Opening the door to gratitude

As we rush toward Thanksgiving this week, I’ve been thinking a lot about how to model and teach gratitude. During this past year of political and environmental turmoil, it’s often been difficult to pause and remember to be grateful for the many good things in my life.

One thing I’m always grateful for is my weekly yoga class where serenity reigns for at least an hour and my instructor always brings in the perfect quote to set the tone for meditation. So instead of looking for Media Monday inspiration online or in the news or entertainment world, I’ll return to the spoken word. The quote last week was from Melody Beattie:

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.

How can we help our kids experience gratitude? The answer isn’t a big surprise. Recent research confirms that parents who show gratitude are more likely to create experiences that develop a sense of gratitude in their children. It’s important to teach children not only how to express gratitude as a form of politeness but also to talk about how it feels to be grateful.

Back in 2014, we learned from Nicole Haladyna how Austin’s Woodland Schoolhouse encourages empathy and gratitude through bonds with nature.

We can also look for schools where gratitude is a part of daily rituals and make sure to put kids in situations where people talk the talk and walk the walk of gratitude during everyday life—family dinners, community yard sales, charity food drives, even birthday parties. Writing thank-you notes and taking time each day to list a few things for which they’re grateful are easy but proven ways to increase children’s understanding of what it means to be grateful.

One interesting bit of information in the research is that both optimism and extraversion are strongly associated with gratitude. Extraversion seems to lead people toward the kinds of social activities with larger groups where it’s easier to demonstrate and learn gratitude. And optimism tends to lead people toward activities where they can make the world better, which then boomerangs back and increases gratitude. Because gratitude is such a bedrock part of most religious traditions, parents who are involved in organized religion also seem to increase opportunities for children to feel and understand gratitude.

For the past five years, a psychology project of the Center for Developmental Science, jointly run by the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill, Duke University, and North Carolina State University, has specifically been working toward understanding the teaching and learning of gratitude. They’ll hold a conference about their insights on gratitude in January.

In an article by Alyssa LaFaro for UNC, researcher Andrea Hussong says, “We think that a lot of gratitude lessons are learned in daily conversations, rather than big, sit-down, let’s-instill-a-virtue discussions.” The team has recently started producing some short videos to help model such conversations, but the goal is not necessarily to change kids’ behavior, but “helping parents learn how to listen to their kids, how to help kids share with their parents, and then how parents can appropriately share back with their children.”

One more good thing about gratitude: UNC psychologist Sara Algoe says, “Gratitude may actually alert us to people in our environment who are looking out for our best interests. And that’s really central to survival, to the human species. We need to be able to find people who have our backs.”

So in the interest of my own survival: Thank you to everyone who is part of the Alt Ed Austin and Alt Ed NYC communities online and in person, including my sister Teri in Austin and Karen Sullivan in New York, who let me contribute from afar. I’m grateful that I had a chance to meet so many of you a year ago at the 5th Anniversary party, and I look forward to meeting more of you next time I’m in Austin or New York! Happy Thanksgiving!

Shelley Sperry
Sperry Editorial
 

Drag those bones out and celebrate!

It’s a colorful, musical week in Austin because of Halloween and Día de los Muertos. If you’re looking for kid-friendly learning experiences related to the celebrations, here’s a little roundup:

Throughout the week, the Austin Public Libraries will host a program of stories, music, and mask-making that will make kids of any age (and their parents) smile. Take a look at all the participating libraries in this full list of events.

For kids who love music and don’t mind crowds, the annual Easter Seals Día de Los Muertos concert raises awareness and money for people with disabilities in central Texas. It’s an all-day wonderland with food, art, and lots of bands to make you clap and dance, including the Grammy-winning Grupo Fantasma. It takes place at Stubb’s Waller Creek Amphitheater. Best of all: Kids 12 and under get in free with an adult. Check out the full musical lineup.

If Halloween is more in your wheelhouse, then the Rec Centers all over the city will host Howl-O-Scream with carnival games, treats, and haunted houses from 6:30 to 8:30 pm on Halloween night. The details are all here, and admission is just $3.

And finally, if you have a little one who’s just now learning to deal with the scary aspects of people in masks and trying to understand the make-believe of it all, they might feel much better after watching Mister Rogers go old school with a paper bag mask and a happy song. I know I did.

