Evening star., 1951-09-11
MARYLAND Mothers Run Arts Cooperative
By Betty Miles

44AnV Va oAAAAAA9 49,
mothers, the cooperative nursery
school, has given the impetus toI
another fiourishing mother-runI
project in Montgomery County.
Maryland. Now in its fourth year
the Community Arts Cooperative
is designed to provide children
from to IL years old with the
kind of creative activity found in
the best nursery schools.
It all began when three mothers
who had been active in the Silver
Spring Cooperative Nursery
School became concerned about
creative arts for their children
who had passed nursery school
age. Many groups in Montgomery
County are interested in creative
art work for teenagerS. But moth
ing was being done for the 5 to IL
year olds. nor were the public
schools, with so many pupils per
art and music teacher, providing
such activity.
Mrs. Blanche Schnapper, Mrs.
Aaron Nadel, the first chairman,
and Mrs. Charles Holstein decided
to do something about the situa.
ton. They had a group of mothers
already organized to draw on, of
course-tl1e women in the Silver
Spring Cooperative NurseryI
School whose children, like their
own, had outgrown nursery school. |
They also were able to reach many
mothers through the Council of
Cooperative Nurseries in Mont
gomery County. Today, 900 fami-
lies are in the Community Arts
Cooperative with the actual
planning and running of the group
still in the mothers hands.
Interest in your child grows
when you work in a cooperative
nursery" Mrs. Arthur Abrams, the
present president, explained. Ones
ability to see further needs, and to
meet them. is developed by such
activity. Some of the mothers find
themselves today shutting back
and forth between work in the
nursery and work on the arts
program, depending on the ages
of their children.
Two things were mustS for the
founders Of the arts cooperative:
The classes had to be creative
ones, and they had to be held near
the homes of the children.
In this kind of program, the
children are participators and
creators in activities designed
to help them grow and express
themselves and at the same time
develop understanding and appre-
citation OF music and dancing and
drama. The emphasis is on their
creating the dance they do and
the play they perform. on painting
their own kind of picture. Typical
OF the results was one little girl,
shy and awkward, who bloSsomed
through the opportunity for ex-
preston and muscle development
provided py the class in creative
dance.
Distinguished instructors were
recruited to carry out this work.
Evelyn Davis was the first.
teaching four classes of creative
dance-three for children from
4 to II years, one for mothers
and the program was an unquali-
fed success. The next year. the &
number of classes was doubled. {
Miss Davis comes to the Rock [
Creek Cabin. the property of the I
Maryland National Capital Park
and Planning Commission in
Chevy Chase, to teach these
classes. Square dancing for;
adults, with Albert Mcpherson as /;
caller, was introduced in l948,
too, and is taught twice weekly
at the same place. Mrs Cornelia
Yuditsky, who directs the Creative
Art School for children in Wash
1ngton, began her classes in art
for youngsters from to II years
old the second year, and tumbling
for boys from 6 to IL years was
introduced. This will be taught
this year by Mr.. Dave Fields. of
the University of Maryland. Last
year. pre- instrumental music,
taught by Mrs. Lee Sneider, wasl,
added for children from to 10,
with classes given at the Silver
Spring Cooperative Nursery
School. Mrs. Sneider studied at
the University of Michigan and
at the Juilliard School of Music.
There will be an art class in
Bannockburn, too, this year, be-
ing taught at the request of moth
ers in a cooperative nursery |