10 Essential Picture Books for Young Children

I was reading a ‘picture book’ to my 5-year-old granddaughter yesterday. We had just started and she interrupted and said, “It should start with ‘Once upon a time.'”

It made me think about stories and the timelessness of them. And I know that for some folks the idea of telling a story (without a book) is daunting, let alone make a story up. I think it is so important for young children’s lives to be filled with stories. I also think if you want your children to become readers, you need to read to them so they have something to imitate. And when they ask for the same story again, and again, and again for weeks on end, overcome your own desire for something different and support the child’s natural healthy instinct for repetition. It builds brains!

For this post I decided to share some of my favorite picture books with you all. I love stories and books! But which stories? There are so many to choose from.

Recently someone at a workshop I gave mentioned a book that I had to get. Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt describes the imaginative use of books in family life, and in it she also has lists of book suggestions. 

Ms. Hunt asks; What kind of books? Stories that make for wonders. Stories that make for laughter. Stories that stir one within with and understanding of the true nature of courage, of love, of beauty. Stories that make one tingle with high adventure, with daring, with grim determination, with the capacity of seeing danger through to the end. Stories that bring our minds to kneel in reverence; stories that show the tenderness of true mercy, the strength of loyalty, the unmawkish respect for what is good.

Further she says, “Cruelty, evil and greed come into clear focus against kindness, truth and honor in a well-written story. I say well-written because nothing offends a child more than having to be told when something is mean and base or noble and good. The painful spelling out of what one is supposed to learn from a story evidences the author’s inability to create valid characters in a real-life plot. And it insults children. (p. 82)

So here is a short list of books that are extra special for me.

1. Some people have never heard of Wanda Gág. She wrote and illustrated many books for children which include Millions of Cats, and Snippy and Snappy. Both of these have that quality of repetition so important for young children’s developing brains. Her black-and-white illustrations have a magical quality with so many little details for the children to get lost in. After Disney’s Snow White movie was released, she translated and illustrated Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs as a reaction against the "trivialized, sterilized, and sentimentalized" (her words) Disney movie version.

2. Two more repetition stories - The Apple Pie that Papa Baked by Lauren Thompson, and illustrated by Jonathan Bean, takes us through the process of making an apple pie. The illustrations are simple yet rich and in the end you can just about smell the pie. A wonderful story for the autumn. 

Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain by Verna Aardema is a lovely cumulative retelling of a Kenyan folktale. It describes the cycle of water and life on an African plain told in simple language that hooks you right in.

3. Barbara Berger is one of my favorite author/illustrators. Some of her books I read to my daughters literally hundreds of times, and eventually I memorized Grandfather Twilight. Grandfather Twilight is an elderly man whose daily task is to walk through the woods as evening approaches and set the moon up in the night sky. The pictures are magical and the story is a rich yet simple poem. Two of my other favorites by Barbara Berger are The Donkey’s Dream and When the Sun Rose.

4. Rosemary Wells is a must on my list. She wrote and illustrated three Bunny Planet stories about a young bunny whose day doesn’t go quite the way he wants it until he goes to the Bunny Planet where Queen Janet makes everything okay again. Ms. Wells also offers Only You which is a love poem from a baby bear to his mom describing the things that only a parent can do. This is a picture book for grown-ups about connecting with young children.

5. Pete Seeger’s storysong Abiyoyo was made into a book with illustrations by Michael Hays. This retelling of a South African folk tale is enlivened by the multicultural community depicted in the pictures. A wonderful story of courage accompanied by a simple song. It is such a favorite of mine that I included it on one of my own story cds.

6. Miss Rumphius written and illustrated by Barbara Cooney tells the story of a little girl who wants to make the world more beautiful, and how she did it. My daughters simply loved this book and call it ‘the lupine lady book.’

7. Eric Kimmel’s Hershel and the Hanukah Goblins is for the older range of pre-first graders. It tells how, with cleverness and courage, Hershel overcomes the goblins and their spell on his town.

8. I like stories describing real, archetypal work and these two are right up that alley. How a Shirt Grew in the Field is the story of making linen from flax in picture book form. Ox Cart Man by with illustrations by Barbara Cooney tells the story of the seasons and the work that is needed therein for this 1800’s New England family.