Shelley Sperry
Sperry Editorial
 

Media Monday: Zoom in on culture with Google

Today’s Media Monday is for parents and kids looking for a way to expand and enrich their learning about art, history, archaeology, the natural world, and that big mishmash that makes up our shared human culture. Google Arts and Culture is both an online site and an app for phones and tablets (both iOS and Android) that brings a VAST collection of art, historical and natural objects, museums, parks, and more to viewers through high-resolution images, sound, and 360-degree virtual reality video.

The idea is to allow learners to get as close as possible to the process of creating batik cloth in Ghana or Leonardo da Vinci’s engineering creations. We can see art, architecture, and historical objects that we might never have the chance to look at and learn about in person, and through these superb images and sounds—all accompanied by expert narration by historians, scientists, and museum curators—we can see much more than we would be able to see even if we were at the museums ourselves.

Kids interested in art can almost touch Mary Cassatt’s brush strokes and colors, and kids interested in dinosaurs can watch The Giraffatitan come to life, as its skeleton is covered with flesh and skin and it begins to walk around Berlin’s Museum of Natural History.

The thing that struck me most when I was exploring the website and app myself is the advantage of the zoom feature. If I were at the London Natural History Museum’s exhibit on butterflies in real life, I couldn’t get close enough to really see the changing colors of the wings the way I can by zooming in on my screen. And as someone who lives in Washington, DC, with easy access to the Smithsonian’s amazing collections, I have to admit that the advantages of using this tool are nothing to sneeze at: no crowds, no waiting, you can stay as long as you like at each exhibit—and they’re all open 24/7.

Each week new experiments and collections are featured. The Voces Oral History Project, based at the University of Texas, is featured this week. The project documents and creates a better awareness of the contributions of U.S. Latinos and Latinas of the WWII, Korean War, and Vietnam War generations.

Clearly, this will send you down some fun rabbit holes, so allow plenty of time the first time you and your kids dig in. Yes, I did look at the life story of a pickle—I’m not ashamed of it! I especially enjoyed the collections of London’s Museum of Natural History and exploring the art of China’s Forbidden City. For fun, I also watched YouTube creator Ingrid Nilsen talking about the history of ripped jeans and other purposely tattered clothing that goes back to 15th-century Switzerland. And as a huge fan of volcanoes, caverns, and all things geological, one of my absolute favorite collections is a group of videos of park rangers offering guided tours of U.S. National Parks, including Hawaii Volcanoes National Park.

For a little more context about Google Arts and Culture, check out the Library Journal’s review.

Shelley Sperry

Media Monday: The ocean is telling us something. Young people are listening.

I never imagined I would be thinking about how to approach another crisis like Hurricane Harvey in a Media Monday post within only two weeks. We live in such troubled times. I’m writing this as Irma has just crossed into the Florida Keys, and as yet we really don’t know the extent of the devastation that will be visited upon millions of Floridians and others in its wake.

As we watch and wait, I want to use this opportunity to focus on the issue of educating our kids about the oceans and their powerful, vital role on the planet. There are many excellent and easy-to-find resources about the what, how, and why of ocean science out there from nonprofits, the government, and universities, so I’d like to zoom in today on ocean advocacy organizations that are not just educational, but created and driven by children and teens.

Please visit Alt Ed Austin and Alt Ed NYC on Facebook to let us know how your own kids are showing their interest in oceans, climate change, and the environment. One resource for kids who want to start a small environmental project of their own is DoSomething.org.
 

Kid-Created Ocean Projects

The Sink or Swim Project was launched by Florida teen Delaney Reynolds, who speaks to kids and adults all over the world about the science of rising sea levels. The project has some terrific books, infographics, and a comic book that will appeal to young people who want to learn more, and Delaney’s blog touches on many current climate change issues. Her TED talk explains it all:

Ella Van Cleave, now a student at Quest University, works with The Dolphin Project and Gale Force Films. Ella began her advocacy for oceans at age 12 with a love for dolphins. Today she is making a crowd-funded documentary film called To the Sea. The film aims to tell the “stories of the frontlines of the battle against climate change.” Ella explains, “I believe that one of the biggest steps we can take to ensure environmental sustainability is to get a firm grip on issues that affect the oceans, namely ocean acidification, pollution, and over-consumption of aquatic species.”

