During the Stretching Our Imaginations camp we read some wonderful books that explored the idea of imagination, and used them as a starting place for collage and aquarelle art. We watched a DVD of the book The Wall by Duncan Weller and from it, created our own monsters out of sculpey. But, by far, our favourite part of this camp was our daily discussions about imagination — what it is and how we use it. We liked these so much, we thought we’d share the transcript of one of them.

Today we are going to be studying something called Imagination. What is Imagination?

Imagination is when, for example when you’re playing dress up, and you’re imagining that maybe that [pointing at the bookshelf] would be the castle. When you imagine something that could be real but couldn’t be real. It’s not really there, but it’s really there in your head. –Zach

You’re going and pretending like you’re sleeping in a castle. –Lucas

It’s like imagination is in a castle and like there is a bad castle it’s just your sleeping imagination. — Nicholas

Imagination is like when you are sleeping but you are actually not sleeping. –Eli

Christianne asks for the kids to shout out something that they imagine. When someone suggests a deer, she begins to draw one.

My dad saw a real deer before when he went off to the bathroom. Between the trees. –Jasmine

Christianne tells a story about having seen a deer eating blackberries, and explains that since she is imagining blackberries she will draw them to remind her of her memory. The group helps her imagine the deer, whether or not it has antlers, and at the same time they discuss what imagination is — because none of us can see a deer here, but we can all imagine it here, eating blackberries. Christianne begins to draw something new. After each line she draws, she asks the group to identify the animal. They shout out possibilities until they reach the right animal.

Fox. Monster. Snake. Zebra. Crab! –Group

Crab is right… Together the group finishes imagining the crab, and suggests specific things (pincers, legs) to help Christianne draw it on the page. Eli identifies the next drawing almost instantly — it is Miga. Zach, his brother, confirms that Eli is pretty smart.

Mouse? Snake? Octopus! –Group

Sam whispers a new suggestion to Christianne, Christianne begins to draw, and the class begins to guess what the drawing will turn out to be.

Whale. Scissors. Tweezers. Umbrella. Duck. Dinosaur. Boot. Skis. Dragon. Mermaid. Bird. Hummingbird. Flower. Butterfly. Woodpecker. Mosquito! –Group

How do you start to use your imagination? How do you do it? What do you actually do?

You think for a while. –Zach

Christianne introduces the story Let’s Do Nothing by Tony Fucile, about two friends who’ve done everything fun already, played every sport, and can’t think of anything else to do…

I know what they haven’t played. Volleyball! –Charlotte

The two boys decide to do Nothing for ten minutes…Nicholas makes a connection between doing Nothing and breakdancing when your parents can’t see you. Christianne tells the children to do Nothing. But kids keep wiggling their toes, and blinking their eyes, looking at each other, or laughing — which isn’t Nothing!

Nothing is very hard to do.
Conclusion: The boys tried to do Nothing, but couldn’t because their imaginations wouldn’t let them.