Nature vs. Nurture?

The Washington Post parenting blog has a relatively civil exchange about the age-old question of nature vs. nurture. Are boys really more likely to be interested in guns? Are girls more likely to be girly and wear fluffy clothes? It's an intriguing question. Before my life with children, I thought it was a lot more nature. I couldn't really fathom how boys could be so filled with a certain kind of energy and curiosity that they would be continually fascinated by guns, destruction, and, well, fart sounds using their arms. I have now rethought this.

I remember reading Dr. Dobson comment on this within the last several years. He wrote that even if you don't give boys guns, they'll make them out of peanut butter sandwiches. I am not really a fan of Dobson, although I am thankful he has mellowed with age and the influence of his adult children. But that image has stuck in my mind.

My husband asks "What about life before guns?" My answer was that boys would still have that impulse for destruction, for curiosity, for those fart sounds. That's what the anthropologist seemed to conclude in the comments. It's more nature.

Well, I'm going to stop this because we're watching Buckaroo Banzai again. Wherever you go, there you are.

Handwriting and typing help

My son has been enjoying learning how to type with the SpongeBob Typing CD. I bought this several months ago and he liked it, but then found it frustrating. Now he is motivated to learn how to type because he is using the computer more at home and school, so he wants to use the keyboard. And he has better hand-eye coordination after piano lessons. So much seems to be having things in the house ready for him when he's ready...and I'm not always sure when that is.

He is quite intrigued by anything SpongeBob and this CD is very much in the upbeat, slightly silly SpongeBob style. There's a keyboard on the screen that he uses to help him find the keys as he types the words on the screen. He is up to 8 words a minute. (Edited later: He eventually clocked in at 11 words at minute and now must type even faster on his own while typing on Club Penguin.) We have tried other typing programs for younger kids, but this one seems both better and more sophisticated. Definitely worth checking out for a high tech parent.

(Additional: Check out this review chart of Top Ten Typing Programs for Kids: http://typing-for-kids-software-review.toptenreviews.com/ ) We use MacBooks at home, so our options were somewhat limited on which typing software to purchase. Still, I think that the SpongeBob works.

Another benefit to consider for those debating about their child learning to type: Typing using both hands. This is a good way to develop both sides of the brain and to get muscles going for playing the piano or other musical instruments. I am pretty sure that because I played the piano and learned to type in sixth grade, that I have more ambidextrous confidence.

After examining numerous workbooks and ideas on handwriting, we have found that the handwriting program that worked best for him is Handwriting without Tears. This program using an up-and-down, rather than slanted, style. The style is not filled with lavish curliques that make little sense for today's handwriters. Still, it flows together nicely and the results are pleasant and easy to read.

The workbooks are relatively inexpensive, nicely designed, and kid friendly. The program starts with activities for kindergartners and moves on up. I like that there are workbooks for printing and cursive improvement in fourth and fifth grade levels.

We found that going through the books was easily manageable in one to three pages at at time. We also bought the lined paper, which is different than the standard, three-lined learning tablets. The two-line paper is innovative but quite helpful. I would highly recommend the entire program.

Before we got into the HWT program, he practiced cursive handwriting using School-Rite's handwriting instruction guides. I bought these on sale at Kid's Palette (noted on side list) and was skeptical. But they seem to be working for him as he needs to feel the movement of cursive handwriting. The guides make letters that fit into paper lines that are about one inch, so this is large. Every letter has arrow directing the writer. We have both the uppercase and lowercase instruction guides, which I would recommend. The guides are heavy plastic that seem quite sturdy.

Edited in later: The guides don't follow the HWT modified style. In retrospect, the guides seemed like a good idea. But the HWT workbooks are the best and proved better in the long run.

Kolackys

For the Cultural Fair at my son's school, we decided to make kolackys to celebrate his Slovak heritage. My mom, who's not Slovak, used to make these frequently as well. The tiny cookies are made with a cream cheese dough and filled with a jam (usually apricot), poppyseed (using a can of Solo), walnut mix, or cheese.

