A Taste of India

Grape Play with Toddlers in the Studio

Our Research Question for our Year of DELIGHT

 

It’s 1984 and I’m knee deep in a muddy creek, beneath a blue-azure sky.  Hints of willow, cottonwood and ponderosa cling to a warm summer breeze.  Wildflowers lend a breathtaking bluster of color to the almost neon green of a riparian area set amidst an otherwise parched Arizona landscape.  I double over in a side-clutching, fully belly guffaw, that leaves my body shaking in delight.  My younger brother has just surfaced from another dramatic plunge and emerged with two crawdads clinging to his fingers.  He does a wild, crustacean dance in mock pain, purely for my enjoyment. A morning spent crawdad hunting, without any track of time, immersed in pure joy and giggling glee.  This remains one of my most delightful memories.  Wet, filthy and in love with the world.  Memories like these are ripe for the picking, nearly as delicious to recall as they are to create.  

As many of you know, every year in the studio is informed by a research question.  And this summer, I did a deep dive into the art of Fun. Mainly I started asking myself the same question I now pose to you, “When was the last time you recall having SO MUCH fun?”

Really…  Give it a second and watch the memory surface.  Does the recollection gladden your body?  

How does it feel?

For many adults, frolicking good times can take a minute to remember.  I wondered why.  Are we creating less Fun for ourselves, or is it something else? Do we consider fun important?  And what exactly do we mean when we speak of FUN?  

Catherine Price in her book, The Power of Fun relates that true fun involves a trifecta of playfulness, connection and flow.  Let’s break it down…

  

Playfulness can be defined as that feeling we get when we are outside the normal responsibilities of our life and enjoying what we are doing for its own sake.  Play feels good.  Why?  Because it IS good!  Play decreases our susceptibility to various diseases, including dementia and heart disease and is connected to brain development and neural plasticity, aka learning  What?  Yep, play promotes academic success big time.  How big?  According to current research it takes around 400 repetitions to acquire new information, unless it’s done through play, in which case it only takes 10-20 repetitions.  Ten to twenty repetitions! That is no small difference.  And what does it do for our mental health?  According to Dr. Stuart Brown, the founder of the National Institute of Play, plays’ opposite is not work but depression.  Play is essential to fun… okay… now onto connection.

Nearly all of our truly fun experiences will involve some degree of Social Connection. Look for yourself.  Think back to that felicitous memory, what were you doing?  Most likely you aren’t alone.  Because being around other people we enjoy, contributes to a positive mood.  This is as true for people who self identify as introverts as it is for extroverts.  Infact, one study revealed that spending time with people is a required condition for happiness AND according to the longest running longitudinal study ever conducted (say that five times, fast)  these relationships are more reliable predictors of longevity and well being than any other single factor.  

 

The third component to fun is flow.  Flow is a term coined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi referring to the feeling of deep immersion that accompanies being absorbed in a challenging activity.  A flow state is not the same as mindlessly scrolling through our phone or being lost in a movie.  Flow requires that we are present and passionate about what we are doing.  Like fun, true flow is dynamic, present and transportive.

Okay so we have the recipe… play, connect, flow.  

So where’s the fly in our ointment?  There’s an implied requisite that deserves further attention. Being present.  We inhabit a smartphone society, pinging and dinging all the livelong day.  Our attention is often darting among distractions and distraction is the nemesis of fun. With all that noise, our days keep getting busier, making it easier to overlook or undervalue the ordinary delights in our daily lives.  

How do we counteract this tendency toward diversion?  In Ross Gay’s, Book of Delights, he offers a practice of noticing the good things.  When we set our eyes on delight, we increase our recognition of the felicitous possibilities contained in every moment.  In time, as we train our brain to notice the positive things, we settle into the immediacy of the moment with gratitude.  At ease with what's in front of us we are more likely to meet the prerequisites for having FUN.

This leads to my research question for the year: How does embracing an attitude of joy and delight enhance community relationships and improve feelings of belonging?  As always, I turn to the children, the biggest fun magnets I know, to guide us.

 

Welcome to a Year of Delight in the Studio!  

In the spirit of FUN, the studio will be offering 3 playful and informative studio nights for parents.  You won’t want to miss them, so mark your calendars!  The first one is just around the corner on October 3rd from 5-6.  I look forward to seeing you there!  I welcome each of you as partners in our delightful journey to belonging.  I have already reached out to a few parents about the possibility of collaborating with the studio, sharing something you love or a cultural celebration with the children.  If you’d like to participate in this way please reach out to me and we will playfully discuss the details.  

I look forward to a wonderful year together.

Stay Curious and Full of Wonder,

Your Studio Teacher 

Angelina

Toddler Arts

Wonder walking with XP

Welcome to the 2023-2024 school year!  

