
Monsters in your School
Calling x4 D15 Primary School Class Groups
Dance in Your School
14 & 21 March 2025
An Event Celebrating Early Arts
Thursday 11th May 2017
10am-2.30pm
Fee, Fi, Foe Fum ... Join Us For Some Toddler Fun!
A host of wonderful artists awaited the little ones for a GIANT Botanical Toddler Takeover Adventure!
The Toddler Takeover is a little event with a big focus on arts for the very young. For the third year and for this one day, Draíocht transformed into a big space for an adventure through story, visual arts, music and dance for the very young.
Construct, respond and play in Eamon O' Kane's Kindergarden inspired exhibition ‘A History of Play’; tip toe through the big flowers and swooping butterflies of The Giants Garden before discovering the twinkling stars and magical sounds of our Night Garden. Play with clay, dance and move and watch a story unfold!
With a combination of book-in and free drop-in events, children were invited to explore the little spaces that big people don’t usually see; under chairs and through mysterious curtains, on the glass and up the stairs - they travelled with us to new exciting and sometimes hidden places! Armed with just their imagination and natural curiosity, they explored colour, sculpture, weaving, making and construction in our Galleries and Workshop Spaces! There was also a Teeny Tiny Takeover space dedicated solely to adventurers under 18 months.
Roam Free @ Draíocht
Time: 10AM-2.30PM
Cost: Free Event, REGISTER @ BOX OFFICE ON ARRIVAL FOR YOUR FREE TICKET
AGE: Activities are designed for 18 months - 4 years but younger and older siblings are welcome in the roam free areas.
Location: Roaming all over Draíocht
Event Information: These creative spaces are free open spaces for self-directed play and inventiveness. Follow the Foyer Footprints, look under the chairs, around the stairs, beneath the tables ... In the Ground Floor Gallery, explore colour and building in the HISTORY OF PLAY exhibition. Make your way to our GIANTS GARDEN and find a beautiful butterfly and towering flowers where the auditorium seats usually are. Here you will also find a teeny tiny takeover space dedicated solely to adventurers under 18 months. Make your way to the First Floor Gallery to our HISTORY OF PLAY Response Area, EXPLORE KINDERGARDEN PLAY, add some colourful leaves to our Kandinsky tree, weave on a felt loom and build with blocks. Today, cones become trees, lights become stars, chairs become faraway places ... play, weave, stick, build - dress for mess and enjoy!
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INTO THE NIGHT GARDEN (max 18 children)
Times:
Session 1: 10.15am - 10.45am Anne Cradden
Session 2: 11.15am - 11.45am Órla Kelly
Session 3: 12.15pm - 12.45pm Anne Cradden
Session 4: 1.15pm - 1.45pm Órla Kelly
Cost: €5 per child, with a free accompanying adult
AGE: Ages 18 months to 4 Years
Location: Main Stage
Event Information: Draw back the curtains, hear the music, see the lights, join in the story with Artists Órla Kelly and Anne Cradden. This is a magical session of shadow stories and play, in a wonderful garden where we discover the fantastic darkness of the night and the bright magic of the stars!
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BIG, HUGE, GIGANTIC STEPS (max 16 children)
Times:
Workshop 1: 12pm-12.30pm Antje O' Toole
Workshop 2: 12.45pm-1.15pm Antje O' Toole
Cost: €5 per child, with a free accompanying adult
AGE: Ages 18 months to 4 Years
Location: Workshop Room
Event Information: How does a Giant tend his garden? How does he move … how does he dance? Dancer Antje O'Toole knows all the moves and she is willing to show you too! Bust a move with your little one in this fun, contemporary dance workshop.
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CLAY PLAY (max 13 children)
Times:
Workshop 1: 10am-10.30am Deirdre O’Reilly
Workshop 2: 11am-11.30am Deirdre O’Reilly
Workshop 3: 2pm-2.30pm Deirdre O’Reilly
Cost: €5 per child, with a free accompanying adult
AGE: Ages 18 months to 4 Years
Location: Workshop Room
Event Information: Squish, squash, cut, mash, make and play with clay, just like muck in a garden it'll be a bit cold and a bit wet. Roll a wriggly worm, twist it into a snail ... Artist Deirdre O’Reilly will help you explore with clay and sensory play.
Our Artists
Órla Kelly is the co-founder and director of Early Childhood Creativity, an initiative that aims to stimulate creative thinking and activity in early years, children and their parents, and to support artists and educationalists to develop specific and creative ways of working with early years children (0-6 years). Órla is a visual artist, creative educationalist and an arts manager. She has worked with children for over fifteen years creating work in Ireland and Europe. Órla is currently working in partnership with Fingal County Council and Scoil Bhride Cailini in Blanchardstown, as artist-in-residence in Room 13.
Antje O’ Toole, holds a Masters in Contemporary Dance (University of Limerick) and a Masters in Education (Goethe University Frankfurt). Additionally, she has training in dance therapy from FITT, Frankfurt. In her teaching, her interest in the person as an ever-developing individual, the dance and the progressing relationship between the two comes together. At the very core, Antje wishes to provide a class where the student can experience him- or herself as a moving-dancing self, and to provide support to become a more confident and skilled mover.
Deirdre O'Reilly is a visual artist, ceramicist and creative educator . She has over 16 years experience of working with adults and children through the arts. Deirdre's innovative creative workshops with children allow a fully explorative and experimental way of working with all types of materials. Giving children the space to look, explore, think, create , make changes and decide to fix them is all part of her exploratory process. Deirdre also engages in Collaborative arts practice and has realised several large scale public art commissions as part of these collaborations.
Anne Cradden graduated with BA in Fine Art from DLIADT in Dun Laoghaire in 2005. She loves sculpture and drawing, and her work focuses on highlighting the physical places and spaces we inhabit. She is also passionate about arts education, and has facilitated many art workshops and discovery sessions for both adults and children in a variety of settings. She is currently artist in residence for Fingal County Council’s Room 13 project at Tyrellstown Educate Together National School, where she and the students share a studio as well as their ideas and experiences.
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