Cultural Arts Day (India) - follow up

Double Rainbow! The clouds parted and the rain held off for Cultural Arts Day 2014. The day was a success with beautiful presentations and explorations through India's people, history, art, dance, food, sports, clothing, etc. Thank you to all the parent volunteers for your hard work. The kids were engaged, calm, inspired and enjoying themselves. Below are a few photographs from the day...
(Double Rainbow photograph by Tomas Ybarrola)

                                           Athmika's mendhi (she did both hands herself)

                                            Kinder & 5th Mehndi drawings

Mehndhi/Henna drawings - K-5 grade students all drew mendhi hand and feet drawings over the past 3-4 weeks. Some even tried emulating the henna "cone" with little puff paint squeeze bottles. We learned the elements of henna see http://www.hennapage.com/henna/what/lineart/index.html and the language of India through it's art and symbols. No henna was applied to kids' skin at school. Why not? Allergies to henna are rare but a possibility. Organic henna would have needed to be prepared from scratch or purchased from a local henna artist. Permission slips would have been required. Clothes probably would've gotten stained...it was really tempting though. The kids did get mendhi style rubber stamps on hands as they left yoga, which was one of the choice activities at lunch. There is still a possibility we will henna drums at school. Stay tuned...

P.S. Doing henna on your own? Use fresh, organic henna if possible and NEVER use "Black Henna" http://www.hennapage.com/henna/ppd/ See the Resources section in the post prior to this if you're looking to purchase henna.

Encinal Eagles rock!

Mrs. Noon's henna

-  note the ABC's on my foot. 3rd-5th are studying cursive following the henna unit since many henna elements are cursive marks and as an effort to keep cursive alive!

                                                     

                                                      

                                                                               Mrs. Noon's name in Hindi

Rangoli by Bita










Namaste! Next week we are on to the wonderful world of Fiber Arts (sewing, weaving, etc). I hope to bring the calmness from these yoga and henna studies into our next round of lessons.