This is your blog, a repository of our year of studio documentation in one place. I will post what I've shared in the newsletter as well as a lot more, so keep coming back... to get the ball rolling, here is our introduction to this years research question:

It’s 1984 and I’m knee-deep in a muddy creek, beneath a blue-azure sky. Hints of willow, cottonwood, and ponderosa cling to a warm summer breeze. Wildflowers lend a breathtaking bluster of color to the almost neon green of a riparian area set amidst an otherwise parched Arizona landscape. I double over in a side-clutching, fully belly guffaw, that leaves my body shaking in delight. My younger brother has just surfaced from another dramatic plunge and emerged with two crawdads clinging to his fingers. He does a wild, crustacean dance in mock pain, purely for my enjoyment. A morning spent crawdad hunting, without any track of time, immersed in pure joy and giggling glee. This remains one of my most delightful memories. Wet, filthy, and in love with the world. Memories like these are ripe for the picking, nearly as delicious to recall as they are to create.

Why the trip down memory lane? As many of you know, every year in the studio is informed by a research question. And this summer, I did a deep dive into the art of Fun. Mainly I started asking myself the same question I now pose to you, “When was the last time you recall having SO MUCH fun?”

Really… Give it a second and watch the memory surface. Does the recollection gladden your body?  

What were you doing? Who were you with? How did you feel?

For many adults, frolicking good times can take a minute to remember. I wondered why they weren't easier to recall. Are we creating less Fun for ourselves, or is it something else? Do we consider fun important? And what exactly do we mean when we speak of FUN?  

Catherine Price in her book, The Power of Fun relates that true fun involves a trifecta of playfulness, connection, and flow. In the coming weeks, I will be breaking each of those components down, as we dive into a Year of Delight in the Studio!

In the spirit of FUN, the studio will be offering 3 playful and informative studio nights for parents. You won’t want to miss them, so mark your calendars! The first one is just around the corner on October 3rd from 5-6. I look forward to seeing you there! 

I welcome each of you as partners in our delightful journey to belonging. I have already reached out to a few parents about the possibility of collaborating with the studio, sharing something you love or a cultural celebration with the children. If you’d like to participate in this way please reach out to me and we will playfully discuss the details.  

I look forward to a wonderful year together.

Stay Curious and Full of Wonder,

Your Studio Teacher 

Angelina

City of Care

This is a brief transcription of two of the MANY conversations the XP children and I had over the year.  It reflects their desire to imagine and create a Society that cares for everyone and everything.  A society they called, the City of Care

John         I am going to make a park.

Lila           In our city I want there to be NO bad things happening to the Earth and only good things.  I am building an environmental station to monitor and care for the earth.

Ari            In our city, no one gets scared. So we should not have too much scary movies.

Lila         But some people like them. If we care about people we have to let them watch

Ari         So then they could see them.

Maddie M Everyone needs a house. Everyone needs a good house.  They should be different but all equally good.

Lila Different because we need to have a house we like. Different people like different things.

Maddie S Yeah but equally good so everyone feels cared for.

Henry Maybe everyone gets given a house

Lila But maybe they don’t like that house and who has the money to give away a house to everyone?  

Group Conversation about money ensues.

Lila Money is just a thing, it doesn’t have to be real.  We could make care the most important thing.

Group Animated conversation and eventually agreement that CARE is the most important thing.

Maddie S We care for the earth.  We pick up things.  We give to the earth, for earth because we are part of the earth.

Ari If we don’t take care of the earth we can’t live on it and would have to live on Mars. 

Lila Yeah, if we don’t take care of the earth we might not even have water or trees or food or anything we need to survive.

Ari Yeah and that would be way worse than Death Valley

Group Animated conversation about the planet “burning up”.

Henry We might need healthy food to eat in our city, like fruits and vegetable but we need to grow them ourselves.

Ari Yeah, and we need high protein stuff.  Like beef.

The group looks at him.

Lila Is killing animals really caring?

Ari Okay….I know! We need to find a way to get protein without killing the animals.

William And we need fruits and veggies

The group calls out: lettuce, carrots, radishes, beets, beans, watermelon, blueberries and…

Ari And meat is good for you.  Hey, we need to find a way to find a protein that’s as high as the protein we get from killing cows without killing anything.

Group Discussion and a blank on what that could be.  

We all  agree that we may need to think about that more to come up with a plan.

Henry We need bananas!

Ari Bananas need the  warm.

Lila Yeah! We need a greenhouse with good weather to grow our food.  I’ll make a greenhouse!

Ari So in the city we need a way to take care of our city in case something happens and we have to live in space. 

Angelina What will happen.

Ari We could ruin the earth.

Angelina Will we need to leave if we are taking care of the Earth.

Ari I’m not talking about the Earth.  I’m talking about taking care of human beings. Humans are a really important part of the earth

Are they more important than Nature?

Group Another animated discussion ensues. We decide to vote.

