Books

Post 292: Don’t Want To Go

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Shirley Hughes is an author we like a lot around here. She also one that we did not know about for a long time. She is British and some of her work is out of print, never the less, her drawings and stories capture childhood development in a visceral way and our kids love them.

One of her books entitled Don’t want to go coincidentally about a young girl named Lily who does not want to spend the day being cared for by a neighbor when her mom has the flu and her dad has to go to work.

Ultimately Lily has a great time and when her dad picks her up from the neighbors, she intones “Don’t want to go”

This episode is one that has been played out over and over in many households, and we had what I hope will be a winning moment in preparing Lily for preschool in the fall.

I played my guitar for the kids at Luke’s preschool last year. To my great joy and satisfaction I am now playing there again as a way to get Lily used to the environment and keep a connection for her upcoming attendance. The first day she was not at all interested and said over and over “me no like that!”

But low and behold after 20 minutes of singing and Lily finally getting up and joining in the dancing of her own accord, what do I hear, but “me no want to leave”

That translates a week later to her leading the charge, basically running into the school for our next “concert” she even had a request, one of Luke’s favorite songs:

My Darling Clementine

Go figure.

Post 290: Little House Grill

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Luke has been working on this for awhile, he finally asked me for some help getting one of the screws in and I asked a few questions.

How did you get the screws in? 

He screwed them directly into the 2×4, I imagined it was in partnership with a hammer, but he basically muscled the screw through the would, do you understand how difficult that is?

What is it?

It is a grilling device based on one that he heard about in “Little House in the Big Woods“. One of the Laura Ingalls Wilder books that we have read many times. When I told mom about it her only comment was, “I can’t wait to use it”

Post 266: In Praise of, not

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We try not to praise our kids,

Sounds almost criminal right? It is one of the main tenants we try adhere to from the many philosophies of child rearing that talk about raising a self confident child.

The premise is, if you praise a child, then the child will always be looking for praise as an end result and not be able accomplish things out of a sense of purpose or fun or just because they want to.

We see it in action ALL the time in the world, in both little people and not so little people. A constant litany of “you can do it, your OK”.

At the park. I have seen parents in a complete frenzy almost yelling at their children, that they were OK and that they could accomplish whatever it was they were trying to accomplish. What I think I see on the child’s face is confusion and often intense fear that results in a lot of crying and disillusionment.

One of the many articles that have been handed out to us at our RIE class is a chapter form Alfie Kohn’s book “Punished by Rewards“. which discusses these issues.

And do we do this without ere? of course not, if Luke makes an awesome thing out of Lego, I usually respond very praiseworthy, I guess I just try not to beat him up with it, that is the part that makes no sense.

But, why did I write this post? Because I find it amazing and yes charming that Lily will praise me and mom when we do things she like or that were done by her asking. She offers a hat to put on and when I put it on I hear, “Good Da!“

Day Two Forty Two

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Bumpy Hot Dog Lane.

I looked it up and can confirm it is purely in Luke Wallace Cline’s mind.

He started talking about the goings on on Bumpy Hot Dog Lane a few months ago, and now it is a regular part of his riffing. All I have to do to get him started is ask what’s new in the invisible newspaper (luckily he installed an invisible newspaper stand in the minivan) and he usually comes back with:

“Oh my goodness, more bad guys found on Bumpy Hot Dog Lane!!”

From this point it is often a long and involved description of what happened on Bumpy Hotdog Lane did how close the police are to apprehending the bad guys.

I love this type of meandering, especially because it comes 100% from his imagination, not from a book, tv show, movie, internet site, etc, etc.

For me a child’s imagination far exceeds anything we adults can come up with and the more we stay out of the way in their creative process, the better.

If I ever write a book, I hope to call it

Life and Times on Bumpy Hot Dog Lane

Day Two Thirteen

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PleasureIsland

I am contradicting myself. Apropos of the very last post.

I spend a lot of time thinking and talking about what the mind of a five year old can and cannot comprehend and their ability to navigate between good/evil, good/bad, good guys/bad guys.

I see in practice that Luke cannot yet comprehend the difference between a good guy and a bad guy, so why do I constantly use that as a point of discussion?

Why would I try to explain that it is not safe to be out in front of the house unless I know about it, that there are bad guys in the world and it might be unsafe to be out there alone?

I guess it is always important to keep the dialog going because it is all preparation for his life, his understanding, but sometimes I feel awfully silly espousing a belief system that he cannot be aware of.

And yet…

The other night we were reading Pinocchio, from a collection of the least 2010 appropriate book we own. A collection of condensed Disney tales. He had not picked Pinocchio, and I certainly had forgotten how EXTREMELY dark it is. Just to review, the puppet is given life and a cricket as a conscience. He proceeds to wander into a very bad group of boys all destined to a life of servitude as malformed donkey slaves. Meanwhile his father is inside a monstrous whale at the bottom of the ocean, how jeez.

We did not finish the book, Luke closed the cover and said can we please read something else, to which I gladly said yes.

It’s all sinking in I guess, perhaps it makes more sense today than it did a few weeks ago.