Last night, while sitting at my nephew’s baseball game, the antics of my other nephew reminded me just how important it is to young children that we adults see them. We had a rousing game of peek-a-boo going on, for one, but about every five minutes he climbed up the bleachers to get a hug from mom or dad or show us something he’d found, or share something he’d seen or said while playing with his cousins.
I’ve written about this need before here, along with some insights from Becky Bailey about how we can respond to children in such situations without judgment. One of the advantages of noticing our children and observing them without judgment is that they are less inclined to misbehave from a place of seeking any attention, even if it’s negative. We can pre-empt much of this by making sure they know that, just like we did when they were newborns and we oohed and aaahhhed over every little body part or gurgle, we still see them as the miracles they are.
This morning, however, I wanted to share some thoughts about noticing kids from the book I’m currently reading, Playful Parenting. The author, Lawrence J. Cohen, Ph.D., talks about noticing, “what children need” (pg. 36). In a Kindermusik class, for instance, if your child is unusually cranky or disengaged with the activity, noticing what he or she needs might include wondering if breakfast was sufficient or if the big trip to the zoo yesterday means being extra tired today. Maybe some quiet time away from the commotion is in order.
Most pointedly, the author says, “I’m always amazed when adults say that children ‘just did that to gedt attention.’ Naturally children who need attention will do all kinds of things to try to get it. Why not just give it to them?” (pg. 36).
Of course, there are many reasons I don’t often given my kids enough attention, as I’m sure there are for you. There is food to get on the table, laundry to clean, and sometimes, I’m the one who needs some attention, too! (In which case, a lunch with my friends is clearly in order.) Still, remembering just how valuable it is for the long-term emotional health of our kids can be extremely important.
The author also adds that it is important not to “cut off” our kids when “they are talking about ‘unimportant’ things, or when they are chattering away about nothing, or when they are repeating themselves” (pg. 39). I know I don’t like it when my kids cut me off or ignore what I am saying—and the best thing we can do is teach by example, right? Eventually, they’ll get around to the part that is really interesting for us, and then the payoff will be pretty great.
I’m knee deep in summer sibling rivalry. As an only child growing up, I often find this kind of behavior to be extremely draining, and the logic behind it escapes me. Today, however, in the middle of the 4th of July family madness, I’m going to see how well the day goes if I focus on noticing their good behavior (without judgment) and wondering what they might be needing (from me or from the situation) when they’re fighting. I’m also going to tune in to myself—to note what it is that may be preventing me from playfully engaging with them. With any luck, such a tweak may help the day go better.
Ahhh. . . summer. I’ve actually had some slow afternoons. It’s been lovely.
Kindermusik summer camps have started, of course, and the kids are having so much fun. Today I’m back for my last installment, giving you ideas of how to extend summer camp into additional themed learning. I present: Pirates! (Check out our previous installments here: 1, 2 and 3)
Peter Pan would be a great place to start. Depending on the age span of the kids in your family, there are many ways to get at the Peter Pan story. Older children would enjoy a Peter and the Starcatchers read along, or even reading the original Peter Pan story. If not, the Disney movie version is classic. You might also consider Hook orFinding Neverland. And for a quick respite from the outdoor heat, Jake and the Neverland Pirates is a hit at my house.
Go for a neighborhood stroll, and have the kids walk a plank every chance they get (curbs make for great planks). Feeling extra adventurous? Send (or go with) the kids on a neighborhood treasure hunt in the neighborhood. There’s a simple scavenger hunt here. And then you can come back home for some pirate booty! (Popsicles are easy—but you could pick up some Rolos or chocolate coins at the grocery store if you want to go that route).
Teach the kids how to use binoculars. OutsideMom.com has some great tutorials and ideas here. Not a telescope, but perhaps a little more accessible. Of course, if you have a telescope, it would be fun to take it out and do some similar activities.
Finally, dig out all your dress-up jewelry, bandanas and pretend swords and let your kids’ imaginations take over.
