PROJECT GOLD:   CHILDREN AS ILLUSTRATOR/WRITERS:

THE RUTGERS COLLECTION OF ORIGINAL

ILLUSTRATION FOR CHILDREN’S LITERATURE

Overview

              This research project focuses on the Rutgers Collection of Original Illustration for Children’s Literature and how it can be used as a way to help young people see themselves as illustrators and as writers.   Approximately 45 third graders from Solomon Schechter Day School of Raritan Valley (SSDS) participated in a year-long project.   At their school ,   they attended workshops to help them develop and expand their own personal imagery storehouse, viewed different pieces (which have been selected and photographed) from the Collection as a way to understand important artistic concepts,   wrote and drew,   were mentored by college students, and created a final illustrated work.   They visited the Rutgers Zimmerli Art Museum to view actual pieces from the Rutgers Collection of Original Illustrations For Children’s Literature ,   attended a live presentation of illustrator   E. B. Lewis describing his own work, and, finally, exhibited their work at the Zimmerli Museum.         

The goals of the project were multi-dimensional.   Through participation in this project, the following objectives were accomplished:

Children learned to see themselves as illustrators and as writers.   They came to understand that their own experiences and/or imaginative images are wonderful stimuli for artistic and verbal creation.   Children gained experience in “stepping into” the role of the illustrator/writer by creating their own books and seeing them exhibited in the Zimmerli.

              In addition to the third grade students involved in this project, Rutgers undergraduate students explored the concepts of personal imagination as it shapes both the visual and verbal product.   College students, participating in the Honors Seminar developed in the Spring 2002 semester, used the Collection as a model, created their own pieces, “shadowed” a young person as he/she similarly created, and developed educational methods to assist young people in creating imaginative work.

              Students enrolled in the Graduate School of Education course during Spring 2002 personally observed and contributed to a curriculum which helps elementary students achieve competencies in the areas of the Visual Arts and Language Arts Literacy, both essential aspects of New Jersey Core Curriculum Content Standards.    

              This researcher provided the direct instruction to the elementary students and college students, as well as documented all phases of the project.   Through the personal experience of all phases of the project, this researcher’s personal objective was to create a scholarly article that is an important addition to the literatures in mental imagery ,   creativity , arts education, college instruction, and museum education.

Table 1 shows the project goals, tasks used to implement these goals, and the impact of the project:

Table 1 :Project Overview

Timeline

Table 2 shows the timeline for this project.   An explanation of the timeline follows Table 2.

Table 2: Project Timeline

This project began in Spring 2001, when the researcher, together with the Curator of the Rutgers Collection of Original Illustrations for Children’s Literature, began to identify those concepts that would be addressed in the classroom instruction and those pieces that best illustrated those concepts.   Some of those concepts include:   illustrating from real-life, illustrating from imagination, the notion of style, the nature of color, for example.   During Spring 2001, one of the researcher’s top graduate students assisted in both selection and in photographing these works from the Collection to be shown to the young people in their classrooms.

Also during the Spring 2001 semester, the researcher worked with the administrators and third grade teachers of the school in planning the specifics of the Fall 2001 schedule in the classrooms.   Time schedules, room schedules, and students schedules were established.   Permission letters to parents were sent home.           ,                   

              During the Summer 2001, the final decisions about the pieces were made and the week-by-week curriculum was firmed up so that everything was in place. All materials was purchased and materials readied.

              The Andrew Mellon Grant project took place in Fall 2001.   During this semester, 45 third graders participated in weekly sessions for approximately twelve weeks at their school.   This researcher, with her undergraduate assistant, visited the three classes of third graders for approximately forty-five minutes to an hour once a week.   During these sessions, students participated in creativity/imagination workshops, writing activities, and drawing activities.    Works from the Collection were featured at most of the sessions.   After each session, the researcher collected the art and writing work of each child, scanned the art, and typed the writing as a way to record the progress of each child.  

              The project will continue during the Spring Semester 2002. During this semester, the children were bused to the Zimmerli Museum .   During this visit, the students viewed works from the Collection.   During a second special event the students   attended a lecture/ demonstration of illustrator/writer E. B. Lewis, who discussed his personal artistic process.     Already selected as part of the offerings of the Rutgers College Honors Program is a course that builds in part on this project is Image to Image to Image:   The Imaginative Process of Illustrator/Writers.   The fourteen undergraduate Honors students enrolled in this course visited the Zimmerli and the Collection and shadowed three elementary students as part of their course requirements.   These honors students were exploring their own artistic processes and comparing them to professional and to elementary students.   Each of these students created an original book   to be exhibited at the Zimmerli.   The researcher was the instructor of this course.  

              Finally, in May 2002, an exhibit of the books of the third graders and the college students was held at the Zimmerli.   This final step empowered all levels of students involved to see themselves as artist/writers and their ideas as worthy sources for artistic creation.