Marimekko cont...

Just realized why Marimekko rang a bell. It was thanks to my friend Nora, who passed away May 9th of last year at the age of 27 after battling adrenocortal cancer. I miss her very much. Here is a link to her blog entry where she talks about Marimekko, and the beet soup that reminded her of it. She and her wonderful family have great taste in all things, especially cheese, prints and books. I hope to make it back to Minnesota to visit them.

Ravishing Beasts

Went and saw the "ravishing beasts" show yesterday at the museum of Vancouver. The show is about taxidermy, and for the uninitiated, the museum is located at the planetarium, at Vanier park. It was an amazing show and they have a craft show coming up that opens on the 13th of January and it's called "art of craft". Totally worth checking out, and come to the craft night there on the 21st. I'm not sure if they have a new curator there or what but seems like there is some fresh energy that is doing great things there, like the show about cycling, which I missed, which included a screening of the triplettes of belleville in the park outside last summer. Hooray for forward thinking curators and museums!

Marimekko

Just wasting some time on ebay and found some cute mugs with a name that rang a bell... "marimekko" a few google searches later i found a store in Vancouver that sells their many gorgeous wares. The print designs are gorgeous and remind me or huntervasser, warhol and 70's band posters all rolled into one.

The Botany of Desire

I have found myself recommending Micheal Pollan's book "the Botany of Desire" to several people. In recommending it I discovered a website about the book, and the DVD, which I didn't know existed, but do thanks to PBS. It has video clips, lesson plans, and of course a store where you can buy the book DVD etc. Check it out by clicking here.

Love Train

Went and saw my uncle perform as part of a gospel choir a few weeks back. They were awesome and the performance ended with the entire chapel full of people singing and clapping along to love train. Tonight, I wanted to hear that song again, feels pretty appropriate for this time of year, it's dark, it's cold, time to join hands and join the love train.

Much love and happy holidays

-Alicia

Thoughts on the Downside of Documentation

I had such a good day today. I worked at the preschool I have subbed at for the past 8 years or so. It was so calm. The kids were amazing. We made star ornaments, I mesmerized them with LED lights to celebrate the solstice, we played monsters, we sang carols, we made a hopscothch, we played hockey, we drew and when I tried to write their quotes on the backs of their sheets they were confused and, in some cases annoyed. One boy told me to close my eyes and erased everything I had written, including his name. It made me think that maybe too much documentation can seem/feel like scrutiny. There were moments when I wished I had a camera so I could take pictures of the amazing block fortresses they were building, or the drawings they drew, but not having one also allowed me to just revel in the moment with them, instead of feeling weirdly voyeuristic and paparazzi-esque. Bottom line, kids are awesome, and I think they are extra awesome when you give them an environment that is safe, relaxed and calm. There were quiet breaks in the day. No workplace is perfect, but I have to say that the feeling, at least for me, was a really good one. Felt like being home, and home at this time of year is a pretty good place to be. I feel like having this blog as a personal place for reflection is very valuable, and I am happy to have had a crash course to intense documentation, and happy to have a break from it :) at least for now.

More Dance inspiration

dance parties and channeling rough play

Lately at my job we have noticed the older boys are really into rough play. As teachers (and perhaps especially as mostly female teachers) who want to keep things as safe as possible, and roughhousing can feel like an affront to our sense of security, however, there is research that shows that this kind of rough play is an integral part of development. Check out this Ted talk by Stuart Brown, here is an expert on it

A pioneer in research on play, Dr. Stuart Brown says humor, games, roughhousing, flirtation and fantasy are more than just fun. Plenty of play in childhood makes for happy, smart adults -- and keeping it up can make us smarter at any age.

We have been wrestling with how to channel this rough play in pro-social ways. One example is that during the dance parties, many of the children want to roll on the floor or sort of "mosh" into one another. We have thus far said that this kind of "dancing" was not allowed as it risked being trampled upon for hurting others. I was talking with my friend and mentor Susan Swanson about this and her imminent trip to Brazil and we thought about the possibility of introducing the children to Capoeira, the Brazillian dance/martial art. Susan and her husband showed me some amazing videos online of adults and children doing Capoeira. I was mesmerized by the spinning limbs moving in sync with the music and bridging the line between dancing and fighting. The most wonderful thing? The dancers never actually make contact with each-other, and when a pair is dancing the others stand on the side so as to give the dancers lots of space to move around. I was discussing this yesterday with Ms. Pamela and Ms. Zahra and it turns out that Ms. Sammy does Capoeira! How perfect! Perhaps this can be integrated into outdoor circle where there is lots of room? I think it could be a wonderful way of channelling rough play while also working on gross motor coordination and development, singing, percussion and socialization!