Oooh, summer is getting closer! I am equal parts thrilled that I don’t have to get up early to get anyone to school and terrified of the inevitable sibling spats that happen with the kids. Fortunately, you all have me to do the legwork of creating some ways to extend our Kindermusik summer camps into some longer activities to keep the kids busy, giving them some structure on your terms. Here we are with part 3! (Check out parts 1 and 2)
Be sure to check out the @Home materials for sure with this unit. In addition to a great video, there are some fun rhythm activities right at your finger tips.
This camp focuses on rhythms and drumming. Outside of class, you might spend some time investigating a little about each country mentioned in the book we use.
Go here to learn how to make Malian mud cloth. The author has some great background information, a link to making a virtual mud cloth (as she says, “for the mud-averse,”) (but really, what kid doesn’t like playing in mud?) and directions for this kid-friendly activity.
Time for Kids has a fun virtual sightseeing trip to Nigeria here.
Antonio Sacre, storyteller, shares an amazing perspective about trying to find his roots in Cuba. It may or may not be interesting for your kids, but it certainly is worth your while.
For something a little more kid-friendly and still Cuban-centered, introduce you children to Celia Cruz, the Queen of Salsa, singing the numbers in Spanish on Sesame Street:
As promised, here is another installment of making the most of summer camp, along with a nifty pin-able image of a cute dog to help you bookmark the page.
In My Garden:
Plant a garden together. Roots, Shoots, Buckets and Boots is one of my favorite books to draw from for inspiration. How delicious does a pizza garden sound?
Visit Red Butte Garden. They have an especially fantastic children’s area.
Last May in the blog, I wrote a couple of blog posts (check them out here and here) about some easy ways to expand our Kindermusik summer camps into some extended opportunities for learning and fun. I can’t believe it’s May again, but since I’m planning our summer, I thought I’d pass along some of the ideas we’ve come up with in our family this year.
One of the best weeks of my entire parenthood life (and it only gets better with each passing year, the more sepia-toned my memory becomes) was when I did a Zoo Train camp at the studio and combined it with trips to the Hogle Zoo and Tracey Aviary. I think the fact that I was able to make all sorts of connections with my kids between what we were singing and what we were seeing at the zoo appealed to the educator in me. I loved seeing the look on my kids’ faces as they listened to the song of the kookaburra, after just singing about it the day before. Somehow, even before fully understanding the value of being mindful, I was able to capture the gift of being with my kids, just for that moment, as they were right then.
Of course, I don’t want the doing of anything I share here to get in the way of being mindful and present with your kids. That’s part of why I’m passing this along—completing some of the planning for you so that you can keep things as simple as possible. Nor am I suggesting you complete every activity I suggest here—take what you like and make it yours.
Jazz Kitchen:
Listen to Nighttime Jazz on kuer (90.1 on the FM dial, or there are links here to find online listening options). Steve Williams hosts, every evening from 8 pm to midnight. A drive home from any activity for us includes jazz.
Check out Nicky’s Jazz for Kids—it’s a great CD and/or book and is available at the Salt Lake County library.
Check out the pbskids.org website about Jazz—this kid-centered website talks about the history of jazz, and some fun activities for writing lyrics, checking out common jazz instruments, and exploring patterns and rhythms essential for jazz composition.
Ken Burns’ Jazz documentary is currently on Netflix. Your kids might not want to sit through all ten episodes, but checking out some of the episodes centered on your favorite genres might make for a nice 20 minutes together.
Here’s a cool short movie called the “Silhouettes of Jazz,”—it “outlines the history of traditional jazz music in a virtual walkthrough of a shadow art museum,” and is worth your time!
Of course, you can make some “noodles from scratch.” Here’s the Pioneer Woman’s recipe for homemade noodles or you can get some from the store to use in this delicious, kid-friendly spaghetti recipe from Jamie Oliver.
Prince and Princess Camp:
Check out one of the princess-themed books from the list A Mighty Girl has compiled—a great way for your kids to see that princess don’t always have to dress in pink or have wicked stepmothers.
Do I even need to suggest another viewing of Frozen? Maybe you could go old school with a showing of Pete’s Dragon.
Have a pretend tea party. Or, make some simple sandwiches (pb&j) and cut them into stars or circles for a fun lunch. Homemade ice cream sounds delish, too!