To find a recipe, first I explored the 50-year-old Slovak cookbook from my husband's grandparents' Slovak Lutheran church. It had a whole chapter on kolackys and I discovered that the sweet little cookie treats I loved are only one version of kolackys. The other is more of a small, fruit-filled bun made with a yeast recipe. I also found my mother-in-law's recipe in my 3-ring notebook collection of recipes. It was the non-yeast version. She made them thumbprint style.

I decided to check out kolacky recipes on the Internet, which is where I've been going more often for recipes. I am even bringing my laptop into the kitchen these days.

I love the little hints I found for kolackys. The best was to use a baby spoon to dollop the filling into smaller cookies. My son thought it was funny using his old babyspoons. Another was to roll the dough into a log to easily cut rounds. Another good idea was to use powdered sugar instead of flour.

Some of my favorite recipe sites:
Recipezaar
Epicurious (the site of Gourmet and Bon Appetit)
All Recipes (sometimes not particularly sophisticated, but often quite good.)
This is the link to the kolacky recipe that most resembled the one I ended up using.

I am so glad to be able to have this high-tech recipe source.

Moms Organizing Online

The New York Times article about Moms Organizing Online is intriguing. Last year I began checking out the Moms Rising web site. I was somewhat dubious about exactly what they're trying to organize for and about. Maybe it's a good thing. There certainly are numerous issues about motherhood and parenting that feminists have refused to even acknowledge that they exist.


I used to prefer to identify myself as a feminist in that I thought equal-pay-for-equal-work was right and vital. I supported feminists causes. But I have felt betrayed that many so-called feminists have turned a blind eye to issues related to motherhood.

I still try to support some feminist issues. But I would hope that the dichotomy between mothers and non-mothers would someday end. I am tired of being called a breeder by feminists.

Thoughts on Newbery Award

The high tech part about the latest controversy over the 2007 Newbery Award is that it began through librarians and then children's literature experts discussing this online. Would the controversy have arisen if librarians only communicated to a few others online? Would Publishers Weekly, The New York Times and other media taken it as seriously if a school librarian from Kentucky called a NYT reporter to say that she had problems with words in the latest Newbery winner? I doubt it.

But because librarians and academics could discuss this on the internet the issue unfolded in a different way. Different aspects of the issue were aired in a somewhat sensible way. Yet, as usual it seems that those who are noisiest seem to want to win more and often end up doing so.

I am coming close to an end of a six-year-term as an elected board member of our local library, so I have come to see library issues from several perspectives: reader, parent, taxpayer, board member, free speech advocate. Librarians are not obligated to purchase a book just because it won a Newbery Award, or any other award. This is especially true for school libraries who serve a very select audience and who have a limited budget. Even so, the Newbery is not so much as about the best book of the year per se. Instead, it is an award more about consumerism and selling books. Why should people be upset that librarians have brains and have decided not to bring a book into the library that they don't think works for its constituents? Librarians select books. That's what they're paid to do, among other things.

Libraries have limited budgets. I am always asking for more money to be spent on books. I do want more ideas into our community. I am glad that our library is now using a national program that seems to be bringing in a wider range of books. And I am frustrated when our library doesn't have a book I think it should have. That happens all the time. If any patron asks specifically for a book that a library doesn't have, libraries can either inter-library loan it or decide to purchase it. And that is what may happen for some of the libraries that don't initially purchase a book. But don't scream at librarians for falling into the award-business with eyes wide shut.

And, I am very curious why the people that selected the Newbery even chose this book in the first place. They must have known it would cause controversy. Would they have felt differently if the body part being bitten was a girl's? Why aren't the names of the committee ever revealed in public anyway?

The writer's defense of the controversial word is particularly lame, especially since her day job is a librarian in LA. She likes the sound of this word as she thinks it's sounds 'delicious.' The word sounds 'delicious' which seems to be why she wrote a whole book around it. 'Delicious'?

The Newbery Award doesn't always recognize the best children's book of the year. Look at what won the year that Charlotte's Web was published. It is an award that reflects the time, culture, and values of the committee. It tends to reflect what many librarians think should be appropriate, think should be read about. It is also an award that was specifically designed to sell books.

