loving art, science and creative kids
6/21/2019 12:21:57 AM
From the Garden
As a visual, linguistic and tactile person I enjoy painting, pottery and writing. I'm happiest when I put my intelligences to good use.
Multiple Intelligence
Howard Gardner is a developmental psychologist best-known for this theory of multiple intelligences. He believed that the conventional concept of intelligence was too narrow and restrictive and that measures of IQ often miss out on other "intelligences" that an individual may possess. Most people have several intelligence strengths, though one or more may be dominant. I, for instance am a visual, verbal and kinesthetic learner. It is why I paint and enjoy writing.
According to this theory, people have many different ways of learning. Unlike traditional theories of intelligence that focus on one single general intelligence, Gardner believed that people instead have multiple different ways of thinking and learning. Most of us have strengths in several categories, though one may be more dominant than the others.
Gardner originally identified and described eight different kinds of intelligence but a ninth one was added recently that made me stop and think about spiritual people I know. Reflection about the nature of the universe draws mystics and philosophers into realms that are difficult for me to grasp. I can’t help but admire the way those with existential intelligence explore dimensions that are beyond my understanding. Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences
Verbal-linguistic intelligence (well-developed verbal skills and sensitivity to the sounds, meanings and rhythms of words)
Logical-mathematical intelligence (ability to think conceptually and abstractly, and capacity to discern logical and numerical patterns) Spatial-visual intelligence (capacity to think in images and pictures, to visualize accurately and abstractly)
Bodily-kinesthetic intelligence (ability to control one’s body movements and to handle objects skillfully)
Musical intelligences (ability to produce and appreciate rhythm, pitch and timber)
Interpersonal intelligence (capacity to detect and respond appropriately to the moods, motivations and desires of others)
Intrapersonal (capacity to be self-aware and in tune with inner feelings, values, beliefs and thinking processes)
Naturalist intelligence (ability to recognize and categorize plants, animals and other objects in nature)
Existential intelligence (sensitivity and capacity to tackle deep questions about human existence such as, What is the meaning of life? Why do we die? How did we get here?)
Gardner's theory influenced the way I developed science museum exhibits for a diverse audience. A multitude of sensory approaches were used to entice people to learn. Tactile challenges, visual descriptions, auditory presentations, and emotional settings were used to get information across. Gardner's theory influenced the way my I developed science museum exhibits. A multitude of sensory approaches were used to entice visitors to become interested in science. Tactile challenges, visual descriptions, auditory presentations, and emotional settings helped get information across.
When founding the Museum Tour Catalog, I organized it along similar lines. Educational toys were shown on pages title by the learning style. Our call center posted a chart listing Gardner’s intelligences. When purchasers called for advice about what to buy, before responding, staff would ask questions to get at the learning style of the recipient and make recommendations accordingly.
Rather than focusing on a single measure of cognitive ability, the concept of multiple intelligence considers the different mental strengths an individual may possess. This outlook is particularly helpful for parents and educators who work with struggling learners. Not everyone is a sit-at-your-desk and read type of learner. Recognizing core strength is the path to resilience—to self esteem—to pleasure. The paintings I make rely on both visual and kinesthetic abilities. The process of painting them provides me with joy.
6/14/2019 5:36:36 PM
View from a Bridge
What good is beautiful landscaping, great architecture, and city design reviews if t people walking the streets trash their environment?
Whack a mole
Wham! Bam! Don’t you wish it was easy to get rid of problems you thought resolved? I am continuously surprised to watch society revisit the same issues over and over again without making progress. I keep thinking we’re moving forward only to see well considered resolutions erode and push us backwards. The following are a few items I thought were behind us.
Trashing Neighborhoods. Whack! There was a time when city streets were littered with trash. People thought nothing of throwing cigarette and fast food wrappers on the ground or out car windows. And then, in 1965, came Lady Bird Johnson with a campaign to clean up America. She began beautifying D.C. and then took her mission nationwide. She believed that a cleaner, more beautiful country would calm people and bring them together. Her efforts had some success, and for years people picked up after themselves. My partner, Ray, often describes his father starting to throw a gum wrapper out the window when he stopped and said, "Lady Bird wouldn't like that." Today there's a new wave of litterers who trash and mar our streets, reminding me of third world country slums. Bam! Hit it down! Let’s restore Johnson’s original goal and beautify our cities, clean up trash, and border roadways with natural vegetation.
