they have acquired. The most successful museum experiences relate folk art to the world of the children in school. "A World of Wood:' includes a series of follow-up projects for making a piece offolk art using contemporary materials and mounting exhibitions in the classroom. The teacher's guide also suggests ways of integrating folk art into the social studies, math, and language arts curriculum after the kit has been returned to the museum. Flexibility and clarity were the guiding concerns in the development of the design and format of the outreach kit. Each kit includes a teacher's guide in looseleaf notebook form with a table of contents, background information on folk art, an explanation of the themes, the slide lectures, activity sheets, bibliography and evaluation form. Since we wanted to reach a broad audience, the materials were designed to appeal to children of many different age groups. The decoys segment of the kit is suitable for children in grades one through six. The younger children use both an outline and photographs to design their own decoy. By comparing the finished drawings, they are made aware of the idea that each decoy maker interpreted his subject in his own way. Older children are given information about Elmer Crowell and play the role of a reporter interviewing this renowned decoy carver. Younger children might use the slide of a witch whirligig to design a whirligig to celebrate a favorite holiday or event. Older children, looking at the slide of the Uncle Sam whirligig and handling the Lincoln whirligig, learn that patriotism is an important theme in American folk art. One activity sheet urges them to design a whirligig depicting a current social or political figure.(During an exhibition of whirligigs at the Museum in the fall of 1981, a group of sixth graders was asked to draw a political whirligig. One girl designed a powerful whirligig depicting the Ayatollah Khoumeni standing on a wheel populated by American hostages.) The kit format relies upon an easily
recognizable set of logos. Aware of the tative of the International Paper Comlimited time available to teachers who pany Mill in Jay, Maine, and the staff of might use the kit, we adopted a duck logo the Children's Museum of Maine. The for the decoys, a spoon for household ob- Museum expressed interest in acting as a jects, and a figure with paddle arms for coordinating facility in Maine. The Intertoys. The logo is repeated in the topright national Paper Company public relations corner of each sheet for easy identifica- manager suggested sending an announcetion. The material suitable for younger ment of the program to each state teachers children is denoted by a solid black logo association. while the materials for older children is This outreach program will be available indicated by a logo of the object in outline. for loan to schools in the fall of 1982. A We field-tested the materials for the kit school may borrow the entire kit. in schools in the New York City area dur- However, to meet anticipated public reing the spring of 1982. When we took the sponse, we have also prepared twenty-five kit to the fifth grade at P.S. 59 in Manhat- teacher's guides and slide presentations tan we showed the slide presentation. which may be used independently of the Then we divided the class into two groups, kit. We hope that "A World of Wood" is one for handling objects, the other for the first in a series of educational programs activities relating to decoys. In the group which will take the collection of the discussion which followed, the children Museum of American Folk Art to schools offered some inventive suggestions for and communities across the nation. For clarifying the projects. further information contact— "A World of Wood" was made possible by a generous grant from the International Paper Company Foundation. An article Susan Saidenberg about the kit has appeared in the spring Curator of Education issue of "Community Focus:' a nationally Museum of American Folk Art distributed newsletter published by the 49 West 53 Street Foundation. The kit recently travelled to New York, N.Y. 10019 Maine for a pres \ tation to a represen- (212)581-2474