海華中文學校 青少年領導才能營 

Hai Hwa Overseas Chinese School
Chinese Youth Leadership Camp (CYLC) 
 @ Austin College, Sherman, Texas

(July 19, 2006)

If you would like to share your pics, please submit to ArtsAndVirtue@MSN.com. We missed a lot of pictures.

Many thanks to Ms. Shannon Chen, the President of the Hai Hwa Chinese School, Ms. Irene Yeh, 
and all other teachers for including Chinese calligraphy lessons in their 2006 camp program.

We had introductory classes for about 120 students. 
This year we had students from Texas, California, Taiwan, and China.

海華中文學校於 1988 年在德州的李察遜市 (Richardson, Texas) 創立，創立的宗旨為提供在達拉斯北部地區的中國家庭
孩子學習中國語言及文化的場所。目前學生來自李察遜市及布蘭諾市 (Plano) 各地區的中國家庭及非華人家庭。

Group 1 -- 10:20 - 11:30 AM

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Among the first group, there are about 40% students that have some experience of Chinese calligraphy.
An American student volunteered to try to rotate ink stick on the inkstone.

 

After handing out the lecture notes and giving a brief introduction of the Chinese character 
evolutions and styles, we went on to the correct posture and correct way to hold a brush. 

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However, we did not have enough time to emphasize the following points about holding the brush in detail, which are often neglected by most people and result in less satisfactory progress for beginners.

Note 1 for holding a brush:

  • Use fingertips (not knuckles) of the first three fingers to hold the brush. (Using fingertips instead of knuckles is more effective in turning the brush tip for small details of the stroke. However, most resources and pictures in books use the first knuckles of the 2nd and 3rd fingers to hold the brush, which is “less effective” and prone to “unstable” results when writing detailed calligraphy strokes.)
  • The 4th and 5th fingers serve as a “cushion” or “buffer” to neutralize the forces of the first 3 fingers.

Note 2 for sitting posture:

  • Keep your head straight in a natural position. Do not tilt or strain your neck. Keep head and neck in a naturally bent curve but not too forward. 
  • Relax your shoulders. Place left palm under your right wrist to stabilize and smooth the paper.

Make both “unnatural” and “natural” natural. Having a good posture in writing is advantageous to our daily work and study.

A more detailed tutorial is located at http://www.art-virtue.com/tutorial/index.htm with video clips and guides. By using this, you may even learn by yourself! 

To get calligraphy tools and suppliers, please visit http://www.art-virtue.com/links/links.htm#4.


Then the students began to copy from the samples. The teachers and 
counselors went over to each table and helped students.

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Our first group pictures:

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Group 2 -- 1:30 - 2:40 PM

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Group 3 -- 2:50 - 4:00 PM

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During the short duration of time, I was not able to write names for all the requests... but we hope to see you again 
at Hai Hwa soon. A few students today showed their talents and really impressed both the teachers and me! 

One of the girls' grandmother is living in Nanjing, China and practices calligraphy. 
She had been watching her grandma practice for a while. She was pretty gifted on her first day's try!
We may encourage both the parents and students to continue our national treasure and cultural heritage.

We are looking for future opportunities to help those young students enjoy their happy experience 
in practicing Chinese calligraphy - one of the most glorious arts throughout the Chinese history. 

Luckily, we have 5 bookstores in Dallas that sell Chinese calligraphy and painting supplies. 
(http://www.art-virtue.com/class/index-ch.htm#why)

 

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