Join the Cambridge School Volunteers this spring as a volunteer in its hands-on, outdoor science illustration program, Art & Science in One. Art & Science in One pairs volunteer mentors and elementary students for a hands-on, structured program in nature journaling. Meeting once a week in the spring the AS1 program trains volunteers to held students develop basic science skills of observation and recording, through modeling these skills and working together as a two-person team in explorations of a local habitat. Read more about the program at www.csvinc.org/scienceillustration.
Sited at Tobin Montessori School and Fresh Pond Reservation, Art & Science in One (AS1) was launched five years ago with support from the Cambridge Community Foundation and Friends of Tobin School. Once a week for five weeks every spring, each student in a mixed-grade classroom of fourth- and fifth-graders pairs up with a CSV volunteer. Together, each mentor-student pair explores techniques for observing wildlife, sketching plant and animals, and training the eye (and the hand) to capture the details of what goes on in a natural habitat. The classroom teacher and the CSV coordinator accompany all sessions.
Tobin Montessori School, the program’s home, is the first district-level certified public Montessori School in the country. The two hour sessions begin March 31 promptly at 11:30 am, and will not meet on Good Friday (April 14) or April 21.
You will receive training from a Harvard Museum of Natural History drawing instructor, and do not need to be an artist. Volunteers who are themselves eager to learn about nature, drawing, or both, who can model curiosity, and attention to detail, are sought. In-person registration is required. Visit Eventbrite (www.as12017.eventbrite.com) to make an appointment, either at 459 Broadway, Cambridge or at Tobin Montessori, 197 Vassal Lane in Cambridge, or call 617-349-6794. The program coordinator will contact you in advance of your appointment date for a brief phone interview and will answer your questions. The in-person registration will take, usually, no more than 20 minutes.