Angelina Who thinks the Earth and humans are equally important ? 11

Who thinks humans are more important? 3

Who thinks Nature/Earth is even more important than humans? 12

Henry We need bathrooms in our city!

Group Big conversation about taking care of water and we can’t make new water

Angelina I heard that the same water on Earth now, is the same water that was on Earth when the dinosaurs lived.  

Group Wow.

Ari That’s a theory.

Angelina I believe that’s a fact.

Ari You don’t know Angelina.

Angelina How bout you research that and get back to us.

Ari Okay!

Maddie S. Did you know that monkeys were one of the first people on earth.  They became smarter and smarter and they became humans

William         And then the first people were cavemen

Angelina Were there women?

Henry No women don’t like caves

Angelina Really?  Let's take a poll. If you are a girl and you like caves raise your hand.

All girls present raise their hand.

All boys present, if you like caves please raise your hand.

Four boys don’t.

More discussion.

The Group decides there were women and so we call them, Cave People

To be continued…

May 4th  meeting

Maddie S So we don’t need money to buy all this stuff because what if no one has money.  We can have a little card to pay

Gareth What if you don’t have a card

At my library I was thinking people can apply for a card and we could give you a card.

William could do the same and it could say toy store on it.  The card would be for everyone and would have limits

Declan Yeah  we’d need it for food

Henry What if we were out of cards. 

Declan Or we had the wrong cards.

Maddie S. You don’t have to have cards that say specific cards.  Maybe you just need a name card.

Ari         Someone needs to make a sky for the city.

Buildings Explained

John A Park

We need parks for people to get to play on.  If there were no parks people would be bored.  Playing is important, it makes you feel happy.

Luke Gardens

We need a garden so we have foods and so we won't get sick. I take care of the garden. I plant the food and everyone gets to eat.

Maddie M Community House

Everybody needs a house, otherwise they will just be wet or cold in the snow and rain.  Home is a cozy place where you eat and sleep.  Every person gets to have a home. Construction workers help build the houses for the people and themselves and we help them in other ways, like food and stuff.

Maddie S. Library

We need a library because it's where you can get books and you can read.  You can even sit at little places and you can read there.  You can read any books you want but you need a library card so you can borrow them.  Anyone can have a library card.  Then you can use it to borrow one to ten books at a time and then you bring them back and other people can borrow them, one to ten at the time.

Riley A Donut Shop 

A Donut Shop is important in our city because it’s also for celebrations.  Celebrations and parties make people feel cared for and sometimes you get donuts and money.  Donuts are delicious. We make vegetable or fruit donuts too for people who need them. There's’ a strawberry one that is gluten free too. Everyone can have a donut. 

Henry A School

This is Children’s Garden Montessori, Preschool through Highschool.  We need to have a school so kids can learn. When they learn and they they learn more and more.  All kids can come to my school. They read books to learn also.  They sometimes make art. They sometimes go outside and into the forest and park and the rest of the city.  It is important to have children around.  When they’re growed up they can make babies and they can go to school, so they can learn more and even better things.

William Toy Store  

It has a ton of toys and if people don’t have toys they can buy it from the toy store. If they don’t have money, some of the toys can be free.  Sometimes if someone misses or loses a toy I can just deliver the same toy back.

Lila Environmental Station

We don’t want bad things to happen to the earth.  Environmental Station.  I came up with it because I was in an earthquake in Palm Springs.  I found out there were other bad things like, droughts, pollution, tornados and so I will take care of them so it’s safe.  I care for the earth to take care of the people.

Murray Fire Station

This is a fire station with a fire truck.  We don’t want fires happening to houses or buildings.  We are first on the scene if there’s a problem.  We definitely need it in a fire station in a city of care.

Sloan A Candy Store

I made a candy store.  If anyone gets hungry for something sweet they can come to my store.  Candy makes you feel loved and safe by all the yummy candy.  Maybe I could make healthy candy like peach lollipops instead of sugar.

Isaac Recycling Center. 

They are good for our world.  This city doesn't create trash, only what is recyclable.  Nothing is new.  We do it so it doesn’t pollute the planet.

Ari Hospital

If people get really sick or really hurt they might need to go to the hospital.  I take care of them.  I give them special medicine, I have a special camera to take pictures inside of them.  We have a kitchen to make like chicken noodle soup or tomato soup to make them feel better.  Of course we need a hospital.  We take care of people!

Gareth A Forest

We need a forest because forests give us care.  They are beautiful.  They’re green.  They have animals.  Forests have lots of animals. We need Wild.  It gives us lots of things. I wanted to make a forest because I love forests.  Forests are important.  We care about the forest in our city and forests care for us.

Declan A Restaurant

We need a restaurant so people can eat or go to dinner or on a date.  If people are poor they can come to the restaurant.  Everyone gets fed at my restaurant.  If you can’t pay, maybe it could be free because everybody deserves to eat.