At Centre de Santé Barton, the exploration of the five senses was quiet, intentional, and collaborative. As the groups were often less than five children, and sometimes as little as one, myself and the kids had extensive opportunities to take our art process slow.

Through an exploration of texture, sound, smell, sight, and imagination, we explored the many different feelings our senses can elicit.

We worked indoors at the EarlyOn center, a calm and welcoming space with an art table and many supplies available. Often, it was just myself and a few children who were there, so I decided this would be a great opportunity for the children to let their imagination run wild.

We used texture passports and paint to create texture prints, using the objects we had on hand indoors. A paintbrush, a rock, a pencil, the edges of tables, and more, were used to take indoor textures. I worked with three siblings who spent an hour silently investigating what textures might make interesting prints. One little girl especially loved making prints with a little plastic toy mermaid I had brought in, mentioning, “J’adore la texture du sirene.” Meaning, “I love the texture of the mermaid.” I was not expecting her next move, which was to make multiple prints with every single part of the plastic mermaid toy, but she showed me that an object doesn’t just have one or two textures, it has many, depending on how you look at it.

We also explored the sense of imagination, and during that period, only one child was present to do so; so naturally, I took that as an opportunity to indulge the imagination. She drew an image of the ocean with a man fishing, and she imagined all the fish he caught, naming each and every creature. She told me stories about the fisherman, and how he climbed into the mountain to cook his fish, and made a hilarious demonstration of her story by acting as if she was the fisherman, hiking into the mountains, and falling over and over. Sometimes, I think children just want to use their imagination to be storytellers, as displayed by this little girl at Centre de Santé Barton.