Here are some videos you can check out if you are interested in what Capoeira looks/sounds like:

kids: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM1EQuPgV8M

pros: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJDwHpNylZE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z8xxgFpK-NM

Outdoor Literacy

The other day when we were playing outside Je and Ca were jumping on the new cobblestones and singing the alphabet. I thought of something I had read in "Teaching Green" about numeracy and how it can be a cool idea to number the trees in your schoolyard and use them for games and I proposed to the children that we could write the letters of the alphabet on the stones thinking this may help the children gain a more firm grasp of some of the letters, like that LMNOP is not one letter for example. They liked this idea and so we drew it out in chalk. There were only 24 cobblestones in the line so I pried two from the frozen ground in another part of the yard. I noticed other children like Ka and Fr were now joining in walking and hopping along and naming the letters so I decided this might be a good permanent thing to have outside to help encourage literacy in the children. After checking with Ms. Pamela I found some bright yellow outdoor acrylic in the shed and set to work with Na Ay and Au helping me to keep children from stepping on the stones until they were dry and helping me think of what letter was next and as I painted we thought of different words that started with that letter and sang our phonics song (se the JJJ Justin post:). As I was painting Ms. Gina came by and said "Looks like you are having a sesame street moment!" I thought this was quite flattering as despite my reservations about having kids watch TV, especially before age 2, I feel Sesame street and their amazing puppets have done amazing things to encourage literacy and numeracy in preschool aged children over the past 30 years. The first tiny snowflakes of the season began to fall as I painted XYZ I hope the paint will dry in time so they can last into 2010!

-Ms. Alicia

Tomatosphere!

I take it back! The Canadian Space Agency has renewed my faith in being a canuck. Enter Tomatosphere they send you seeds that have been subjected to "mars like conditions" as well as seeds that have been to the international space station and subjected to conditions there. Plus these are tomato seeds! Hooray!

Seeds in Space!

Wow, there are very few times in my life when I wish I were American, but now is one of those times. I just found out about NASA's Education program which includes a program where they send you an activity kit so you can grow seeds that have BEEN IN SPACE! They will ship these seeds to teachers in the states so that students can do trials and see if the plants exposed to space will grow any differently than earth seeds. Also they have a design challenge where students design or test various lunar plant growth chambers. I have just emailed NASA to see if they will make an exception.

Thanks Niall for this one

"All children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up."
- Pablo Picasso

(notice he uses "he" rather than "they".. anyways...)

Symphony of Science

H1N1

Just watched one of my favorite movies of all time last night, Willow. In one part the evil witch turns an entire army of humans into pigs...and well, sort of got me thingking about, you guessed it, swine flu. I have been debating about getting vaccinated. My job reccomends I do so, and apparently if I do come down with the flu, and am not vaccinated then I am not eligible for sick day coverage...so....pretty tempting. But now I hear they have run out of the vaccine for H1N1. Also, I have never had a flu shot before, and have some reservations. I got an email from a friend the other day and I feel like this good advice makes more sense than the relentless media hysteria over vaccination. Here it is:

Dr. Vinay Goyal is an MBBS,DRM,DNB (Intensivist and Thyroid specialist), having clinical experience of over 20 years. He has worked in institutions like Hinduja Hospital, Bombay Hospital, Saifee Hospital, Tata Memorial, etc. Presently, he is heading our Nuclear Medicine Department and Thyroid clinic at Riddhivinayak Cardiac and Critical Centre, Malad (W).

The following message given by him; I feel it makes a lot of sense and is important for all to know

The only portals of entry are the nostrils and mouth/throat. In a global epidemic of this nature, it's almost impossible not coming into contact with H1N1 in spite of all precautions. Contact with H1N1 is not so much of a problem as proliferation is.

While you are still healthy and not showing any symptoms of H1N1 infection, in order to prevent proliferation, aggravation of symptoms and development of secondary infections, some very simple steps, not fully highlighted in most official communications, can be practiced (instead of focusing on how to stock N95 or Tamiflu):

1. Frequent hand-washing (well highlighted in all official communications).

2. "Hands-off-the-face" approach. Resist all temptations to touch any part of face.

3. *Gargle twice a day with warm salt water (use Listerine if you don't trust salt). *H1N1 takes 2-3 days after initial infection in the throat/nasal cavity to proliferate and show characteristic symptoms. Simple gargling prevents proliferation. In a way, gargling with salt water has the same effect on a healthy individual that Tamiflu has on an infected one. Don't underestimate this simple, inexpensive and powerful preventative method.