9. Mushroom in the Rain is adapted from a Russian story by Mirra Ginsburg. It is a fantastical story of animals getting out of the rain under an ever expanding mushroom illustrated with whimsical pictures. Like The Mitten by Jan Brett, there is almost always room for more friends to come on in and be warm and dry.

10. To round off my list of 10 (I know. I cheated already) I include a story from my childhood. The Contented Little Pussy Cat by Frances Ruth Keller tells about Abner who is always happy and care-free. The other animals wonder how he can be so easy-going and when they find out his method they know he is on to something. This is also a profound story for adults about the path of spiritual development toward true presence in the moment.

Another of my favorite authors is Jane Yolen Besides all the wonderful stories she has written, she wrote a book about children’s literature. In Touch Magic, Ms. Yolen takes into the world of folk and fairy tales. She says; The best of the stories we can give our children, whether they are stories that have been kept alive through the centuries through that mouth-to-mouth resuscitation we call oral transmission, or the tales that were made up only yesterday - the best of these stories tough that larger dream, that greater vision, that infinite unknowing. They are the most potent kind of magic, these tales, for they catch a glimpse of the soul beneath the skin.

Touch magic. Pass it on.

P.S. What are your favorites? Post them and share!
Touch magic. Pass it on.

Great Snakes and Short Boys

Yesterday I told a story to a 5-year-old friend. While telling, I tried not to look too much at her, but I couldn’t help glancing over from time to time and seeing her mouth hanging open and her eyes focused somewhere far away as she sat still and listened. I was telling her a fairy tale and she was spellbound. Later in this post I include a story in its entirety for your reading pleasure and maybe you can go to that faraway place my young friend visited.

"Fairy tale" for me is distinct from other types of stories. It is a true story in imaginative pictures of an individual's soul and spirit development, a symbolic representation of the struggle to become a whole and free human being. The characters in the story are all in each human being; in me and in you. The story is the story of us all. Fairy tales describe how a spirit being descends into matter and lives as a human being, and finds its way to connecting with all of its parts, to self actualization. The path to the marriage of one's own soul and spirit is therein articulated.

Fairy tales give nourishment to the developing human being as seeds of moral strength. In the telling of fairy tales to children, the children receive images of strength and determination to carry through, to overcome the evil, to learn to see. It is not always clever and older siblings who are best suited to the task, or young, strong and handsome men. While archetypes abound, it is possible for a human being to break out of a mold, to become something unexpected. Within is the promise that weak can become strong, poor can become rich, donkeys can become musicians, and what once was lost can be regained.

If you really read the fairy-tales, you will observe that one idea runs from one end of them to the other - the idea that peace and happiness can only exist on some condition. This idea, which is the core of ethics, is the core of the nursery-tales. The whole happiness of fairyland hangs upon a thread, upon one thread. Cinderella may have a dress woven on supernatural looms and blazing with unearthly brilliance; but she must be back when the clock strikes twelve. The king may invite fairies to the christening, but he must invite all the fairies, or frightful results will follow ... A promise is broken to a cat, and the whole world goes wrong. A promise is broken to a yellow dwarf, and the whole world goes wrong. A girl may be the bride of the God of Love himself if she never tries to see him; she sees him and he vanishes away. . .A man and woman are put in a garden on condition that they do not eat one fruit; they eat it, and lose their joy in all the fruits of the earth. This great idea, then, is the backbone of all folklore - the idea that all happiness hangs on one thin veto; all positive joy depends on one negative. Now it is

obvious that there are many philosophical and religious ideas akin to or symbolized by this; but it is not with them that I wish to deal here. It is surely obvious that all ethics ought to be taught to this fairytale tune; that, if one does the thing forbidden, one

imperils all the things provided ... This is the profound morality of fairy-tales; which so far from being lawless, go to the root of all law ... We are in this fairyland on sufferance; it is not for us to quarrel with the conditions under which we enjoy this wild vision of the world. The vetoes are indeed extraordinary, but then so are the concessions ... As in the fairy-tales, all that we say and do hangs on something we may not say and do. But let us not forget that we have a veto.

G. K Chesterton, February 29, 1908, The Ethics of Fairy-Tales

I think about stories, meditate about them, dream about them, and sometimes am inspired by sudden flashes of insight. I collect fairy tales and folk tales and read them and re-read them. I read lots of stories. And I read everything I can about stories by various authors. For the children, the images speak so well on their own. For the adult, reading and rereading the same stories many times, letting them wash over you again and again, learning them well enough to tell and inwardly seeing the images as you are telling; these all will help the story to be able to speak to you on deeper and deeper levels. I invite you to let the fairy tales into your heart and listen to what your heart thinks.