*Introduce your kids to Peter Paul and Mary’s Puff the Magic Dragon, if they don’t know it already. (and try to explain what Mary is wearing and why!)
I’ve been volunteering at my daughter’s preschool all morning, where I got to observe first-hand the value of “being a helper.” At every turn, the teacher was asking kid to be good helpers, good listeners, good friends–an interesting thing to note after reading this NPR article this morning.
In the article, the author, Maanvi Singh, notes the power of asking kids “please be a helper” rather than “please help me.” Researcher and psychologist Christopher Bryan has published a study in Child Development this week in which he notes, “While the children were playing, an experimenter gave them various opportunities to lend a hand. Preschoolers who got the talk about being helpers actually dropped their toys to offer aid 20 percent more often than kids who heard a lesson about helping.”
Apparently, it even works on adults. “Being a voter” is more important than voting.”
Erik Erikson defined the third stage of development as “initiative versus guilt.” In other words, children about the age of three begin expanding their abilities, learning new vocabulary, or working on projects alone or with families. Certainly, there are some cultural differences around the world; however, in the United States, where we are inclined to offer choices in parenting (“Do you want to wear the white shirt or the black one?”), children begin to develop a strong sense of themselves from a young age.
However, through this, Erickson noted that children’s beliefs about themselves are not always realistic. How many times have I asked my preschooler, “Do you need help pouring that juice?” and to have her decline—only to then spill juice all over the counter?
Eventually we figure out that we can’t do everything. But it’s super important to have this attitude when you are 3—think of all the new skills a child that age has to develop. If they think they’re not even capable of doing it, they might not ever even try.
As adults, we all go through periods of self-doubt. Yet one more thing my kids teach me, when I remember to learn from them—the power of seeing myself as a “risk-taker,” so that I can have the courage to fail, if it means opening myself up to succeed.
Oh, and I also need to remember to ask them to be my helpers.
Simultaneous action, development, or occurrence. The state of operating or developing according to the same time scale as something else. “Some individuals do not remain in synchrony with the twenty-four-hour day”
–Google Dictionary
(For the similarly named song by The Police, click here.)
In human development terms, synchrony is the dance that happens between babies and caregivers, right around three months of age. In highly technical terms, it’s what makes adults go completely ga-ga when a baby smiles at them—suddenly, we get huge smiles on our faces and we start talking like we forgot all those grammar lessons from fourth grade.
Come into a Sing and Play Kindermusik class and observe the way moms, dads, grandmas and grandpas interact with their babies. Synchrony abounds. It is part of why Kindermusik is about developing the whole child, in this case, social skills.
Kathleen S. Berger, in her human development book, Invitation to the Life Span (2014), writes:
“One study found that those mothers who took longer to bathe, feed, and diaper their infants were also most responsive. Apparently, some parents combine caregiving with emotional play, which takes longer but also allows more synchrony” (pg. 141).
Interestingly the adults are the ones who imitate the babies, not the other way around. This explains why newborn babies don’t elicit the same response from us. They get plenty of oooh’s and aaaah’s, but no peek-a-boo games.
What happens when we don’t react this way, when we don’t give the kids this attention? Ed Tronick, the chief researcher on the still-face technique, shows us (fair warning, it might be really hard not to reach through the computer and give the child some love, but rest assured it doesn’t last long, and ends well):
So, obviously, this is something that comes naturally to us as caregivers, whether or not we’re enrolled in a Kindermusik class. But Kindermusik has given me is a large array of songs that I can sing to help slow me down during those routines and to engage in this responsiveness cycle with my children. I can spontaneously burst into a rendition of “Bubbles,” while I’m bathing them, “I See You,” when doing a peek-a-boo game, or “Little Red Wagon,” when I’m bouncing one of them on my lap waiting for the oil to get changed. And, gratefully, these are songs that I can actually tolerate listening to while we’re driving (unlike Other-CD’s-That-Must-Not-Be-Named).
And, as I have said before, I especially love coming to class and having that time with them there. While I strive for it daily with my kids, it is the one place where I can come and just be truly present with them—no laundry to worry about, homework to get done, or kitchen floors to mop.