Nuclear Proliferation. Whack! Though not perfect, international steps were made to reduce nuclear weapons. Treaties with Russia and Iran were hailed as milestones. Stopping North Korea from atomic prowess was a high priority. Over the last two years we’ve pulled out of agreements with Russia and Iran and are playing footsie with a North Korean dictator. The U.S. has started a new arms race. I remember years of fear when schoolchildren were taught to take shelter under their desks in case of a nuclear attack. Why is this nonsense happening again? Nuclear proliferation is a no win situation except for arms manufacturers. Bam! Hit it down!
Abortion. Whack! I thought the topic was put to rest 50 years ago. Citizens and the Supreme Court agreed that women had rights to make decisions about their own bodies. It wasn’t up to the government to interfere in conversations that belong in the doctor’s office and family living rooms. The current rush for states to pass abortion bills and revisit the issue reverses years of discussion, research and agreement. If passed, these bills will return women to seeking back room abortions, abandoning thousands of unwanted infants to a life of poverty and crime. Discussing abortion rights divides the nation by putting us on vitriolic sides that make neighbors hate each other. Bam! Hit it down.
Low income housing. Whack! There was a time when poor people didn’t wander the streets of America? Through HUD and other social services we made sure all citizens received a subsidy insuring they were housed. Over the last two years, the White House has directly attacked our efforts to house the poor. They are now calling for a 10.25 billion dollar reduction in funds for public housing assistance, partnership programs, housing for persons with disabilities and the elderly. These budget cuts follow on last year’s push to slash eighteen percent of HUD’s budget despite studies, like one done by the University of North Carolina, showing it is significantly cheaper to house the homeless than leave them on the streets. Bam! Hit it down!
Prison Reform. Whack! Since our country’s beginning, prison reformers have struggled with how to punish criminals while preserving their humanity, how to protect the public while allowing prisoners to renter society and how to satisfy the desire of victims for justice and revenge. Americans view incarceration as just punishment. It is supposed to take away personal freedoms while protecting the public.The problem is that strict punishment and long sentences don’t stop people from committing crimes. It does not increase public safety but it does cost society money. The three strikes and you’re out crime law blossomed prisons with low level criminals (mostly marijuana smokers) who are disproportionately African American. When released they remain a burden to society. Bam! Hit it down! The current administration is trying to bring about reform by placing prisoners closer to their families, reducing unfair sentences, giving federal judges more discretion in low-level cases and limiting some mandatory minimum sentences. It is a beginning, but the federal system accounts for only 10 percent of the prison system as a whole. Let’s start working on reforms within the states and get rid of private companies managing prisons. Bam! Hit it down! Fight for decarceration.
Climate Change and Global Warming. Whack! When did our country adopt such uneducated, uncaring and destructive outlooks about the environment. For years scientists spoke of the disaster humankind was bringing on itself through carbon emissions and other pollutants released in the atmosphere. We've proven that it is possible for countries to come together to solve world problems. Nations joined in an effort get rid the world of chloroflourocarbons and close the Ozone hole. Why can’t we do the same and solve global warming. The Paris Climate accord was an excellent beginning, yet the United States selfishly pulled out. No one likes change but sometimes it is necessary. Bam! Hit it down! Human beings were given a brain. We’re made to think, solve problems, to preserve the planet and to insure our very existence.
There are many other subjects that see-saw their way into the news and family discussions. Please share a few on my blog site that bother you.
