The Creation Station Mid Beds Review
The Creation Station Classes
Mid Beds
Reviewed by Jane Perrone
I've taken my children, aged five and two, to a couple of Creation Station classes run by Louise Platt in Mid Beds during the school holidays.
I like to try to set up craft activities at home for my children to do during the holidays and at weekends but it's very time-consuming to set everything up and clear away at the end. The beauty of Creation Station is that someone else does all the preparation for you, right down to providing protective painting coats for the older children and splash suits for the toddlers to keep clothes clean, and it happens in a hall rather than your own front room.
The class starts with all the children sitting in a circle, so Louise can introduce herself, meet the children and explain what's going to happen. The theme for the session comes from the Magic Ideas Box, and joining in with a couple of Creation Station songs helps to break the ice and get everyone in the mood for craft. For the Halloween half term session, the children could stick their hands into this treasure chest and have a feel: the slimy black spaghetti caused squeals of both horror and delight!
Once the painting coats were on, we headed to the tables and chairs where the kids were each given a bowl of the spaghetti (coloured black with food colouring, so harmless to any children with a penchant for putting things in their mouths!) to make patterns on sugar paper. Then orange, black and white paint trays appeared for further pattern-making: for the younger children, this was a great way of experiencing new textures and developing fine motor skills in handling the slippy pasta: for my five-year-old, it was all about experimenting with just how much mess she could make.
Then it was time to decorate cut-out shapes of a pumpkin and a ghost using more paint, pasta, tissue paper and glittery shapes, then string them onto a willow cane for easy hanging. The session ended with the children returning to the circle to show off their works of art. Everything had been thought of, from the music playing while we worked, to the washing up bowls of warm water and towels nearby to clean up mucky hands (for some, including my son, this was as much fun as the painting).
The class managed to hold the attention of both my children, which is rare indeed, and at £5 a session plus a sibling for another £2.50, the class felt like good value, and each child had something to show for it at the end: with a bit of help, both children managed to create decorations we were proud to display in the window for Halloween.
For more information about The Creation Station Mid Beds visit their website here.
You can also find The Creation Station Mid Beds on Facebook here.
There are also Creation Station classes in other areas, to find your nearest class click here.