This story I slightly adapted from the collection The Girl Who Married a Lion and Other Tales from Africa by Alexander McCall Smith. Here is the story of The Great Snake:

When the old chief died there was much discussion as to who would be the next chief. The old chief had a son, but the boy’s mother did not want her son to be chief. She said;

"He will never have any peace if he is chief. Every day there will be people asking him to do things. This is a boy who likes to sleep. If he becomes chief, he won't be able to sit on his chair and sleep whenever he wants. He can’t be chief!"

The elders agreed with her and so they decided how the new chief would be chosen. 

"There is a hill near our village. In the rocks around the hill lives a very large snake. Whoever can capture that great snake and bring it back here shall be made the new chief."

The elders agreed this would be the best way to choose the next chief, but doubted if anybody would be brave enough to try. When a short boy came forward and said he wished to try, they all laughed.

"Don’t be silly. Short boys can never catch large snakes."

"I should like to try," insisted the boy.

The elders tried to convince him but he kept asking again and again until finally they told him he would be allowed to try.

"That snake will kill you," they warned him. "As you go down its throat, you will remember these words of ours."

The short boy set off towards the hill where the great snake lived. As he left the village, he heard his friends crying because they thought he would never return. He paid no attention to their sorrow, though, as he knew that he would capture the snake and bring it back to the village.

When he reached the first rocks at the bottom of the hill, he stopped and listened to the sounds carried by the wind. He hears the swishing of the grass and the movement of the leaves in the trees. He heard the trickle of water and the sound of an eagle’s wings hunting high above the ground. And then he heard something else – the sound of a snake hissing.

The boy walked on until he was at the bottom of the hill. The sound he had heard was now quite loud and before too long he saw the head of the great snake appear from a crack in the rocks. The snake was angry that a short boy had come to disturb him, and with a sudden sliding it shot out and darted towards the boy’s feet.

When he saw the snake coming towards him, the boy turned around and began to run away from the hill. He ran as fast as he could, and the snake just laughed at those short legs and drew closer and closer to the fleeing boy.

Looking over his shoulder, the short boy saw that the snake was getting closer and heard its laugh. He took the calabash from his shoulder and began to drop things from it. First he dropped a lizard, and then he dropped some frogs. After that he dropped some small insects.

The snake came to the lizard and stopped. It opened its great mouth and swallowed the lizard. Then it resumed its chase of the boy, only to stop again when it came to the frogs jumping about on the ground. The snake gobbled up all the frogs, although it took some time to catch them all. Then, its belly heavy with food, it slid on after the boy, only to stop again when it came to the insects.

By the time that the snake had eaten all the things the boy had dropped from the calabash, they were just outside the village fence. The boy called out to the elders that he was back and walked slowly through the gap in the fence.

One of the elders saw the short boy and called;

"So you are back. Where is the great snake?"

The boy said nothing at first. Then, with all the eyes of the village upon him, he turned around and pointed at the gate. As he did so, the great snake, fat and slow from all its eating, slid heavily into the village.

The people let out a great sigh when they saw the snake arrive and immediately the villagers pinned it to the ground with sticks. The short boy stood before the elders and asked if could now be made chief. The elders were surprised but kept their promise and made the short boy the chief.

The short boy became a wise chief, and he grew taller.

P.S. Let me know if you liked this story. And what are your favorite 'fairy tales?'

Complaining Geckos and Other Teaching Tools

The other night I told a few traditional folk tales from around the world to a group of adult friends. In the middle of one story, at the part where a choice was made that had obvious negative consequences, one of my listeners gasped. When the story had ended and everything had been resolved, he said, “You don’t have to explain that, the story already says it all.”

From long back, long before books and libraries, even longer before computers and the internet, storytelling was the way people learned about the world and their relationship to it. Ancient folktales from diverse cultures have the same archetypes and themes because they all depict the struggle to become a whole and free human being. Folk tales and ‘fairy tales’ from the ancient oral traditions depict soul/spiritual truths in imaginative form. 

