Creativity vs Convenience

Originally Posted October 5, 2012

I often think back to my childhood and marvel at how different it was from what my kids experience today. No need to make a list, y’all know what I mean. It was a time when the closest thing we had to electronic toys was a fork and a wall socket.

My husband and I make sure that Clancy and Jack have adequate time to be bored enough to get creative. Left to their own devices something always emerges. Great things come of that time including their proclamations that building a castle out of toilet paper rolls or concocting a “shrinking potion” with stuff from the spice rack is waaay more fun than playing Angry Birds. Of course all the have to do is see their other devices and they forget all about what they said. 

The other day I heard someone say that lack of creativity is never more glaring than right now, approaching Halloween.

She pointed out the every empty storefront in the neighbourhood is a Halloween Costume Shop. And this is true. There are no less than six within a two mile radius of my house. They are all huge, all stocked with the same synthetic (and likely flammable), cheaply made, expensively-priced outfits. Last year I took off a mask to find I had brought the wrong Anakin home at the end of the night. With about 15 of them on the street it's no wonder I lost track of my kid.

When I was young you couldn’t even buy a cape in a store, much less the mask and codpiece to go with it (well, wait that's not entirely true - I had an uncle who shopped for stuff like that). 

One year I wore an old fur stole, long dress, my mom’s high heels, pearls and a wig and went out as a Grown Up. It wasn’t until years later I understood what my older brothers had meant by “Little Hooker". I went as a ghost, a hobo and a nurse and one particularly cold year as a fairy in a snowsuit with wings. Were these costumes creative? Not really. I mean that sheet with eyeholes thing...come on.

So what's wrong with buying the outfits? Will they love us more if I help them make their costume? Will it forge some enduring bond between us that will enrich our lives? And more to the point are we creative enough to make them something cool that won’t get them beaten up?

They can’t wear their costumes to school anymore so I don't see the point of investing a bunch of my time AND money in something they will only wear once for a few hours. But it at the store and we get our money back in candy and chips that night and can sell it to the consignment store the next day.

Let's go back in time, just for a few minutes, to see if we were really more creative back then or just short on options ... (cue the flashback harps) ... let's go back to my house, October 30th, 1970...

Mom: Patti, what do you what to be tomorrow night? Ghost?
Me: I was a ghost last year.
Mom: A pirate?
Me: Mom, I am a girl!
Mom: How about a hobo?
Me: Three things: I am a girl, I don’t like cigar butts, and what is a hobo anyway?

Mom (sighing and looking at ceiling dreamily): Wouldn’t it be nice if there was place up the street, a Halloween costume shop, that only appeared in October, and was stocked with all kinds of great outfits to pick from?
Me: You mean where we could go to get a Chatty Cathy wig or a Marsha Brady dress?!
Mom: Oh, if only such a place existed. Oh well, we’re just dreaming. Let's think...I know, I’ll pin up my pink coat and you can go as Jackie Kennedy. 

I am pretty sure that if my mother could have put aside a few shekels to shop at such a place she would have. I have a few shekels and that place IS right up the street, so...off we go.

But I will always remember the one year I did get creative and make a costume for my son. But he has already forgotten.

Some Kids Are Bored at School

Originally posted September 9, 2011

My friend’s daughter comes home everyday from school and begs not to go back. We have all heard that from our kids but when you hear it everyday it bears investigation. What is the impetus for this plea? Is she being bullied? Is she having trouble understanding, hearing, seeing? Does she need glasses or just a good, hard talking to about life and the things we HAVE to do? 

It’s become apparent over the weeks and months that this kid is so bored it makes her sad. Truly sad and bordering scarily on being downright depressed. She's all of nine.

School is not serving up anything that whets her appetite. Out of the classroom she is self-directed and finds things that she can immerse herself in for hours; googling and reading and watching anything and everything she can find on a subject she loves. Animal behaviour, the history of a far off country, the culture of a people she will likely never encounter - none of which are topics that will ever be brought up in elementary school let alone studied in depth to the degree that this kid digs on her own.

Forced to keep going to a place that does not engage her she will eventually lose the desire to learn altogether. 

Everyday our children show themselves as being what they truly are, what we all are when we are young - curious. We are born with inquiring minds. Just watch a two year old explore his environment. He touches, tastes and smells it all to discover, not be shown, all the amazing things around him. When these innate energies are stifled we begin to wither.

Can there be anything more heart breaking than to watch our children slowly become more and more bored with their young lives? 

If you are curious about your children and they ways in which they like to learn and what you can do to stimulate those appetites, read this great article entitled The Educational Value of Creative Disobedience