my daughter said she didn’t like the color she received Aaron responded with “From the famous words of Pinkalicious, you get what you get and you don’t get upset.”  We can’t wait to go back for more fun!

Shine ON!

Visit ShineNYC.net to see other services offered.

Disclaimer:  I received a trial class for the purpose of this review.  All opinions expressed are my own.

Tags: Art, children, classes, developmental classes, experiment, Kids, NYC, shine nyc, yoga