In ancient times, the shamans and the initiates at the various mystery centers around the earth developed knowledge of the natural and spiritual worlds. This information was embedded in images, as stories. In long ago times the intellect was not as developed as it is today, and so for the average person to have access to those truths, it had to be learned as a story. The stories spread from the mystery centers out into the diverse cultures of the earth. Variously called troubadours, minstrels, bards, griot, minnesingers, and more - all are the storytellers who shared traditional knowledge stories on their travels and told them throughout the lands. These old stories come from a time when humanity was more closely connected to nature and the world of gods and goddesses.

What I think of as ‘true’ fairy or folk tales give information about the path of development an individual can take to create a balanced path in life, uniting soul and spirit and body, and learning to walk in harmony. Nowadays this information would be offered as a book; perhaps The Inner Marriage of Soul and Spirit, or as a lecture, Overcoming the Materialism of Our Time. In olden times when the intellect was less prominent in the human psyche, the guide to becoming a more evolved human being was the told story. 

For children, story is an especially powerful way of learning. The images and messages young children receive in story stay with them as companions on their life's path. Fairy tales offer pictures of coming to terms with earthly existence in a way that the young child can digest - images and plot rather than intellectual explanation

There is nothing of greater blessing than for a child than to nourish it with everything that brings the roots of human life together with those of cosmic life. A child is still having to work creatively, forming itself, bringing about the growth of its body, unfolding its inner tendencies; it needs the wonderful soul-nourishment it finds in fairy tale pictures, for in them the child’s roots are united with the life of the world. (Rudolf Steiner, The Poetry and Meaning of Fairy Tales)

The nourishment of these ancient stories can be a seed of inner fortitude. The stories give pictures of the strength and determination needed to carry through, to overcome the evil. They show that it is not always the clever and older ones who are best suited to the task. They tell of the promise that the weak can become strong, that poor can become rich. They speak of the benefit of kindness and honesty.

By the time a child is four, so-called fairy tales are an important element of their lives. Tell your children fairy tales and folk tales - the ancient ones that no one can claim to have written because they have been handed down for millenia. Albert Einstein said that fairy tales cultivate intelligence. Fairy tales also nurture personal morality.

I think it is important to be familiar with a story before telling or reading it to children. After digesting the story, I consider whether or not the story resonates with me as depicting truth. The stories we tell to young children must be true for the storyteller. If a particular story doesn’t feel true for you, don’t tell that one. The deep knowledge and golden wisdom that is the fabric of these tales is tangible, and the more you think about a particular story, then more and more the underlying truths and lessons reveal themselves. 

One amazing thing about these wise old stories is they contain no sentimentality or cuteness. They just tell the facts without any sense of preciousness or stating of judgements and opinions. There is no need. The story already speaks volumes about what is right, and the consequences of wrong actions and words.

I have a long list of my personal favorite fairy tales, but some special ones stand out. For me, these stories describe my own experiences of being a human being trying to evolve. They include; The Frog King (a Grimm’s Fairy Tale), Nkosnati and the Dragon (from South Africa), Chamakanda (from Zimbabwe) and Shingebiss (from the Chippewa people of North America). I have written about these and various other stories in past articles and blogs, and I have recorded many favorites on my storytelling cds.

"Where did it happen and when did it happen? Where and when did it not happen?” It happened and it is happening and it will happen. These stories are true pictures that are true for all time.

P.S. What are your favorite folk tales? Here for your enjoyment is one of my favorites. It is from Bali, Indonesia and is called Gecko’s Complaint:

One night the Chief was awakened out of his sleep by five calls of “geh-ko, geh-ko, geh-ko, geh-ko, geh-ko.” It was Gecko the Lizard and he wanted to see the Chief, a wise and kindly man, who received him pleasantly even though it was the middle of the night. Gecko had come to lodge a complaint. He said he was disturbed and unhappy.

All the other creatures thought Gecko could have no reason to complain. He could do so many things the other creatures could not, such as walk on a wall, or upside down on the ceiling. He could do these things because of the little pads on the tips of each of his toes. Not only that, if he lost his tail while fighting with another lizard, he could grow another one just as good, if not even better, than the old one. 

Gecko rarely got tired as he expended a minimum of energy, sitting lazily up in the rafters, going out at night in search of mosquitos, and filling the night with his loud calls. What could Gecko have to complain about?

Gecko was upset because he hadn’t been able to sleep for several weeks because of Firefly. Night after night the black lightning beetle with red and yellow spots flew all around him, glowing like parks of fire, flashing his light into Gecko’s eyes. The Chief, who did not like his sleep disturbed either promised to make an investigation. He told Gecko to come back in a week.

