The Creative Learning Project of Morocco began in September of 2001 when two women living in Fes, one British and one American, realized the need to enhance the everyday curriculum of the students at Ecole Amira Aisha of the Institute Mohamed Benabdallah School Group in the medina of Fes with a class which gave children the opportunity to express their natural creative ability while teaching them something about the world around them. A proposal to create art and craft classes for children 3 - 6 was presented and accepted by the school. The classes explored topics of interest to young students, topics such as: Animals of Morocco, All About Me, and The Shapes of My World, which, along with other lessons, were eventually gathered up and produced into a booklet entitled "Learning Through Creativity."
With the departure from Morocco of the British woman, Vivian Erickson, the director of the Creative Learning Project of Morocco, carried on these six original classes, plus adding two more classes at the Institute Mohamed Benabdallah in the ville nouvelle, a sister school of Ecole Amira Aisha. At that time, a second year curriculum of "Learning Through Creativity" was developed around the theme, "Children of the World." Along with these classes the Project was expanded to include Saturday morning and Wednesday afternoon activity classes for children from grades 4 -6 from both schools. Children in the activity classes explored a particular country, researched it, wrote a fact sheet about it, and created a craft project representing something from their chosen country. These papers and projects were presented to the parents at the closing program in June of 2003.
The following year, along with the development of the third year curriculum of the "Learning Through Creativity" course, a cultural exchange camp was added for the Institute Mohamed Benabdallah School Group, held during the April school break in Fes. The multinational staff presented a well rounded camp experience for approximately 85 children from Fes, Sale and Temara which included sports, English lessons, crafts, puppetry, and field trips. The cost was minimal and the international staff worked on a volunteer basis through the CLP "Vacation with a Purpose" program inviting internationals with certain skills to come to Morocco, spend some time touring various cities, and doing some kind of community service for the children of Morocco. Since that time the CLP has held three such camps, two in Fes and one in Temara. One of those camps, held at Al Manal in Fes, a school which joined the Project in 2004, provided English lessons for adults as well as children.