References
(2019) No New Housing:Impact of the Trump 2020 HUD Budget. Affordable Housing, retrieved from https://affordablehousingonline.com/fy20-hud-budget-cuts
McKay, T (2014) Study Reveals it Costs Less to Give the Homeless Housing Than Leave Them on the Street. MIC. Retrieved from https://www.mic.com/articles/86251/study-reveals-it-costs-less-to-give-the-homeless-housing-than-to-leave-them-on-the-street
Gale,T (2007) Prison Reform Movement. Encyclopedia.com. retrieved from https://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences/news-wires-white-papers-and-books/prison-reform-movement
Berger, D. (2019) “Prison Reform” Is Not Enough. In 2019 Let’s fight for Decarceration. Trending. retrieved from https://truthout.org/articles/prison-reform-is-not-enough-in-2019-lets-fight-for-decarceration/
Global Climate Change. (2019() NASA. retrieved from website at https://climate.nasa.gov/
Lady Bird Johnson. Portrait of a First Lady. OPB. retried from https://www.pbs.org/ladybird/shattereddreams/shattereddreams_report.html
Art is always for sale. Contact me at [email protected]. View from a Bridge mixed media 32" x 22" x 3 D picture $599.00 USD
6/8/2019 3:28:29 PM
Personal Space
Several years ago, one of my girl friends fell in love with a Pakistani man. While on a trip to meet his family she became ill and was confined to bed for a week. A relative was assigned to sleep in her room, usually under her bed, until she recovered. When healthy, the family insisted she be accompanied by someone when out walking. My friend said she had a wonderful visit and enjoyed meeting her boyfriend’s family but found it difficult to have her personal space continuously invaded.
The amount of open-space we need differs from person to person and culture to culture. We form bubbles around ourselves that make us feel nervous when they are punctured. People who grow up in the heavily populated cities of Pakistan are much more tolerant of being touched and having people stand close by, than those raised in wide-open spaces.
U.S. studies measuring closeness say that good friends and family want 1.5 feet to 3 between them while casual acquaintances and co-workers prefer 3 to 10 feet and strangers need more than 4 feet. Boundaries vary depending on whether it is a professional relationship, a male to male or female to female encounter or a romantic vs. platonic one. Next time you have a small gathering, sit or stand in a circle. Select two people to walk towards each other and stop when they feel uncomfortable. Repeat the exercise until each person has a chance to walk toward every guest. You’ll have an interesting time discussing the differences afterwards.
When taking a seat in a crowded auditorium we commonly leave an extra one between ourself and our neighbor. In a crowded theater, where sitting next to someone is expected, we are comfortable with that person being there. We carve out personal space on highways as well in crowds. I find nothing worse than being followed closely by a tailgater.
American travelers often have a difficult time adjusting to crowds when abroad. Visitors to Cairo learn quickly that residents don’t have a sense of personal space. They brush up against each other without thinking, drive fearlessly around obstacles created by randomly parked cars, and jump on crowded buses when they don’t have the fare. Since there’s little privacy, apartment buildings employ guards, bawabs, who pay attention to the comings and goings of residents. They let potential bridegrooms know if their fiancés entertain men.
The Washington Post shared a study of personal space conducted with 9,000 people in 42 countries. In Brazil, metro-riders engage with each other, chatting freely with strangers rather than escaping to their cell phones. Brazilians are more touchy-feely than we and they pay more respect to the elderly and mothers with children. Even though the country is riddled with crime polite friendly behavior is common among strangers.
In general, people in South Americas require less personal space than those residing in Asia. In Romainia, strangers stay their distance but friends are kept close while in Saudi Arabia, people stand farther away from friends than Argentinians do with strangers. Hungarians prefer love ones and strangers to remain at arms length. Europeans tolerate people being wrist-length distance apart. The U.S. is an arms-length society.
Though differences vary by country, there are also commonalities. Women prefer more space from strangers than men. Residents in warm areas tend to move closer together than in cold climates, and old people stand farther away from neighbors than younger ones. In all countries in the world, infants don’t mind being kissed and held close by adults. Children don’t start forming personal bubbles until the age of 3 or 4 when the amygdala begins to sense fear and become active when there’s a threat to safety.
