Art Discovery Stories

So...how do you teach your child art? And why is it important?
I think that art is extremely undervalued as a means for teaching our children and for helping them express themselves early on. Why do we wait so long to teach valuable principles that art can help instill...

Peter Reynolds Has great books, so I'll start with his...
- Letting go of Perfectionism
Ish Book

Teaching that drawing isn't about being perfect, but capturing the essence of the idea or object. I say ish to my son all the time now. And he just smiles and lets go of his perfect view...confirming to himself that it's ok...he's ok. Smiles all around.

- Exploring Deeply and Giving things a Try
The Dot

When Vashti gets frustrated and doesn't know where to start with drawing, the teacher has her sign her "marker-stab" dot and frames it. Vashti then challenges herself to do better. And her world expands into a gallery of dot-variety that inspires others. (my personal favorite!)

- Opportunities for trying new things & Observation
Sky Color

When faced with not having a blue and needing to paint the sky, she finds a new opportunity to tobserve, think and adapt in trying something new. She uses everything but blue! And it's beautiful.



More from Peter Reynolds
I'm Here (about noticing sounds, others and being present and being a friend)
North Star (about not following the path others take, just because...but taking your own path. Talk about homeschooling and entrepreneurship, eh?!)
I Am Yoga (i really want to read this one! but the library doesn't have it yet. anyone else want to request it from the library to help urge them to get it?)




There are so many other great stories by other people....
Harold and the Purple Crayon (love this simple crayon that the boy draws as he tells a little story)



Not a Box (using a box for a variety of things; sequel is Not A Stick)



The Pencil (about a boy and his pencil...then they color, then the erasers get in on the action. Pretty funny, but it leads you through the book as he draws more. Lind Harold and Purple Crayon, but supersized)


I Ain't gonna Paint No More

This one is fun for messy out-of-the-box painting. For some reason, it isn't one of my favorites though.

Art

This one takes the reader through the process of creating some art. I love that you see the pieces sepearately during the book, but then his master piece at the end incorporates lots of those original pieces that came together into one vision for him.

Look What I did With a Leaf 

Then you can get into Nature art...whole 'nother ball game, but super fun.

A Day With No Crayons

This is a good book about observing color and thinking outside the box of crayons.

Art & Max

This one is just a funny story about an artist...breaking from the still, exact portrait painting into a new world of color and exploration. I'm sure it has words, but I don't even recall them...so good to visually see the progression.

Mice

This book is all about mice who cut out paper and make portraits of themselves and the cat. Every page is their paper creations. It'd be cute to make a simple mouse with string arms. you can talk about shapes.
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Ed Emberley Books
Fingerpint or Thumbprint Books

I love Ed Emberly! This book (and a few other like it) uses simple fingerprints and then just adds dots or lines. And who can't draw those? So empowering to create! He has some holiday versions too. lots of themes within.

Picture Pie

We've been enjoying this one that is all based on a circle and cutting it into portions...



Other Books for real Art Principle Basics
Look, Look, Look

Walks you through a postcard of a famous painting and point out the basic art elements of color, shape, line, etc.

Mouse Shapes

Uses shapes for making pictures

Mouse Paint

introduces basic colors

Green

Exploring the various types of green (forest green, lime green, pea green, etc.). An award winning cute book with clever cut-outs!

Little Green

Great beginners introduction to representing movement and motion of animals and things through lines, squiggles, zigzags. Any level artist can do that! This book is particularly about a hummingbird and the boy just watches and watches it for a long time, from his window (with his paint brush). Great for pointing out the need for observation.

Color Zoo & Color Farm

These books just show you animals made from shapes, but they go shape by shape as the face changes into a new animal by changing one shape. We like just looking at it as a jumping off point to then cut out shapes and make animals, but there is no real story or anything.

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There are so many more! I have a long list of them I'm trying to get through in the next few years...but I hope to post a part two of the books that introduce you to both art and a famous artist, like "Noisy Paintbox" about Kandinsky who would create music because he saw it as color in his mind. That would be fun to create an art color project by listening to different music and trying to express self and sound.

So let me know if you know of any I can add to my list--running tab on Goodreads!

Tell & Draw STories

Here are a few storytelling ideas to inspire and empower your kids to share stories, as well as draw. Everyone can be involved and create.

Tommy's Cat

Peanuts at the Zoo

Shoo Fly...