The next day the Chief called on Firefly and told him of Gecko’s complaint. “Is it only Gecko you are disturbing, or is it possible that others are also bothered by your light flashing into their eyes?” said the Chief.

Firefly’s light was out as he spoke to the Chief, “I meant no harm Sir. I thought I was doing something for the village. I heard the drumming of Woodpecker as he struck the tree trunk with his bill and I thought it was a kulkul, the wooden slit-drum, calling the villagers together. I was only flashing my light to help pass on the message.

The Chief went to ask Woodpecker about this. When he found him, he told him what Firefly had said. Woodpecker said, “I was only passing on a warning, Sir. I heard the kwak-kwak-kwak of the Frog in the rice paddies, and I thought Frog was warning that an earthquake was coming. So I just passed on the message.”

Now the Chief went in search of Frog, and told Frog what Woodpecker had said. Frog replied, “The reason I was kwak-kwaking more and louder than usual is that I saw Black Beetle walking down the road carrying garbage, which I thought was so dirty and unhygienic that I had to stop him.” “I would have done the same,” said the Chief, and he went off to talk to Black Beetle at once.

Black Beetle, plump and gleaming like polished copper, was very humble and respectful as he explained the situation. “You see, Sir, Water Buffalo comes by so often dropping his pat in the middle of the road, and I thought it was my duty to clean it up.”

The Chief was beginning to lose patience. “Tell Water Buffalo I wish to see him.”

When Water Buffalo appeared before the Chief, he was polite but expressed his displeasure with Beetle’s report. “It is clear that I am not appreciated. Rain washes away stones in the road, and I fill up the holes. Who else does that, I ask you?”

By this time the Chief was tired, but he had to hear Rain’s story. And Rain was angry.

“Complaining about ME? Who asks for Rain, who needs Rain to make the plants grow, and for washing and drinking. Without Rain there are no mosquitos, and if there are no mosquitos, Gecko is hungry and unhappy. Don’t speak to me, speak to Gecko!”

When Gecko returned to see the Chief, as he had been told to do, the Chief spoke to him quite sternly. “Gecko, say no more. We all have our problems. Go home, and live in peace with your neighbors.”

And he did.

The Billy Goats Gruff in My Living Room

Stories can be powerful tools for teaching, healing and transformation. When there is a behavior in your young child that you would like to see changed, an effective tool can be a story that portrays the challenge and an outcome you’d like to see. Later in this post I’ll give some tips about creating a story for your child.

Stories are a wonderful teaching tool and a powerful way to convey the values of the teller to the receiver of the story. With young children, it is an effective way to help change behaviors and create new habits without a lot of intellectualizing and explaining. 

One of the amazing things about storytelling is that is received by the heart of the listener, bypassing the intellect. After a story, we say; “I loved that story,” or “I didn’t like that one.” We don’t respond to a story with, “I disagree with that,” or “That’s not correct.” We respond with our feelings, and it seeps into our thoughts later.

Young children so easily learn stories by heart, even without comprehending the meaning. For the very young, stories are an opportunity for language to wash over them. They begin to taste the flavor of their mother tongue, and they learn language sounds, vocabulary, grammar and syntax. And, they begin to develop an essential capacity for later reading - the capacity to make inner pictures of what the words are describing.

There are some important guidelines for telling or reading stories to young children. The first is that the story has a ‘happy ending.’ For the children to develop and unfold their skills and capacities, they have to feel that their world is a safe and good place to be. Stories can help create an environment where the children can thrive, and can provide nourishment for their young souls.

The other guideline is that the story speaks powerfully for itself. Any interpretation spoken to the children dilutes the message that the images of the story already so clearly brought. Adult minds of course engage in analyzing and looking for meaning in stories and everything else but practice holding back. Interpretation is an intellectual activity, and stories speak to the heart. Don’t speak your interpretation of the story or state the moral to the young child.

Now, about making that story for your child. 

In the story you make ‘the names are changed to protect the innocent,’ but the basic situation remains. If you want the characters to have names, choose names other than those of your child and his or her friends. In your imagination transform your child’s situation into one involving animals instead. What animal would your child be. Switch the gender of the central character so the child is less likely to think it is about him or her. You can include real interactions your child has had, and even include some actual dialog. The creative part is making an ending where the situation is resolved and everything comes out fine - a happy ending. An ending where needs are met and there is a feeling of satisfaction.