Consideration of personal space got me thinking about other species, birds in particular. How do they fly close and move in formation without colliding? Their beaks and feet are used to sense touch, noses point direction yet flying in formations calls on a grouping of senses based on physics rather than biology. Geese in a V-Pattern create “air paths” with less resistance, enabling them to cover long distances efficiently. The upwash created by the lead bird helps support the weight of those that follow. To avoid exhaustion the lead position changes regularly. Maintaining formation, requires birds to sense and communicate through sight, sound, response to external stimuli, and changing wind patterns. Birds, such as the Ibis, position their wing tips carefully and synchronize flapping to save energy while flying.
Starlings create an amazing dance when they move in murmuration, a whirling, ever changing pattern. It is as though they are connected for they twist and turn and change at a moment’s notice. One starling is so closely alined to the next, yet each one appears to move spontaneously. It’s now known that Starlings only pay attention to the birds flying next them. They react in milliseconds to their seven closest neighbors.
Human beings also pay attention to their to neighbors when moving in formation. In such circumstances, though their personal space may be invaded, they are comfortable responding to whoever is orchestrating the activity. Dancers in a corps de ballet, the blue angels, soldiers on parade, and synchronized swimmers move harmoniously while in close proximity.
As you explore the boundaries that define your personal space ask why your bubble size might differ from your neighbor’s? What influence did you family, community or culture have in defining this aspect of your senses?
Starlings Twirling and Swooping Ballerinas in Formation Synchronized Swimmers
How comfortable are you in a crowd?
References:
Mayne,D.(2019)Etiquette Rules of Defining Personal Space, The Spruce. https://www.thespruce.com/etiquette-rules-of-defining-personal-space-1216625
Fadel,L.(2013) How different Cultures Handle Personal Space. NPR. retrieved from https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/05/05/181126380/how-different-cultures-handle-personal-space
Erickson, A. (2017)What ‘personal space” looks like around the world. The Wahington Post. retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/04/24/how-close-is-too-close-depends-on-where-you-live/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.88b00df38297
Ganzalez,K. (2019) Personal space in Psychlogy: Definition, cultural differences and issues. Chapter 10 Study.comretrieved from https://study.com/academy/lesson/personal-space-in-psychology-definition-cultural-differences-issues.html
( 2019) What is a Murmuration? Wonderopolis. Science. retrieved from https://www.wonderopolis.org/wonder/what-is-a-murmuration
Waldron, P. (2014) Why birds fly in a Vi-formation . Science.https://search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?hspart=pty&hsimp=yhs-pty_news¶m2=db063b7c-ab9e-498c-afda-6ade9148185f¶m3=news_~US~appfocus1¶m4=s-lp0-dsf_news--bb8~Chrome~how+do+birds+fly+in+formation~6F29AA9B0D0401B5AFD2AC8D43A603F0¶m1=20190526&p=how+do+birds+fly+in+formation&type=cn_appfocus1_cr
Art is always for sale. Personal Space is 20” by 16” / wide canvas / acrylic painting $299. Contact me at [email protected].
6/1/2019 3:08:01 PM
For Portland area bookworms. Mark your calendar and join me on June 14th.
To peak your interest: Adapted from Lives of Museum Junkies
The Happiness Business: Playful Learning is Good
What is the secret of life? This question is an easy one for me to answer: happiness, of course. I am not talking about giddy-happy like you might feel if you won the lottery but rather calm-happy, producing a general sense of well-being. The Greeks described happiness as the joy we feel moving towards our potential. It is a process and not an end in itself.
Museum professionals are in the happiness business. Parents too are in the happiness 2013 article in the Huffington Post, Carolyn Gregoire reported on a seventy-five-year-old Harvard study that explored secrets to a fulfilling life. What researchers discovered was that most people rated love first and happiness a close second to finding fulfillment. Yet experiencing joy requires making connections and finding challenges that provide new perspectives. The process is one of problem solving, a creative activity that produces feelings of well-being. What researchers learned may seem obvious, but it doesn’t make it less true.
Philosophers as ancient as Aristotle, as contemporary as the Dalai Lama, and as scientific as University of California professor, researcher, and author Sonja Lyubomirsk wrote in The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want all agree that happiness and contentment are primary goals to work towards for life to have meaningfu. Learning how to do reach this state of well being should start early with good parenting.