4. Similar to 3 above, *clean your nostrils at least once every day with warm salt water. *Not everybody may be good at using a Neti pot, but *blowing the nose hard once a day and swabbing both nostrils with cotton swabs dipped in warm salt water is very effective in bringing down viral population.*


5. *Boost your natural immunity with foods that are rich in Vitamin C. *If you have to supplement with Vitamin C tablets, make sure that it also has Zinc to boost absorption.

6. *Drink as much of warm liquids (tea, coffee, etc) as you can. *Drinking warm liquids has the same effect as gargling, but in the reverse direction. They wash off proliferating viruses from the throat into the stomach where they cannot survive, proliferate or do any harm.

SPEC!

I have been asked to join the board at SPEC, which is the Society Promoting Environmental Conservation. They are Vancouver's longest running environmental organization and have spawned myriad other groups, including Greenpeace! I am very honored to have been considered to be part of their organization and was even more please to find that when I came for my meeting to get some info on my potential role my friend Marnie was there doing her first day as Food Security Coordinator! Small world. Marnie and I have and interesting history, our paths just keep running back into each other. She and I graduated the same year from the Interdisciplinary Studies program at UBC (she was the only other person I knew) and then we both graduated in the summer from Education, though she was in the French immersion program (braver than I). I am hoping that this time we will get to work a little more closely as I think SPEC is a place where our shared ideals have the possibility of being realized.

Collage Collage

The other day I was walking to my Tai chi class near Kingsway and Fraser and stumbled across Collage Collage a wonderful new art space/classroom/shop run by a friend of a friend Erin Boniferro. I had hear about this store but had not made it up to check it out. It's beautiful and has something for every price range, from inspiring books to 50 cent rubber dinosaurs.

I got talking to Erin and she is a very inspiring educator who has been to Reggio in Italy and has dabbled in various educational roles over the years. I am hoping to get her to come and pay us a visit at Alderwood.

I would encourage children and those with the hearts of children to visit and be inspired.

My new job

I have a new job. I have had it since September, so I guess it's not that new...but it still feels that way. I am the eco-literacy coordinator for Alderwood house School in Richmond. Here is our blog. Over the next while I will be working to create a food garden, beautify the school grounds and basically get the kids in touch with the local ecology, which includes many surrounding farms as well as forest. I am hoping that together we will better understand how it all fits together. So far, the commute is long, but I am learning to enjoy it, burning through audiobooks and aspiring to become a transit knitter. The kids are pretty amazing. The other teachers are dedicated and I am surrounded by wonderful and supportive friends and colleagues who are helping me to figure out how I will do all this. Much more to come.

Fat of the Land

Amazing blog I just found out about, has recipe ideas and inspiration for local eating. Check it.

Vancouver Peace Summit (thanks Auntie!)

This past Tuesday I was fortunate to have the opportunity to go and see a panel discussion with His Holiness the Dalai Lama along with some other brilliant speakers including Sir Kenneth Robinson, Steven Covey (author of the 7 habits of highly effective people) and three members of the Blue men who have just started a preschool in New York called the Blue School. The Conference was called "Educating the Heart" and was part of the Vancouver Peace Summit.

The panel began with a discussion of the problems with out current educational system. In particular it's focus on IQ and on facts rather than thinking. This seems to be due to the fact that our current system was born out of the industrial era, and because of this tends to view children as so many train cars and "education" as a kind of giant grain silo, theroetically filling the children up with knowledge, or in most cases information, and facts rather than nurturing creativity and developing a deeper knowledge. The Blue Men prefer to use the metaphor of children as rocket ships and their goal is to run around with some fire trying to light a fuse. They view the promotion of creativity as the most important goal of education.This to me seemed t fit nicely with what I understand of the Reggio philosophy. What do you think?

The blue men then used their performative skills to hilariously demonstrate the 6 creative mindsets they have identified which are:

-The Scientist: making connections, investigating, chinking, grouping sorting, making sense of the world analytically, rationally

-The Shaman: Using Rhythm, dancing, chanting, magic, using our intuition

-The Group Member: Keeps the Shaman in check by focusing on the importance of collaboration, the needs of everyone, but can also lead to groupthink

-The Trickster: Helps to shake things up, new fresh ideas, but can lead to anarchy if there is too much

-The Hero: Has high ideals, and goals, os a creator and gets things done, but can be a workaholic,

-The Innocent: Seeing things with fresh eyes, staying naive, seeing the beauty, taking time to appreciate be silly, childlike

They have noticed that during particularly strong performances they will feel themselves moving through all these different stages, and posit that each of us has them all to some extent and that as educators and thinkers it is important not to get stuck in any one area, and to think about how we may be able to incorporate all aspects into our daily practice. It was helpful as I sometimes feel at school as though our focus on letting the children explore may also need both guidance and ways of seeing this exploration and knowing when creative energy needs to be re-focused so that it doesn't turn into chaos, anarchy, groupthink etc. This is true of the children as well as us as teachers in my view and I hope to be able to keep these mindsets in mind over the next while as I continue to settle into the school.