Erik Erickson’s theory of the psychosocial stages of life has indelibly shaped the course of the study of human development since its creation. Certainly, the theory is not perfect, and others (such as B.F. Skinner, father of operant conditioning) have established differing theories of human development. Nevertheless, without Erikson, we wouldn’t ever use the term “identity crisis” to describe the angst that teens go through during adolescence, nor would we work to make sure that our newborns felt secure in their attachment to caregivers.
In my secondary teacher training, and again in my Kindermusik training, I learned a lot about Erickson’s theory, though in the context of children and adolescents. In the last couple of weeks, however, I have been studying about human development during adulthood and late adulthood stages. The juxtaposition of early childhood development with my own development (now that I am officially “mid-life”) fascinates me.
Of course, like anything we learn, when something applies to our life, it sticks with us. While I probably did have to regurgitate all of Erickson’s stages of life for some test somewhere along the line, it is now that I am actually in this stage of “generativity versus stagnation” that I can get my head around why it is that as a parent and educator I feel so strongly about being productive and caring.
Generativity, as Erickson defined it, is all about getting outside of ourselves and caring for others. We need to feel productive. There are ways that this occurs—through art or other creative pursuits, through employment choices (where possible), and through parenting or otherwise contributing to future generations. If it doesn’t happen, we stagnate and feel, as Erickson put it, “personal impoverishment” (Erikson, Erik H. [1963]. Childhood and society (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Norton.).
I think a lot about the impact that my parenting has on my kids, especially in context of the Kindermusik studio. I often hear that I, as my child’s parent, am my child’s best teacher—this is why home materials can be so beneficial. And it is also at the core of why we offer Love and Logic parenting classes.
But how often do we think about the ways that our children change us?
Many researchers have studied the stress that childrearing can be in our lives, especially when children are young. However, reading Erickson’s comments about what my children puts things in a different perspective for me:
“The fashionable insistence on dramatizing the dependence of children on adults often blinds us to the dependence of the older generation on the younger one” (Erickson, 1963, p. 266).
(From a developmental perspective, foster parenting, step parenting and adoption all present their own, unique challenges—but these are important ways for adults to meet their generativity needs, as well, so I’m not speaking only about biological children, here.)
It’s fascinating to think of all the ways I need my kids. They have all taught me how to love certain aspects about myself. Certainly, I have changed my priorities many, many times. With my son’s new interests, I have learned much more about bagpipes than I ever thought I’d know (no sharps or flats!). I’ve also had to learn not to care so much about the messy kitchen (this is a daily struggle—both to keep it clean, and to let it go when it’s not). And, just when I think I’ve got it all figured out, they go and have a birthday, and it changes everything.
There should be some concluding paragraph here—something somewhat reflective that sums this all up for you. Unfortunately, I find myself coming up a little short with the wisdom. After all, how much more profound can it get, then to think of where I would be (for worse AND for better) without my kids? The ways our kids depend on us, the way we depend on our kids—I’m sure this rests at the pinnacle of why there is so much joy and so much pain when it comes to being the child or being the parent. For those moments of joy, I give thanks. For those moments of pain, I also give thanks, though sometimes not until much, much later.
Today, may you have a mindful day of generativity.
The Blue Man Group came to my daughter’s school this week to teach them a little about what they do. You can read more about it here. My husband and I saw them in Las Vegas over New Year’s—I know I’m late to the party in discovering them, but I instantly fell in love.
I could probably write dissertation on the history of drums, and many people have done just that, with more expertise and eloquence than I can. Nevertheless, here are some interesting tidbits for you to think about, next time you find yourself drumming in Kindermusik class:
You don’t actually need a physical drum to do percussion for a song. While people have been using their bodies for percussion for centuries, the modern, human “beat box” developed as hip hop and rap began implementing drum machines in their music, starting in the 80’s. Of course, it didn’t take long for the human beat box to infiltrate all types of music:
Though it seemed obvious to me once I learned it, bagpipes are either “on” or “off.” A piper cannot employ volume swells. Therefore, the drums in a pipe band (though they have many functions) serve to lend a pipe band further interest through the addition of dynamics:
Steel drums from Trinidad and Tobago aren’t really drums—at least, not in the way we think of a snare drum or bass drum. They are called “drums” because they originate from oil drums or other similar steel containers. They are a percussion instrument, of course, but they belong to the “idiophone” group of instruments, rather than the “membranophones” (the difference being whether one is striking a membrane to cause a vibration sound, or the whole instrument itself). Being idiophones, the steel drums are related to wood blocks, triangles and marimbas (all instruments we get to play with at the studio!).