It begins when children are given opportunities to play freely, letting their imaginations flow. When my children were young, they loved to dress up. I salvaged a cardboard washing machine box and filled it with old nightgowns, prom dresses, suits, ties, scarves, swords, hats and crowns, stethoscopes, homemade armor and makeup. As many as eight youngsters would assemble in our garage to don costumes before parading around the neighborhood feeling like royalty, Hollywood sirens, or superheroes. This type activity, with no rules or regulations, provided a pleasurable way to engage in creative storytelling.
Imaginations ran the gamut as they put together dramas and comedies in our garage or playroom. I was often surprised when actors parroted adult conversations overheard in our kitchen or when they engaged in behaviors they witnessed at home or school. My children and their friends were practicing the life they thought they would be living as adults. They were analyzing the world as they knew it and presenting it back for their friends and parents to see. They made my husband and me careful about what we said and how we said it.
Negotiating for parts in their dramas was also an intense spectacle with children arguing for authoritarian parts. They often played school, assuming roles of teacher, good and bad students or lunchroom supervisor. The reading and math sessions they conducted were often quite difficult. The younger children, however, definitely benefited from the instruction they received at the hands of older brothers and sisters. If real teachers behaved as they did, I am sure angry parents would be knocking down their doors. Despite their rigid rules, I never heard a complaint out of play-school when children were put in a corner with a dunce caps on their heads.
he child actors were happy and intense as they practiced being part of adult society. Later in my career counseling mentally ill clients, I couldn’t help but wonder if they had ever experienced childhood spontaneity and wonderment. Many clients did not know how to be playful. Those raised in strict households had a particularly difficult time feeling happy as adults. Part of my job was to loosen them up so they could laugh, shout, and let their imagination fly.
Melinda Wenner wrote for Scientific American that “free, imaginative play is crucial for normal social, emotional and cognitive development. It makes us better adjusted, smarter and less stressed.” She discussed investigations of twenty-six convicted Texas murderers by Stuart Brown at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston. He found two things that the killers shared in common, they came from abusive families and they never played imaginatively as kids.
Parents sign their children up to play competitive sports. They also buy them computer games, take them to music lessons, enroll them in art lessons, and put them in structured play-groups, leaving little time for unsupervised activities. Though a psychologist like Anthony Pellegrini, from the University of Minnesota believes structured game rules are a wholesome source of social learning and group coherence, he also says that, play, without a priori rules, brings about more creative responses. “This freedom challenges the developing brain much more that following predetermined rules.”
The many benefits of free-play start with the development of strong social skills. It teaches proficiencies that come through interacting with peers, practicing fairness, and sharing equipment. Since imaginative play sparks fantasies, it puts children in situations that require them to learn to negotiate and to be persistent without getting frustrated. Games play an important role in language development for to keep them flowing requires the ability to communicate. Even play-fighting can improve problem-solving skills. It is practice for the unexpected. As a stress relieving activity, play is critical for emotional health no matter the age.
Since, playful learning creates happiness, we all benefit when we loosen up and let the good times flow? Free time, play time is good time, important time. Parents shouldn’t worry if every minute of their child’s day isn’t scheduled. This brings me back to the way contemporary science centers and children’s museums operate today.
Museums are entertainment centers first, education centers second. If visitors don’t have a good time they’ll not want to return. In the early days, when hands-on science centers were evolving, we used to study how Disney integrated entertainment with education at Epcot Center. We experimented with ways to involve visitors in problem solving activities and thought about how to make learning joyful. Our centers transformed from behind the glass, push button, hands-off artifact-filled spaces to ones of curiosity and challenge. Our methods worked. It is why millions of people visit teach year. I invite you to visit a hands-on museum this summer. It is never too late to let your imagination run wild.
Lives of Museum Junkies is available on line and in book stores in i-book and paperback formats.
Also, enjoy Over the Peanut Fence, a parenting book about homeless and runaway youth.
Contact the author for book readings: [email protected].