Elizabeth Grosz on Art

My Friend Nat just told me about a great lecture she went to given by Elizabeth Grosz, I liked this quote by her and am thinking of picking up her book Time Travels: Feminism, Nature, Power (2005)

In her lecture “Sensation. The Earth, A People, Art,” Grosz writes:

Art is of the animal. It comes, not from reason, recognition, intelligence, not from a uniquely human sensibility, or from any of man’s higher accomplishments, but from something excessive, unpredictable, lowly. What is most artistic in us is that which is the most bestial…. Art is … that energy or force, that puts life at risk for the sake of intensification—for the sake of sensation itself—not simply for pleasure or for sexuality, as psychoanalysis suggests—but for what can be magnified, for what is more, through which creation, risk, innovation are undertaken for their own sake, for how and what they may intensify.

Ted Talk on the importance of play

Just watched this and would encourage everyone else to do the same, it's amazing. Discusses the importance of play to human development and happiness...

Abstract Art

"Abstract Art is the communication of what is secret by what is secret."

-Wassily Kandinsky

local flora

Can I get 2-5 year olds to do this? I think I can I think I can I think I can....

learn learn learn

I have finally finished school. I am done my program and while there are still lots of beurocratic hoops to be jumped through in terms of signing my life away to the BCCT, I am still feeling inredibly relieved to have my life back. Also, I got a job! I will be working 4 days a week at Alderwood House School. I will be the "eco literacy facilitator" there. Much more on that later. I have been cramming to try to get back all my gardening know how and get reaquainted with all the things I love so that I can BRING IT to this new job. My brain feels a bit like this picture, which I found on the fffound website (at least I think it was there) a while back.

the most efficient

Bikes rule. I have been learning to fix mine with help from the great people at the bike kitchen at UBC. Thanks Cam!

Sun Dew

When I was up at Cat Lake a few weeks back I was sitting on a log and noticed some tiny lime green plants with little purple tentacles. Upon closer inspection I recognized these as carnivorous plants. I later looked them up and found out they were Sundews. Pretty amazing little plants that use their sticky tentacles to attract and capture insects. These are actually an indicator specis for BC! A friend of mine recently got an ant infestation in her house and has reportedly used pitcher plants to capture the bugs, pretty nice little pets to have. I am going to try growing some in a terarium I have started.

Brian Nash Gill

Just heard about this artist Brian Nash Gill from some friends. Pretty neat stuff. Makes me want to try out some nature prints!

Special Needs.

I have been taking a class that deals with exceptionalities and teaching children with special needs. It has been really eye opening, and brings up a debate about the costs and benefits of prescription drugs (think ritalin) and labeling of kids. While labels can be helpful to validate the experience of students and to help them get the help they may need to be able to work within our system, the labels themselves can also be detrimental and seem to somtimes lead to apathy on the part of teachers, parents and/or students (eg, "I can't do that assignment, I'm ADHD"). This story by this american life called Mother of Invention brings it all home for me.

here is the syopsis

Karen Sosnoski's one-year-old son, Anton, was born with what's known as Mosaic Down Syndrome, a rare condition where some of his cells have the extra chromosome that causes Down syndrome and other cells don't. So as he grows, he could end up having all the health risks and challenges of Downs syndrome...or just a few of them. Through a website, Karen found a kid with the same diagnosis, named Tim Colvin, who was doing really well...perhaps because his mother, Kristy, invented a surprising and unusual way to raise her son. When some people hear about what Kristy did, they're shocked. Karen went to talk to Kristy and Tim about how Tim was raised. (13 minutes)

here is the link.
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1265
just click where it says full episode in orange.

James Chamberlain is a Hero

We had an amazing talk today given by James Chamberlain, the teacher involved in the book ban that happened in the Surrey school board in the 90's. He reccommended a really good resource called GALE (Gay and Lesbian Education)

Article by Samantha

A friend of mine just wrote an article in the online Georgia Straight about the healing powers of nature, as well as her work with the environmental youth alliance, or EYA, where I did an internship a year and a half ago. Nice work Sam!