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Introduction to our art-based activities

We want Clara Tales to stimulate kids to be creative, and to tap into their artistic sides. As such, for every fairy tale, we’ll provide a set of art-based activities that kids can do with their parents or other caregivers, and therefore provide opportunities for connection within the family.

Samantha Kelly, MA, ATR, is an art therapist, and will be designing all the art-based activities for Clara Tales, and she’s provided a brief explanation below of the thinking behind how these activities are designed:

100% of children learn either via auditory, visual, or kinesthetic means (or any combination of these styles). Short films such as “Clara Tale” produce an auditory and visual learning experience. Art making engages visual and kinesthetic processes. When combined, short films followed by supportive art making, all learning styles are engaged and a child is able to process the experience on a deeper, more meaningful level.

Research also shows creative play supported by parents to be the most effective, healthy means for growing a child’s individual creativity, divergent thinking, and sense of self. Short films in which moral lessons are introduced can be not only entertaining for a child but also an excellent catalyst for meaningful parent-child interaction in which moral themes are further explored, processed, and “played with.”

Hit up the “Activities” category on this site to find examples of these activities and others that families can do together.

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Clara Tale

We made this film on a shoestring budget. We used props and costumes that we had to hand (or could easily pull together at almost no expense). We used camera, lighting and sound equipment we or family members owned or could borrow. And the kids in the movie are our own kids or those of friends or family members. Editing, coloring and other post-production stuff was also done by us. And of course, we wrote the story and subsequently the script too.

But Clara Tale is intended to be a prototype for what this project is all about, which is – yes – about producing a series of these short original fairy tales starring and narrated by kids. But it’s also about much more. If you haven’t yet, we encourage you to view our Kickstarter video, which is a great summary of what it is we’re trying to achieve. If you want more details, or just a written version, you can check out our About page.

The point is that, although we want to provide meaningful, wholesome entertainment, we also want to provide a starting point for parents or other caregivers to have meaningful conversations with their kids, and also want to stimulate kids to be creative in a variety of ways.

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Art-based activities for Clara Tale

Here are some art-based activities designed by Samantha Kelly to go with Clara Tale. For an introduction to these activities, please hop over to this post.

“Clara Tale” introduces themes revolving around the importance of love and interpersonal relationships as being valued over material things.

The following are examples of various types of art making and creative play which support the ideas advocated in “Clara Tale.” Such activities are meant to be engaging for both the child and the parent yet relatively simple and accessible for busy families.

Parents may create their own artwork in tandem with child or, depending on the needs of the child and the project, work together with the child to create one artwork.
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Behind the scenes on Clara Tale

Making any movie is difficult – there are so many things that can go wrong. But when you do it with little kids, with some of them as young as six months, there are so many more things that can go wrong. But at the same time, it’s a lot of fun, and you just never know what is going to happen.

We’ve put together this short collection of “outtakes” and funny things that happened while we were filming Clara Tale. We plan to do this for all the fairy tales we film. We’d love to hear about your favorite moment, so leave us a comment below.

(And as you’ll see, the little girl in the film is named Clara in real life – that’s where the name for Clara Tale and Clara Tales comes from!)

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Making the owl costume from Clara Tale

This is great if you’d like to do something a bit more involved than the art-based activities rom Clara Tale, since this takes a little more prep time and takes a little longer. But hey – at the end of it you’ll have a cute little owl costume!

Here’s the list of materials and supplies you’ll need (this list is also in the video):

  • Onesie, or a t-shirt or other top if you’re making it for a bigger kid
  • Felt sheets – to cut out shapes for the feathers on the body, and for the eyes and beak on the mask. We got these from our local craft store, Michael’s, for about 29 cents each. Get as few or as many different colors as you’d like to use.
  • Feathers – these will be used on the mask. We got a small bag from Michael’s for about two dollars.
  • Scissors, preferably fabric scissors.
  • Pins
  • A glue gun.

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Kickstarter video

This is a YouTube version of our Kickstarter video. It’s a great introduction to our project, and we hope you’ll support us. You can find our Kickstarter page at this link. Our Kickstarter is now done – thank you to all our backers. We raised just over $5,000!

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The Owl learns to crawl

This is a break from our usual programming, as they say. But since a lot of people seem to think our little “owl” is the best thing about Clara Tale, we thought you might like to see what he’s been up to since we made the movie. Among other things, he’s been learning to crawl.

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Art Therapy

Here’s a description of art therapy, if you’d like to know more about it. It’s written by Samantha Kelly, MA, ATR, who creates all our art-based activities for Clara Tales.

Whenever I mention my work as an art therapist, I always get a few comments asking what art therapy actually is and how it works. That, my friends, is a good question. No one having any idea what you do is all part of the art therapist territory. This also means that I get lots and lots of chances to introduce people, like you!, to the wonderful world of my work.
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