Link to The New York Times article

Returning to High Tech Parent blog.

Well, I decided to come back and try this again. I am still interested in parenting, children, and related high-tech gadgets.

And we are still into Legos. But this time my son is now 7 and able to put together the Star Wars Lego sets pretty much on his own. I showed him how to sort out the pices into bowls and am convincing him that it's easier to work on a table than on the floor.

He also recently put together a SpongeBob Lego set from his cousins, as shown above. You can see the Lego versions of Spongebob, Patrick, and the snail, Gary. This was harder to put together than I thought because of the roundness of its shape and so many pieces are orange. Oh, the thing we assembled is SpongeBob's pineapple home. We like all interior decorating inside. He even has a basketball hoop.

What is it about SpongeBob that seems so attractive to kids? Is it his eternal optimism? The brightness of the colors? The bigness of his face? (studies show that children respond to large faces, which is why Scooby-Do and many others have bigger heads than their bodies, proportionately.) I think some of the jokes are still kind of funny.

toys

As it's Christmas time and holiday time, it's also the major toy time. One thing I wanted to be sure to do on this blog was to post ideas about toys.

I went to the Oppenheim Toy Portfolio page and found this interesting info on its web site, Five Myths About Toys
http://www.toyportfolio.com/TVArchives/ToyStoreBan/ToyStoreBan.asp

If you're a high tech parent, you probably find high tech related toys hard to resist. Your cool factor among your children may also rise if they see you fondling the latest Game Boy game or figuring out how some kind of talking toy works. I love many of these toys, too. But I am already becoming tired of some of them. And I am wondering how many batteries are leaking all over our house.

If you want to know which toys (high tech or not) from last season didn't sell well, go to a garage sale. That talking ewok-yoda doll is at a lot of garage sales. People find it creepy and it doesn't seem to work very well. It's supposed to tell stories and interact with children. I think a lot of well meaning aunts and uncles bought it. Parents often have told me they and their children just can't stand it. I have found many of once hot interactive-type toys at garage sales. They seem to loose their luster fast and kids often outgrow these. On the other hand, you can almost always make something out of blocks, Play-doh and Legos.

Another major offering at garage sales are the zillions of toys from fast food kids' meals. They're fun, but kids seem to loose interest quickly. Still, I find them often quite innovative. Did you see those hand-held games McDonald's had early in the fall? I saw a lot of parents play with them. As toys, I like the meal toys sometimes more than the ones I pay a lot more for. Well, that's another post.

We are debating about buying a Leap Pad in our house. I think it's cool. My child is fascinated for moments in a store. But I purchased an earlier Leap Pad brand product and was disappointed that it broke after not a lot of use and that my child really wasn't as keen about it as I thought. My mother, who was a teacher, is reluctant to buy a Leap Pad because she thinks it encourages children to think that all books are interactive, that there are buttons on all books. Books aren't like that, she says. It's not the price that bothers her, but the principle. I don't know. Stay tuned.

assembling toys, deconstructing them

I talked with a friend about his son's birthday toys. He said he's constantly coming up to him and asking him to fix a Transformer Dinosaur toy. As I mentioned earlier in a post about Legos, many toys seem sturdier than they really are. The toys purchased at the dollar-type stores are often of such poor quality they're only good for an afternoon. But the books and workbooks you can buy there are often much higher quality.

Parents are always fixing toys these days. But as the dad and I agreed, we could use an electronics or engineer degree just to get some of these things working properly.

We have a large selection of Playmobils in our house. Still, for small fingers they are sometimes difficult to put together. But most of them have smiling faces, even though they may be "bad guys." We like that there's more imagination involved in these. Playmobil characters also have a weird sensibility when it comes to U.S. history. It's filtered through a German lens, so sometimes it's odd. But in general, Playmobils are a lot of fun to have in the house. Everything except the space toys have been very sturdy. They lead to imaginative play for girls and boys. Check the shopping links for my favorite online site to buy Playmobil. Puffins is a cute store in Madison, Wisconsin. The online site has many other of the educational-type toys.

a science & art fair

Last week we went to our school's arts and science fair. We had fun looking at the exhibits the students in grades kindergarten through eighth grade had created. I particularly liked the idea that children could submit artwork or stories as well as the traditional science fair-type project. You have to admire the kids' and the parents' involvement in these things.

