Sunday, March 11, 2012

CraftED Project: Brackloon National School

photo from 2009 Craft in the Classroom in Leitrim

I'm delighted to be invited back into the classroom as part of the Crafts Council of Ireland's CraftED programme in collaboration with National Schools all around the country and the Regional Education Centres.

Craft-makers, teachers and Crafts Council of Ireland project managers recently met for the Northwest Region at the Castlebar Education Centre to launch this year's programme and to allow teachers and craftmakers who will be working together to discuss their plans.

I'm very excited to visit the 5th and 6th class pupils of Brackloon National School near Westport, Co. Mayo for our first workshop tomorrow. Our first day will be spent looking at some Textile Art and brainstorming ideas on what we might work on together. We are then going to jump right into our sketchbooks to explore our ideas further with paint, collage and observational note-taking.

I can't tell you what we will be making because I haven't met these 24 young artists yet and collaboration is key to the success of our project. I have no doubt they will be bursting with ideas and we are going to learn a lot together! So watch this space!

For more information on the CraftED programme see www.learncraftdesign.com