What We Fund

Young Audiences of Louisiana (YALA) in partnership with The Helis Foundation expanded their successful early learning program, Baby Artsplay!™, to cultural institutions across the city of New Orleans. Beginning in the spring of 2017, Baby Artsplay!™ was offered as a series of six free 30-minute workshops held weekly to engage young children ages 12 to 48 months and their caregivers in research-based performing arts experiences that support their cognitive, physical, and social development. The Louisiana Wolf Trap Baby Artsplay!™ teaching method taps into children’s innate desire for active, multi-sensory learning through purposeful singing, dancing, and movement inspired by the unique collections of each host cultural site. Recently, the program’s curriculum has been expanded to engage three- and four-year-olds as they “graduate” from the original Baby Artsplay!™.

Free Baby Artsplay!™ workshops presented by The Helis Foundation have been held at New Orleans Healing Center, Hermann-Grima House, The George and Joyce Wein Jazz & Heritage Center, The Ogden Museum of Southern Art, Ashé Cultural Arts Center, Longue Vue House and Gardens, Newcomb Art Museum, Music Box, and The New Orleans Jazz Museum, as well as at the New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA), where Baby Artsplay!™ workshops have been conducted since 2015.

As expressed by a Baby Artsplay!™ parent of an 18-month-old, “Participating with my child in the Baby Artsplay!™ classes has been wonderful for his development. I enjoy seeing him interact with the instructor and the other kids. He doesn’t understand how much he is learning, but I do.”

Baby Artsplay!™ is successful in encouraging families of young children to feel welcome at cultural institutions and provides caregivers opportunities to bond with their children while improving pre-literacy and social development skills. Young Audiences and The Helis Foundation are excited to announce the Baby Artsplay!™ series garnered national-level attention in August 2018 when Young Audiences was invited to present on the series at the annual Wolf Trap conference in Virginia.

Visit www.ya4la.org for more information and schedules.

Baby Artsplay!™ presented by The Helis Foundation virtual content

Continue learning online with updated virtual Baby Artsplay sessions. View the virtual educational videos on YALA’s website.