Mathematics Creating Eyes to See

If you haven't read Beginners Guide to Creating the Universe, please do. It is a fabulous read! This book is about math and seeing it in nature, but what I really love about it is that it talks about math as a language with various layers--three, to be exact. (I will list the layers and the quotes from the book that I picked out to summarize each point)

Secular Math

What is taught in school can be called secular mathematics: adding, calculating, measuring, etc.
This quantitative approach keeps us dull to the potential wisdom that the familiar counting numbers can teach us. When imaginatively taught to people beginning at an early age, mathematics can delight, inspire and refine us. It can make us aware of patterns with which the world and we are made. Instead, math is taught as a servant of commerce, without regard for its basis in nature. It is viewed as a distant subject that instills much more anxiety than wonder and inspiration. Mathematics is seen as outside us, to be occasionally called upon, rather than woven into the fiber of our existence.

Examples: 

1. My little four year and I have been learning numbers and shapes since he was a baby, right? We have the little Melissa and Doug wood puzzles. He's put them together and since graduated to magnet pieces on a board instead. He can count and do hopscotch, etc. But does it mean anything to him? No. Not just simply doing these things. They are random and without meaning.
2. I got my son those pattern blocks that you can put together all the triangles and it makes the hexagon shape and comes with parallelograms and squares, etc. I remember loving them as a kid! And something inside me just screamed like a little kids two years ago when I bought them ("I want to play!>") So I spent money on my two year old that Christmas to buy a gift I wanted that he could play with. Otherwise he would've been content with the used toy I was planning to give him (since he doesn't know any different) . He plays with them and loves them and can see how they make patterns and fit together to make other shapes. He's building familiarity with shapes.
3. When we eat peas from pea pods it's a fun way to learn all the math functions at once. We talk about sets of threes and twos. We do the same thing with our hands by how we put our fingers together or apart with other fingers. It's so fun to ask him how many ways can we say the number five and see him rearrange his fingers (1+1+1+1+1, 2+2+1, 4+1, etc.).

Symbolic Math

The next level is symbolic or "philosophical mathematics." Symbolic mathematics recognizes numbers and shapes as patterns representative of far-reaching principles. Nature itself rests on an internal foundation of archetypal principles symbolized by numbers, shapes, and their arithmetic and geometric relationships.

According to ancient mathematical philosophers the simple counting numbers from 1 to 10, and the shapes that represent them--such a circle, line, triangle and square--express a consistent comprehensible language. The 10 numbers are a complete archetypal source-book. They are the original 10 patents for designs found all through the universe.
This Book of Nature requires first familiarity with its alphabet of geometric glyphs. We are exposed to nature's text in the natural shapes around us, but we don't recognize it as something we can "read." Identifying shapes and patterns and knowing what principles they represent allows us to understand what nature is doing in any given situation and why these principles are applied in human affairs.

Like consonants and vowels--building blocks and growth patterns--numbers, shapes and their patterns symbolize omnipresent principles, including wholeness, polarity, structure, balance, cycles, rhythm, and harmony. Each shape represents a different problem-solving strategy in the cosmic economy.

Examples: 

1. My four year old gave a talk in Primary about the Godhead. So we used a simple triangle as our visual and I had him teach the primary kids that each corner represented a member of the Godhead and how together they work like one shape and make a strong triangle.
2. I use the principle of the circle to explain to the kids I teach at the art/gym co-op I'm part of how to be a team and work together and listen to each other. Each time we start class I begin in a circle to remind us of this principle. Those who don't listen or goof off have to leave the group for two minutes before they come back in.
3. We use Covey's principle of Win-Win to discuss the principle of a line (opposite endpoints). There are two endpoints and two opinions, but as we discuss together we can join those endpoints to a line and come to a common agreement (which actually leads to the principle of a mediator and finding balance...as a principle of three. Regardless, kids can relate to our teaching better if you can pin it to a simple shape like this.)
4. We actually use the principle of a circle and wholeness a lot whenever we cook and have to stir or blend things together until they are one consistency. I tell my son to listen and to see when he can tell everything is one consistency and therefore done.

Sacred Math

To the ancients the sacred had a particular significance involving consciousness and the profound mystery of awareness. How are you and I aware of these very words and their significance?  Now that you've read them, these words are no longer just on the page. They are within your awareness. Awareness is the ultimate sacred wonder. The study and contemplation of number and geometry can show us, if we look with the eyes of ancient mathematical philosophers, that neither outer nature nor human nature is the hodgepodge it may seem.
Symbolic mathematics provides a map of our own inner psychological and sacred spiritual structure. But studying number properties and intellectually knowing the road map, the symbolism, is not the same as actually taking the journey. We take that journey by finding within ourselves the universal principles these properties represent and by applying the knowledge to our growth. We pay attention to paying attention, directing sustained attention to that which the symbols refer to within us.  When the lessons of symbolic or philosophical mathematics seen in nature are applied functionally (not just intellectually) to facilitate the growth and transformation of consciousness then the mathematics me rightly be called "sacred."