Nothing, however, seemed extraordinary which is kind of reassuring. Even in this day of great technological advances and connections to more science than ever before via the web, students still have to learn the basic science project stuff. That appeals to me and it must to kids. There's still something amazing about making your own volcano, explaining how levers and pulleys work, observing bread mold, and finding out the differences among products such as soaps, diapers, and nail polishes.

I also think it's great that the creativeness of art projects is also included in the school's fair. Both science and art require you to think ahead, build on an idea, and see it through to the finish. The thinking and visualization before art is created is tremendously under-estimated. People seem to think that anybody should be able to make great sculptures with Play-doh. This, of course, is untrue. But the myth persists. Instead, art is about asking a question, considering how to carry it out, and then doing so. It's a lot about having the skills, which means practice. This seems most obvious for classical music and dance. It seems less obvious for design, painting, some types of dance and music, and writing. Intrinsic talent is a plus, but so is hard work and a discerning mind.

Another important part is knowing when to quit a project, knowing when it's done, when it's time to perform, to exhibit, to publish, to show others. A current vogue in teaching writing is to having students constantly re-write. Teachers have told me that a student can always re-write again and again. This is not true. Eventually, you have to know when to stop. Scientists probably have it easier, perhaps too easy sometimes. They know when to stop when they have answered their hypothesis. But the question becomes: was it the right hypothesis?

It's good to see children's art and science projects mingle together and the school support both equally. It will be a better day when the U.S. culture supports both equally, too.

more on those tattoo bandages

We were using a Toy Story bandage today which is supposed to be waterproof. They are really rather awkward to work with. You peel the top so the bottom sticks to your body. This goes against every other kind of bandage you've ever used. They can be waterproof as long as they stay on. But they don't always stay on so well. Maybe they are really more of a tattoo style thing.

What does seem to work, if and when you need it, is that new bandage-less goop. Great on finger cuts! Older adults and children like it. But the advanced medicine does stain white furniture purple. However, I am not great at getting out bad stains. Perhaps another aspect of high tech parenting -- figuring out what cleaners work, which ones are dangerous, which ones are just superfluous.

Legos

I am putting together a Legos Star Wars toy this morning. Legos used to be about creativity -- take these little blocks and make them into something interesting. Now they are about following directions. It's more like model-making. That's a fine skill, but it's not as creative. It's harder these days to find a set of simple Lego blocks not associated with some kind of model or pop culture tie-in.

The Star Wars toys are particularly appealing to kids younger than the box stated age of 6 and above. But that forces parents to put together these rather complicated sets. We lost the directions, too, so I had to look at the box. I am getting better at this. I am not sure if these model-style Legos are a case of good high tech toys. Yes, there is inherent value in learning how to put together small pieces and follow directions. But they also tend to fall apart very easily. Legos used to seem like a sturdy toy to me. Now they seem to be a toy ready to fall apart. Maybe that's the appeal -- kids are always putting them back together.

MegaBlocks are an interesting variation. They tend to be more on castles and adventure stories. They also have intricate little blocks.

I am looking forward to the day when I get to play with my child's Lego director's set. Of course, I haven't bought this yet. But it looks like a cool way to try to be a film director.

Well, it's back to Luke's adventures with the drones.

Starting out

I have been wanting to put together a High Tech Parent place for awhile and now finally have a moment to do so. One thing's for sure, if you're a high tech parent you don't have as much free time as you did before kids.
But technology and new media in all its forms still fascinates me. For instance, consider the weirdness of bandages. Remember when they were just that dull brown color which matched no one's skin color? Now you can get your favorite cartoon character to plaster all over your wounds. Some children think of them as stickers. The packages refer to them as tattoos. Is it right to encourage children to have tattoos at such a young age, in any form? What about all the temporary tattoos which usually last for several days? It's weird enough that my child is wearing a lizard sticker on its hand all day while shopping in the mall or at church.