Skinship

Baby signing workshop

Just to remind you...on Thursday 25th October 2007 between 9 am and 12 am Takatuka organises a baby signing workshop. It will take place in Vodnikova 30 in Ljubljana (across the street from Vegedrom).

You can read more about baby signing here and here.

I hope to meet you and your little ones on Thursday.

Baby Sign workshop in Slovenia

I was writing about baby signs here and many of you were excited about the idea of learning baby sign. Well, we have tried learning it from the book but I really missed a workshop, where you can really see how it works.

After being excpected for a while...Slovenian parents will finally get the chance to learn and use baby sign language. My friend Veronika (the founder of TakaTuka) is organising the first workshop in Ljubljana. It will take place on 4th October between 6 and 8 p.m. and is suitable for parents with children between 7 months and 2 years.

I hope to meet some of you there :-)

LIKEaBIKE

For those of you who have children between the age 2 to 5 here is a  unique toy vehicle for children. It was recommended by my friend Barbara (professor of physical education and founder of Fit Mami). She is mother of Luna (4) and Bono (1) and she deeply recommends this bike.

LIKEaBIKE is perfectly tailored to the mobility demands of children from the age of two. It enables them to playfully acquire co-ordination skills, foresight and agility. LIKEaBIKE kids will have no need for supporting wheels when learning to ride a proper bicycle.You can find more information at LIKEaBIKE EU web page. Even more ifno can be found on the US web page.

Like-a-bike can be bought in most of the countries. In Slovenia they are sold in Kokoska.

I wish you a great ride :-)

Baby signs

Babies have a great need communicate. In the first weeks this communication is mainly trough crying but every day they spontaneously figure out new ways to “talk”. However it takes quite a long time before babies learn easy words, and even much longer to construct more sophisticated sentences. For all those months babies often feel frustrated because they can not communicate their feelings and thoughts. Imagine how frustrating it would be if you were unable to talk and had very limited way to express your needs, fears and thoughts about the world. Introducing your baby to baby signs can help you both have a rich and rewarding interaction.

 
Baby Signs were introduced by  two child development experts Linda Acredolo, Pd.D. and Susan Goodwyn, Ph.D. in 1982. In more than twenty years of scientific research they conducted a longitudinal study funded by the National Institutes of Child Health and Human Development. The study showed that signing babies understood more words, had larger vocabularies and engaged in more sophisticated play than non-signing babies. Parents of the signing babies in the study noted decreased frustration, increased communication, and enriched parent-infant bonding. Signing babies also displayed an increased interest in books (Moore et al, 2001).

 
The most important benefits of baby signing can be summed up in few points:

• Reduces tears, tantrums and frustration,
• Helps your baby to express needs and feelings, which builds a positive foundation of his future emotional development,
• Strengthens the parent-child bonding,
• Helps your baby to develop language skills,
• Boosts your baby’s self-esteem and self-confidence.

You can read more about baby signing, pros and cons, expert opinion and much more at Literacytrust.

I just finished reading a book by Acredolo & Goodwyn Baby Signs: How to Talk with Your Baby Before Your Baby Can Talk, New Edition  and I will soon post more about how to learn baby signing as well as some of our first hand experience.

Children can use technology creatively

What doesn’t belong to the list?

A. Computer

B. TV

C. Paintbrush

Most people would answer c. But Mitchel Resnik explains why TV is the one that should not be on this list. He explains what learning is and explores how new technologies can be used to enable more creative learning. He is using the case study from Singapore where he successfully introduced his innovative ideas. You can listen to Mitchel Resnik’s lecture at MIT. Mitchel is leading the life-long kindergarden project at MIT media lab. Their web page is really worth visiting.

Creativity in education?

Children are incredibly creative, because they are not afraid of being wrong. They try and this is the only way to come up with creative and innovative ideas. But by the adulthood we lose most of creativity. Robinson explains what is the role of education in it. He explains how the education system works. It was designed in the 19th century to meet the needs of industrialisation. But today we are still educating our children under the same system. We are educating them for the future and we don't even have a clue of how the world will look in 5 years.

There is definitely an urgent need to change the way we think of education. I love his quote »Creativity in education is as important as literacy and we should treat it with the same importance«.

You can listen to the whole lecture of Sir Ken Robinson at the TED conference

http://www.ted.com/tedtalks/tedtalksplayer.cfm?key=ken_robinson

We should listen to this speech far before we give our kids to school.

Nurturing couriosity and creativity

There are some approaches in education that nurture curiosity and creativity

http://www.atlc.org/Resources/Montessori.php

You can read more about the Montessori Foundation or even find a scool nearby...
http://www.montessori.org/index.html