Ancient Egyptian arts, crafts, and architecture perhaps provide the best accessible examples of design that used the symbolism of the number, geometry and nature to teach been exhilarated form of self development to train initiates who knew how to translate the symbolism into meditative exercises that's true sacred geometry camera to be talked through books but must remain as part of the ancient world tradition passed from teacher to pupil, mouth to ear.

Studying contemplating and living in agreement with universal principles is a social responsibility and can be a spiritual path.

Examples: These examples are more personal because it is a personal awareness that comes from your intellectual knowledge and applied knowledge to make you a better person. But I can share a few examples of how I better clue-in to Sacred Math...

1. Study with Eyes to See: I started reading a missionary copy of the Book of Mormon this year with the intention of seeing numbers 1-7. So I use the colors of the rainbow to mark any number/shape (or corresponding principles of those). At first I didn't have a great understanding of what I was looking for, but the more I practice and seek understanding, the more I find. It's been so great to opening my eyes to clearly see other examples in nature.
2. Learn from others who are developing "eyes to see." Katie Hansen is starting her Hebrew class tomorrow and she introduces symbols and how to discover them around you. What a great way to really deepen your understanding of symbol and really open eyes to deepen meanings around you. Tresta Neil has her branches of learning that she has to give better understanding about the branches of learning and principles to find in them. Also, TJed did a book Club focus on this book (which I missed, but was probably great) and has a page on their website, I believe, about things you can do to explore this stuff mathematically.

My thoughts...
Needless to say...my homeschooling this year took a different look that the average academic ABC's approach. I spent one full month learning about circles and doing circle activities like making cookies, rolling playdough, circle-time songs, going on a circle scavenger hunt with our circle binoculars, sing songs about wheels on the bus, rolling down hills, playing with circle magnets and the list goes on.
The second month was all about lines. And yes...we spent the whole month reading books about lines and making grids and line patterns and playing with popsicle sticks. There is so much variety.
And that alone gave me greater eyes to see.

I challenge you to do it. Try it. You can make it up yourself and/or reach for others' stuff to be an aid in your journey. There is great stuff out there! You can get together as moms once a week for an excuse to try these fun things. I challenge you to set aside some academics for a trial period in this stuff and then go back to academics with greater depth and meaning. (summer is a great time, since academics are generally on hold anyway)

We need eyes to see, so we can more clearly teach our children simple truths behind all we are learning.

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After the introduction the author of this book goes on to take you through each of the numbers one through 10 and gives you experiments where you can try to apply and see for yourself how these numbers and symbols are seen in real life. It is worth doing those exercises.

Also, here are some other quotes I liked from the book:
(and my comments from the peanut gallery--ignore if you wish, they aren't as great as the quotes.)

• " The best effect of any book is that it excites the reader to self activity." Thomas Carlyle

(the same hold true for any teacher....great teachers empower their students to become great--even if that means greater than the teacher. Right parents? Is that not what we wish for our children...to be better than us?)

• "Numbers are the highest degree of knowledge is knowledge itself." Plato

(This is plato....seriously, he knew something!)

• "Our biggest failure is our failure to see patterns." Marilyn Ferguson

(giving our kids education should include cross-learning so as to understand simple truths and principles found across disciplines. If they know principles they will see patterns everywhere and be better equipped to teach themselves!)

• "Living in the world without insight into nature is like not knowing the language of the country in which one was born." Hazarat khan

(I think we can all agree our kids need natuer. But giving them eyes to see in nature will make nature more meaningful so they don't get bored out there)

• "By the Greeks geometry was held in the very highest honor, and none were more illustrious than mathematicians. We Romans have limited the practice of this art to its usefulness in measurement and calculation." Cicero

(I see a pattern of mathematical understanding lost, similar to apostasy and loss of truths. A call for a restoration!)

• "The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new lands but seeing with new eyes." Marcel Proust

(Amen. Our kids don't need new fancy ways of learning and expensive curriculum out of the reach from the average person. They need real, practical goodness and training from Mother's Who Know.)

• "Doodling is a valid tool for awakening geometric vision and self exploration. Doodles are manifestation of the unconscious. It is a geometer's method for self-discovery." Michael Schneider

(do your kids journal? Do they have a doodle book or ability to doodle, instead of just write? Both are essential)

The Power of 15: Being Present

I read a blog post the other day from a mom who said she'd try to "be present" with his child each day for fifteen minutes. I like this and think it is valuable to do daily. Now, the "15 minutes" makes sense to me as a good amount of time to practice each day, but the amount of time doesn't have to be that. It is the idea of "a little each day" that seems a great place to start.