What a plethora of possibilities for participation n percussion!
I find the science of how music connects to memory to be fascinating. Not only does it aid in language acquisition, it actively connects with our “autobiographical memories,” according to a study published by Cerebral Cortex and as reported in 2004 in LiveScience. The author writes, “(E)vocation of autobiographical memories and associated emotions by music counts among the most poignant experiences associated with music,” and shows in his study that music is tied up in our memories because they are both activated in the same spot of our brains, the medial pre-frontal cortex (MPFC). This is true even for Alzheimer’s patients—they can “recall songs from their distant past,” even when they have lost other, substantial memory, because the MPFC is one of the last areas in the brain to be affected by their disease.
The summer I was 15, my parents and I took one of the best trips of our lifetimes. With our little pop-up trailer, we drove from Salt Lake City to Washington, D.C., and back home through parts of the south. We ate at a fantastic Italian restaurant on Dupont Circle, stood in awe while watching the changing of the guard at Arlington, toured Monticello, got a flat tire in the scorching heat of Oklahoma, witnessed the most incredible lightening storm through the panhandle of Texas and climbed through the ruins of Mesa Verde.
Of course, being 15, and an only child, much of the time I spent “tuned out” on my Walkman (speaking of memories). So, when I wasn’t listening to Frankenstein on tape (now they’re called “audiobooks,” but I still find myself inclined to call it a book-on-tape, as it actually was “on tape”), I found myself engrossed in U2’s Rattle and Hum, which had just come out. It seemed the perfect soundtrack for the trip—just enough rebellious spirit in the music to quench my need to disengage from my parents from time to time. And lyrics that, more often than not, seemed to match our experience on the road: “like a drifter needs a room,” and “a highway speaks of deserts dry, of cool green valleys.” I ask you, is there any better place to hear “The Star-Spangled Banner,” (at the time, my first exposure to Jimi Hendrix) than when you’ve just come from a walk along the Mall? Even today, when I hear those opening lines, “This is a song Charles Manson stole from the Beatles, we’re stealing it back,” I cannot help but be transported immediately to the back seat of the car, my dad at the helm, crawling along on the scenic BWI parkway.
Several years ago, I made a mixed-CD of my favorite Kindermusik songs. (Yes, they used to be called “mixed-tapes,” and yes, I know that people now put together “playlists.” I am somewhat of a Luddite, cut me some slack?) At any rate, the other night, as we were winding down after dinner, my preschooler decided she wanted to listen to some music, and chose this particular Kindermusik CD. Soon, “Los Pescaditos” came on and I found myself on my living room floor, in New Mexico, holding my baby boy (who, at that point, was about 15 months old), with my oldest daughter and husband and all the other Kindermusik parents I was teaching at the time. It was such a calm moment of connection, not just with my children, but also with people who I had come to love during our short residency there. Lullabies in Kindermusik have been by far my most favorite moments in class, and now that my youngest is in with the preschoolers, they are by far the things I miss the most (probably because of this same music/memory connection). Not only did this lullaby calm my stressed-out mama soul at the end of a long day the other night, it reminded me of the many times I have felt joy and comfort just being present with my kids. As much as I love Rattle and Hum, that moment was infinitely more nourishing for my soul.
I talk about mindfulness a lot in this blog—about the importance of taking time to just notice what is going on around us and being present for our kids. I probably do it because it is something I have come to really value, but it is also one of the things that most eludes me as a parent. Even still, I consider it to be a gift that I have such a rich history with the Kindermusik songs that those memories and those moments present themselves to me at unexpected times.
What are some of your favorite music and memory connections? Please, share!
