I'm not sure how long we’ve been creating clay Legacy Pieces with families at our HPUMP, but this was my first time to participate. Depending on how long children have been at the school, their family creates a clay leaf, hand, or foot that the children glaze and then we adults adhere to the outside of our building. With all the pounding and slab rolling and trimming and organizing that goes into getting everything set up ahead of time, it can be easy to forget the larger WHY

I don’t know about you guys, but I grew up spending most afternoons and all summer climbing trees, wading creeks, and exploring the woods behind my grandmother’s house. To this day, the earthy smell of the forest takes me to my happy place. Here at HPUMP, we recently celebrated Pumpkin Festival with a variety of exciting activities with which children could engage. The Atelier set up shop on the nature trail behind our PlayScape providing invitations for children to paint tre

One of the advantages to having a dedicated art studio in each classroom as well as a space unto itself is that we are able to offer children a wide variety of tools and media with which to express and explore their ideas. We encourage them to work with something until they feel done—until they are satisfied—as often as possible. They can use all the glue in the bottle; they can cut the tape until it’s all gone; they can have more paint and more paint and more paint. This lev

“…and at the end of the day, your feet should be dirty, your hair messy, and your eyes sparkling.” Shanti I wish there had been schools like HPUMP when I was young: a place where I could spend as long as I wanted or needed with a chosen task; a place where art experiences went beyond step-by-step assemblage of construction paper and glue sticks and, instead, allowed me to work as deeply as I wanted in messy, earthy clay; a place where my thoughts and ideas were recognized, r