The Power of 15 (minutes).

So let's talk about this....

What does it mean to be present? 

I think of when I talk to my four year old and tell him to listen to me while I'm talking to him. I say to  listen with your whole self: eyes looking, ears open, mouth closed, body still, brain focused. So...being present to me, is real, true listening--observation and attention with all your senses and internal workings of heart and mind.

How are we doing as adults?
Are we teaching our kids to listen well, when we haven't learned to do the same?
Are we being present with them?

Granted...we have tons of things vying for our time and attention. But have we tried to prioritize our life, errands, busy-ness and tasks so we can place focus on what matters most? I know I'm constantly guilty of this. And this is why I am writing this post! Hopefully it will clarify for me more ways to focus on my kids. Because this is life! Learning and relearn to focus and simplify and do what matters most. And I can't do it alone. I need help. Do you?

I like this idea of fifteen minutes a day, but I would like to extend that thought into other areas of our life...specifically with relationships and priorities.

What are our priorities?
Or should I say "who" are our priorities? 

Knowing this can help us understand where we need to be present most.
Here's what came to mind this morning as I contemplated this concept of "fifteen minutes."

15 minutes with...

• God I like to wake up before my kids wake up. This is the ideal. It doesn't always happen. But, when it does....wow! My day goes so much better. My brain actually can do math. My temper doesn't flare at kids not obeying before three strikes..... Not every season for me is this possible (like when I have a baby and am tired all the time, just trying to keep up. Gosh...that seems to be a whole year. hehe). But, when I have that desire and joy, and don't approach it guiltily as a dread-laden task, then my day is infused with purpose and direction. I even bought a pretty study journal that I wrote various things I wanted to study about in the front. When I'm feeling go-getter, I pick a topic i want to study and delve into the scriptures (but I haven't felt that way wince I had my baby a few months ago, so I currently am just going through a cheap copy of the BOM with colors for a specific theme I'm trying to discover.) Sometimes I'll just watch a Mormon Message or read/watch a General Conference Talk. I bought a beautiful wooden box carved with the SLC temple on it and I keep the current cheap copy in it as a reminder to take time each day.

• Self  I love doing "awareness yoga" first thing in the morning when I wake up (either before or after my scripture reading). This is a fancy made up name for laying down and doing whatever stretches and thinking I want. Talk about stress-free and low-expectations. Who wouldn't want that kind of workout? I do this so I can wake up, become aware of all the little muscles and feelings I have inside myself, and to start warming up my brain to have thoughts about my day and the direction I may want to take. All of this is part of it, but I don't have an outline for things I have to think about or not. I just let stuff start to flow in as I become aware of body, mind and spirit. There are two other times I take with myself too (which, come to think of it may make me seem a little selfish, with this getting three times the 15 minutes. hehe): During quiet time my kids take their nap or do reading (12-2) and I get "me time" to do something fun (which generally is something nerdy and involves reading, writing or researching). At night I like to journal a few thoughts to explore my feelings and unwind them. I don't always do this, but keep my journal by my bed in case I can (and to give my poor husband a break from my incessant chatter exploding from all the stuff going on through my brain!)

• Spouse Speaking of hubby. We like to get the kids for bed, do our own things, and then connect at 9pm as we start to unwind and get ready for bed. Monday's this is folding landry I threw on the bed. Hehe. Sunday might be our planning session to go over our week so we are on the same page. Friday or Saturday this would be a date or movie or something. In winter it may be a "tea time" to just have an infusion and bite and chat (like Captain Picard on Star Trek). Other times it may be being together, but me writing in my journal and him reading something, or reading a book together. Or a little footrub, etc. The possibilities are endless, but the time frame is a constant. (Again, this is all ideal. Life happens and kids are NOT always angels and sometimes are still talking to themselves and banging on walls with their feet because they are still hungry two hours later, when they should be asleep already! ugh. But...setting it up is the first battle and then dealing with occasional disturbances is the second. One battle at a time, I say.)

• Child This is the most easy sometimes. We are surrounded by our kids. We have to spend time with them (even more so when homeschooling). We have daily quiet time (12-2, unless life happens at times, which is fine if it's 25%, rather than 99%). I use that time to take one-on-one time to read with Ethan from 12-12:30. This calms him down and gives me that "one" time. My husband gets it in at night for storytime, where he can actually talk to Ethan about his day too. During that time I get my one-on one time in with my 2 year old as I read to her then. And my baby gets it in while I nurse...as I have learned to stop using my ipad during that time and be aware of her more fully.

