For months, the lives of many otherwise privileged kids have been dominated by screens.
Without anything else to do or anywhere else to go, they’ve been relying on digital devices for entertainment, human connection, education, and enrichment.
It’s great that they have this option, but it’s not enough, and it can’t go on forever. Coronavirus or no, we need to make sure children get ample time to interact with the natural world.
Read MoreOver the years, students have come to me for advice on how they might pursue a career in music.
My answer is brutal, honest, and practical. It’s not based on luck or talent. It’s focused on hard work, focus, bravely putting yourself out there, and building a network and a following.
I bear no judgment toward those who choose a different path. It’s wise to give up on a dream if you realize that you’re not willing to put in the work or make the sacrifice that allows you let go of everything else and focus only on the actions that make your desired outcome possible.
Read MoreI am lucky to know many excellent mamas who treat their very young children with respect and dignity, allowing them to make age-appropriate decisions as often as possible.
One such mama shared a story that we can all learn from as we strive to accomplish great things in life. Great things such as weaning and potty-training.
Read MoreWhen I tell people that I run a tiny academic program for middle schoolers (aptly named The Little Middle School), the reaction is almost always the same.
“Middle school? Oh, middle school is awful.”
Or worse, “middle schoolers are awful!”
Why does middle school have such a bad rap? Why do adults have such miserable memories of these early years of puberty?
Read MoreWhen I speak of my life as a child growing up in a small town in Maine, I’m not exaggerating or idealizing when I say that there was endless time to play.
Back in the olden days of the 1980s, kindergarten lasted only a half day, there was no homework until third or fourth grade, and children who were barely out of the single digits could roam around on bikes or on foot. Older kids enjoyed a six-hour school day and no carpool — just a short bus ride. Standardized testing was minimal, and we had outdoor recess all the way through middle school. We didn’t have devices or the Internet — we had the woods, the beach, the library, and each other. And lots and lots of snow.
Read MoreI was on my way to work one morning in my early twenties when I saw someone at a stoplight who changed the way I saw the world.
As a young adult in a new city, I had a rigid set of rules about how to live and, at the same time, a limited ability to operate in accordance with them.
These rules governed what I could eat and when, what I could spend, and how I could spend my time. It was my best attempt to tame the chaos of my circumstances.
Read MoreAt her first piano lesson, Sophie asked me how many instruments I play.
I thought a moment. “Hmmm…piano, guitar…ukulele…a little bit of drums…so…four?”
“I play seven instruments,” she proclaimed. She breezily counted them off on her chubby six-year-old fingers. “Drums, harmonica, shaker, tambourine, recorder, guitar, and, well, now I play the piano.”
Read MoreHaving spent over a decade teaching music lessons, I can say for certain:
Music lessons aren’t where you learn to play an instrument.
Sure, they help. But the real work is done without your teacher, by yourself, playing and evaluating.
If you are unable or unwilling to spend this time “in the woodshed,” you will not achieve your goal of playing an instrument, no matter how much time and money you spend on the lessons themselves.
Read MoreThe elementary school I attended had a series of playgrounds made mostly of tires in interesting configurations.
Back in the olden days, when multiple recesses each day were standard, there was a separate playground for the kindergarteners, another for the first and second graders, and another for the third and fourth graders.
One of my classmates, who went on to become my best friend, remembers, at age five, peering through the chain link fence that separated the kindergarten playground from that of the first and second graders. Gazing at the older kids at play (So worldly! So sophisticated!), she said to herself sorrowfully, “I’ll never make it.”
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