The Where - At Home
To provide a creative environment at home is to provide a safe place to take intellectual and creative risks, to practice perseverance, to dream and to wonder, to not be intimidated by one’s own imperfection. Encourage expression. Encourage problem solving. Encourage each member of your household, young and adult, to accept mistakes as a natural part of life, as simply toll booths on the road to success.
Supply children with toys that are open ended, which do not include prescribed solutions. For example, there are building toys that have no answer – they’re just blocks, or pieces, which children can assemble in limitless combinations. Then there are building toys that lead to a single product. They include directions and a picture of what the end product is supposed to like. There are a lot of parts, but only one answer. That kind of building toy has its usefulness; but which type of toy do you think nurtures creativity?
Books
Supporting Creativity and Imagination in the Early Years, by Bernadette Duffy (Open University Press, 2006)
Light Up Your Child’s Mind, by Joseph Renzulli and Sally Reis (Little Brown, 2009)
Mindset, by Carol Dweck (Ballantine Books, 2008)
Awakening Your Child’s Natural Genius, by Thomas Armstrong (Tarcher/Putnam Books, 1991)
To provide a creative environment at home is to provide a safe place to take intellectual and creative risks, to practice perseverance, to dream and to wonder, to not be intimidated by one’s own imperfection. Encourage expression. Encourage problem solving. Encourage each member of your household, young and adult, to accept mistakes as a natural part of life, as simply toll booths on the road to success.
Supply children with toys that are open ended, which do not include prescribed solutions. For example, there are building toys that have no answer – they’re just blocks, or pieces, which children can assemble in limitless combinations. Then there are building toys that lead to a single product. They include directions and a picture of what the end product is supposed to like. There are a lot of parts, but only one answer. That kind of building toy has its usefulness; but which type of toy do you think nurtures creativity?
Books
Supporting Creativity and Imagination in the Early Years, by Bernadette Duffy (Open University Press, 2006)
Light Up Your Child’s Mind, by Joseph Renzulli and Sally Reis (Little Brown, 2009)
Mindset, by Carol Dweck (Ballantine Books, 2008)
Awakening Your Child’s Natural Genius, by Thomas Armstrong (Tarcher/Putnam Books, 1991)