• Family Taking time to be all together as a family is great too. This is dinner time for us. Or on weekends having a longer time: a family date or outing, or a Sunday night "Classical Hour" to read a classic together, or Monday Family Home Evening to learn and play together around a religious theme.

• Nature I sometimes can kill two birds with one stone (though that metaphor might not be the most approriate for this bullet point. Oh, pun intended). For example, if I go out in nature and commune with God, or take that time to journal or draw, for myself. Regardless, I've found that, like good ole Jason Mraz sings...getting back to Earth and putting our hands in the dirt and feet on the ground is very "grounding." Did you know that there have been studies done about the literalness of being barefoot? If you were to go for a run and then come back and take a scan of your knee, there would be red and orange thermal imaging colors around the knee. But, if you were to then go barefoot for 15 minutes after that, the thermal colors would shift from warm to cool colors, showing a decrease in the physical tension and temperature. Wow. Serious. IT's also good if you feel affected by EMF stuff (like telephone wires and electricity from cell phones and such...which really can interfere with our own body's energy). Ok, I'll stop here. But go for a walk or something. :) 

The end. For now.

Brain gym Notes

Learning is natural, joyous and continues throughout life. But during life we may get stifled in our learning and developing. "Learning blocks" are an inability to get through stress and uncertainty of a new task. We are all "learning blocked" to the extent we haven't learned to move our bodies. There is a lot of research being done to show the effects of body movement and coordination improving the brains functions and vice versa. The two are very related. This is why many sports and martial arts are starting to incorporate not just stretching warm ups, but also meditation and breathing exercises to warm up the mind and improve the synergy of using both body and mind well.

A relatively new technique being implemented a lot in teaching children and in workplaces is called Brain Gym. This approach is based on the premise (that has been thoroughly researched and proven) that the brain and body connection is important, and that working on one will improve the "block" in the other.

Here are some principles of this method:

1. Draw out: intelligence is inborn

2. Focus: attention follows intention

3. Notice: we learn what we actively experience

4. Move to Learn: growth is the search for balance (move from fragmented state to integrated)

5. Interconnect: each of us is affected by every other

Teachers help the child to... (Notice, choose, participate)

1. Notice how they are learning

2. Recognize whine they have learned something

3. Identify what learning is

4. Imagine what the next learning experience will be

A few quotes:

"Ignorance is the failure to notice (and failure to notice that)."

"Knowledge is experience; everything else is just info. Learning is creating new memories."

"Play is the natural ability to interact sportingly with others and the environment, with no fear of failure or mistakes. It is a practice in kindness--no aggression or competition. It is being in touch with a world in touch with us."

"Purposeful attention is a natural, relaxed search for structure. Reactive attention is a survival-based unequilibrium."

"Renewal or transformation is to move from a fragmented to an integrated state (to bring balance of energy and creativity)."

There are three dimensions of the brain that correlate with the body:

1. Focus Dimension

This deals with front and back parts of the brain, or one's vision/attention/comprehension (ability to identify significant information from insignificant). This area deals with the question "where am I?" Focusing on this dimension helps improve full expression of self to be ready, willing and able to move.  Helpful for those with dyslexia

- front lobe is related to new information or future information

- back lobe/brain stem: old information or the past

Activities: cross crawling, walking/crawling, double-hand symmetrical doodling, arm tracing infinity sign

2. Laterality Dimension

This deals with left and right hemispheres of the brain, or one's ability to communicate (understand whole and parts or symbols and their meanings). Working on this dimension includes the use of eyes, ears and movement, and improves oral and written language.

- left brain: analytic (parts to whole) details, time, sequences

- right brain: gestalt (whole to parts) intuition, synthesis, no time, metaphor

Activities: 

3. Centering Dimension

This deals with the upper and lower parts of the brain or the ability to organize. This area deals with the question, "where is it?" And is needed to have balance between reason/intellect and feelings/emotion so as not to feel scattered. Improving this area brings better organized though, speech and action so one can create deeper associations and connections for deeper learning.

Activities: 

There are four other dimensions listed, that seem good for additional info. But I love the fundamental three as the main focus.

4. Motivation Dimension (attitude)

5. Cranial Movement Dimension (rhythm)

6. Breathing Dimension (power)

7. Body Regulator Dimension (self-management)

Helpful LEarning STrategies:



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For more brain 101 information click here for a simple post about the areas of the brain.