Once you have your story together, run through it in your imagination and see how it feels. Fix up some parts if they need it, but don’t worry about perfection (whatever that is). The act of trying to come up with a healing story for your child is such a powerful activity. This really is a case of the trying is what makes a difference.

When you tell your story, put your undivided attention into the story. Make the images of the story come alive in you - try to ‘see’ the story as you are telling it. Is there a way you can get out of the way so the story can speak through you?

You have to remember your story so you can tell it again the next day. And the next. And for a week and more. Repetition helps the story penetrate more deeply into the child’s psyche, and repetition is what strengthens neural pathways. Young children naturally want a story repeated over and over. I am sure you have had the experience of your child asking for the same story every day for weeks on end. Repeat the story as long as possible.

Steve’s How-to List:

1. Change the situation to one involving animals
2. Change the gender of the central figures
3. Change the names 
4. Make a happy ending where the good prevails. 
5. No moralizing or interpretation
6. Repeat the story every day

What I would really appreciate is after you create one of these special stories and try it out, let me know what happened. What was the situation, the story and the result. 

P.S. Please share this ‘how-to make a healing story guide’ with your friends!

Play Lays the Foundation for Thinking

“I don’t think. I just do it.” Commented one five-year-old boy.

We grown-ups have a hard time turning off our thinking. Our analytical intellect is always busy and acting as if it were the king of the mind. For the young child, thinking and intellect are in their infancy and total engagement with what is at hand is their primary interactive modality. Hence they are able to truly play. When a young child transforms themselves or various objects as a part of play, they fully live into that change without an ‘observer’ past of their mind commenting.

As adults, we want to see possibilities of an action before we do it. Young children are far more impulsive. They discover the possibilities only in the doing of the action without any intention, external purpose or consideration of possible results. For the young child, play is full engagement with the activity. Play is their way of being, it describes their consciousness. They have free creative forces that are available to transform self and world. For them, the relationship between perception (what is outside) and concept (what is inside) is mobile and flexible.

The young child ‘s central mode of learning is imitation. They are imitatively busy and their consciousness is spread out into their surroundings. They are at one with all - with their sensory experiences, with the world around them. One aspect of early childhood play is active and eager imitation of the creative forces of the world and of the people around. 

The three year old child begins to put her own uniqueness on the objects around her. The stimulus for her activity comes from outside, as also with the toddler. An object at hand reminds her of something she has already experienced, and that object is transformed into the object from her memory. The young child receives stimulus for play, stimulus for imitation, from the adult around them who is engaged in real life activities. This is how she learns about the world and develops real skills. I think it is important for adults to be playful with young children, and to make time to play with them. However, because of their imitative learning style the building of capacities and skills comes more from the child seeing the adult engaged in ‘real’ work than from the adult on the floor playing.

The play of the three-year-old is not really very social. They like to play near other children, but it is not yet really a playing with others. It is very much vertical play - up and down, and next to. This stage of play is the fantasy stage of ‘this can be that.’ For example:

The four-year-old - “Look. I found a guitar.” (A stick that to me only vaguely looks like a guitar)

The six-year-old - “I need a guitar for our band. This stick is a guitar.”

With six-year-olds, the play is more intricate, more filled with intentions, and more social. A group of six-year-olds might spend the whole morning making the rules and planning for their play. With six-year-olds the stimulus for play has become an inner one rather than being stimulated by objects in their surroundings. Before she plays, the six-year-old has an inner picture, an imagination. Her play is preceded by a mental image, an idea. The stimulus for play more and more arises from inner activity. Play has also become more social and rules are a big part of this developmental stage.

Six-year-old Sally - "I was supposed to be the mother and now Jill is a mother and there is supposed to be only one mother."

There is a recognition that this is play and not “reality,” even though the child can still enter in fully and lose themselves in their play. A typical six-year-old request; 

"How about you be the....., and I’ll be the......" 

This developmental sequence is significant and worth reiterating because play lays the foundation for thinking. First the young child’s play is fantasy that is determined by her surroundings. As she develops, imagination begins to arise. Now play is determined by the child’s inner picture, by her own budding world of concepts. When we are in the world of concepts, we are thinking. Creative play imagination transforms into the ability to form images which then transforms into thinking.

"How about I'm a horse and my name is Jack."

This is one big reason that plenty of time for free creative play is important for child development in the early years, whether it is at home or in nursery, pre-school and kindergarten programs. Play lays the foundation for thinking. 

[Please don’t get too hung up on the ages I mentioned above. Ages of stages are always approximate.]

P.S. If you find this interesting, your friends probably will too. Please forward it to them.

Looking for a Middle Path

Acknowledgement: In the sharing of my ideas and observations there is the risk of seeming as if my ideas are ‘the one and only way’ to think about the subjects at hand. I may come across as sounding like I think that I know something. I do not want to offer any recipes. I do want to offer my ideas and experiences, and actions I have chosen. 

I am continually trying to overcome the human affliction of thinking that what I am thinking are the right and only thoughts possible. For this post, and all past and future posts, I offer my apologies and acknowledge my communication shortcomings. 

‘Nuff said.

The other day I saw an announcement for a class for parents that would teach how to develop “listening and cooperation” from their young children. To me, the flyer said that what they were going to learn was how to be more authoritarian and bossy, and that 'listening and cooperation' in this context meant that the children would do what the parents told them. That isn’t what I think of as listening and cooperation.

Don’t get me wrong. I think boundaries are important. In previous posts I have addressed the importance of establishing boundaries for the children, and ideas of how to respond when the children say ‘No’ to what we are wanting. Discipline is a challenging realm for parents and children alike. First and foremost discipline makes me think of self discipline in the adult. Parents are older and have a more developed brain, and have had more time to develop some self discipline. It is up to us to teach the children by example how to manage challenges when things don’t go as planned or desired. 

Authoritarian parenting offers lots of guidance and direction for the child by the parent who is in control, but not so much parental warmth. The child experiences this as being ruled by threat - 'something bad will happen to me if I don't follow orders.' Young children learn primarily by imitation, and how we adults deal with the realm of ‘discipline’ is absorbed by the children. 

The main motivational techniques developed and passed down over thousands of years are threatening and bribing, AKA the stick and the carrot.  Anytime you get your needs met by a strategy of rewards, bribes, guilt, threats or punishment, the result is a loss of connection, immediate and/or longterm. All of these strategies are coercion. When our child doesn’t do what we want, what strategy does our unconscious habit-self want to do? Most of us use both threats and bribes in various situations. Which is your default mode? What did your own parents use?

The extreme opposite parenting style is that of giving the young children full autonomy to do what and when they want - freedom to be led by impulse without boundaries. This type of parent thinks that loving their child translates into letting the child do whatever the child wants. Perhaps there is a lot of warmth and love from parent to child, but little guidance and leadership. Here love is the predominant parenting intention and the parent doesn’t offer much in terms of guidance and boundaries. Too much freedom and choice for the young child leads to insecurity and a later lack of self confidence. The child needs guidance from adults. Without this guidance, the child is insecure and confused. Young children simply cannot understand in the same way as adults because their neurology is not fully developed. Boundaries create a feeling of safety and protection for the child.

How do you speak to your young children when they do something other than what you want? Scolding, threatening, and moralizing aren’t effective, neither are lecturing and reasoning. Freezing up, walking away and ignoring are also unsatisfactory for both parent and child. “Don’t, don’t, don’t…” is too often what the children hear. Instead we can present a positive alternative in simple words, accompanied be actions. Instead of saying, “Don’t run inside,” you can try, “We walk inside, we run outside.” Instead of “Don’t slam the door,” try, “We close the door gently,” in a quiet voice while demonstrating. “Hands are for work and play and taking care of others,” while gently stroking the hands that have hit, is a favorite of mine. Patience is essential because we will have to repeat many times over many days before we start to see changes. It’s important to keep in mind that young children are not naughty or bad! They are by nature adventurers and explorers searching for understanding of the world. When we understand and remember that, our job of guiding and leading is easier. We can keep our calm and patience longer and the children experience our love for them through our actions and words.

Here are some techniques that people unconsciously use when things don’t go the way they want. If you learn to live without these habits, I guarantee that your interactions with your children will go much more smoothly and you will feel a stronger connection. Do YOU do or have any of these?

1. A need to be right and have the last word
2. Attempting to control 
3. Blaming and shaming
4. Retaliation and Punishment
5. Bribes or Threats, Demands, Ultimatums, Should/Shouldn’t
6. Withdrawal from challenging situations

I have exaggerated the two extremes in parenting style so I could delineate a middle way between authoritarian parenting and stand-back-parenting. This is what I like to call loving firmness (a la Margret Meyerkort). Loving firmness means we try to determine the real needs of the child, and lovingly create and hold the boundaries we think will best serve those needs, and the needs of the others in the child’s life. Loving firmness means guidance and love as equal intentions for the parent. Loving firmness is a middle path that fuses love and warmth and interest with guidance and boundaries to deliver to the child what the child needs. Children are more likely to go along with what we want when they feel our love and our interest in them. They know when we are seeing their potential rather than what we think is wrong with them. Just like all of us, young children thrive on interest and recognition. If we connect with our children and listen to them truly, and then create boundaries that will serve their needs, then the children are more likely to cooperate.

“At the end of the day, there truly is a “one and only way” to care for young children...It is the way in which you, as an individual, can be your most creative and honest self, based on practices, inner and outer, which encompass a deep understanding of the developing child, and in which you are filled with love...” (from an article by Cynthia Aldinger, Executive Director of Lifeways North America)  

Let me know what you think about all this. 

P.S. And please forward it to your friends.

Real Things Real Children Said

A while back I was going to give a speech and was planning to include things real children really said over my years in kindergarten. I never got a chance to give that speech, but here are some things children really said over my years in kindergarten. All of these were things I overheard. I did not initiate these conversations. I had my eyes and ears open, and my mouth was closed, except in those instances when I was directly engaged by the children. I did change the names of the children involved.

I hope you enjoy and learn something from these wise people. Let me know.

Social difficulties and solutions

“I knew he wouldn’t listen so I had to push him.”

“I got my loud voice from my mom.”

“They are teasing me, just like I tease my brother.”

When Jack, the largest child in kindergarten, walked in, he went straight over to George, who was building a house to play in. Nothing happened prior to Jack saying, “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?”

Metaphysics

“You used to be a grown-up, and now you are not.”

“Stars are dead people.”

“It’s true. When you see a shooting star it’s a person going up to heaven.”

Sam - “I don’t have any grandparents anymore. They all died.”

Joe - “That’s ok. Someday you’ll see them again. Someday you’ll die and go up to heaven and be with them.”

Sam - “And then I’ll come down again.”

Joe - “When you die you turn into an angel.”

Sam - “No, but the angels help you.”

Charles - “When you die you turn into a spirit. First you turn into a skeleton, and then a spirit.”

“I’m sad Steve. My grandfather died.”

Me - “I’m so sorry. When?”

“Before I was born. The cigarettes did it.”

Jill - “God is here. I talk to god.”

John - “God is in heaven.”

Maya - “God is everywhere.”

Jill - “God is in us.”

Maya - “God is here. We’re sitting on him.”

Julia - “If you go to heaven you have to get nailed to the cross. I know, I saw it on TV.”

Hannah - “It’s not heaven, it’s the spiritual world.”

Michael - “God is in your stomach.”

Roles and vocations

“I’m half Italian and half vegetarian.”

“When you grow do you want to be a mother or a father?”

Marco- “In the olden days the only people on earth were mermaids.”

Emmett - “What are you talking about? They were cavemen. Cowboys and cavemen.”

Daniel - “A lawyer is a guy on TV.”

Peter - “No, a lawyer is a guy who lives in a mobile home park.”

Random snippets

“I woke up in the middle of the night with an ear infection and my dad had to scream at me to stop crying.”

Hannah, shouting - “Go away. Get out of this room you guys. I’m trying to meditate. Quiet you guys.”

“Steve, you should put up a sign that says to lift up the seat to pee.”

“But the children in kindergarten don’t read yet.”

“Oh.”

“At kindergarten I play over and over and over.”

Sarah whispered something to the back of Katie’s head.

Sofia, to Sarah - “There are no secrets in kindergarten.”

Sarah - “I didn’t tell it to her ear so it’s not a secret.”

“I don’t want to learn any Spanish because I just talk.”

And two sad ones to end

“Oh good, Eileen [the regular kindergarten teacher who was absent] is not here. Now we can play!”

“When I woke up I thought I was a grown up because I was so serious.”

What have you heard lately out of the mouths of babes? Please let me know. And please share this with your friends.