Heirs to Our Oceans is a California-based project that includes kids of all ages who want to stop pollution, bleaching of coral reefs, and other environmental disasters. As they explain it, “We have studied what is happening to know why action is needed to end the human impact on our planet’s oceans. We are sad.  We are mad.  We are motivated.  We are inspired.  We are hopeful.  We are tenacious.  And together we are taking action.” The group was featured recently on the “Loudest, Smallest Voices” episode of the Stepping Up podcast about climate activists.

Nine-year-old Milo Cress started the Be Straw Free Campaign in Vermont in 2009 after learning that hundreds of millions of plastic straws used each year eventually end up polluting our oceans. The campaign now organizes kids across the country to be part of the campaign and holds beach cleanups.

The Alliance for Climate Education includes hundreds of kids working in activist roles. One of them is Victoria Barrett, a New York City teen whose home and family were dramatically affected by Hurricane Sandy. Victoria joined 20 other kids in a lawsuit filed by Our Children’s Trust that’s designed to “highlight the threat of rising sea levels and more frequent storm surges” and to force government action.

For older kids, the Sustainable Oceans Alliance is “a youth-led organization that empowers Millennials to become leaders in preserving the health and sustainability of our oceans.” High school and college students are encouraged to start their own chapters.

Finally, if your kids are curious about the science behind hurricanes, I just found a nice set of brief, illustrated explanations about storm surge, how hurricanes form, and more from Web Weather for Kids, a site created by the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research.

Shelley Sperry
 

Media Monday: Hurricane Harvey and how your family or school can help

Our area is experiencing such an unprecedented disaster that it’s hard to know what to say or do first. Our focus here is always kids and education, so we decided to use this Media Monday post to boost organizations working to help children and families in the Gulf and Central Texas region.

Please let us know through Facebook or Twitter (@AltEdAustin) if you are a school or group of students volunteering, raising money, or doing other Hurricane Harvey relief projects, and we will try to get the word out.

Donations

We strongly endorse sending money donations to the groups on the ground who are supporting first responders and local shelters, including, but not limited to, the City of Houston’s Hurricane Harvey Relief Fund, All Hands Volunteers, and The Red Cross of Central and South Texas. A long list of voluntary organizations in Texas that are active in disaster relief is available here.

A two-week-old infant safe in a shelter where Circle of Health International is providing vital services

Of special note is Circle of Health International (COHI), which provides medical assistance and other services to women, babies, and other highly vulnerable populations in places of climate disaster and armed conflict throughout the world. We know the organization personally as it is headquartered down the hall from Alt Ed Austin’s office at Soma Vida Work Life Balance Center (which is doing its part by offering free work space this week for those in need during the Hurricane Harvey crisis). We can’t say enough good things about COHI’s heroic work and effectiveness.

Another initiative near and dear to our hearts here at Alt Ed Austin is KoSchool’s student-organized donation drive inspired by Austin Mayor Steve Adler’s call to “do our chores” and create Welcome Kits for Hurricane Harvey evacuees. In partnership with Attendance Records, Capital Factory, Lee Ann LaBorde State Farm Insurance, and Alt Ed Austin, KoSchool students are accepting donations that they will assemble into Welcome Kits. If you’d like to participate, please see the image below and get more details on the Facebook event page.

All area food banks are accepting contributions, including the Central Texas Food Bank (Austin and surrounding areas),  Houston Food Bank, the Galveston County Food Bank, and the Corpus Christi Food Bank. They all take online donations.

So many families are in dire circumstances now, with only the bare minimum of clothing, medicine, diapers, and other essentials, that we especially want to highlight groups that are focusing on children. Many groups will need help over the long term to support people who have lost nearly all their material possessions and will take months or years to rebuild and make themselves whole again.

• Texas Diaper Bank (just what you think it is: an organization providing babies, seniors, and the disabled with essentials for health and hygiene)
• Convoy of Hope (a faith-based nonprofit focused on feeding children and disaster response)
• Save the Children
• Portlight (for children and adults with disabilities)
• Driscoll Children’s Hospital in Corpus Christi 

Volunteers

Many churches and nonprofit groups in Austin are looking for volunteers, and we know that plenty of students and people in the Alt Ed community are eager to help.  A general clearinghouse for volunteers to assist in projects related to Hurricane Harvey is available at the National Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster site. Locally, the Austin Disaster Relief Network has a constantly updated list of trainings. And of course, the American Red Cross is seeking volunteers now and always, and will train you in disaster relief protocols.

Finally, we understand that many hospitals and trauma centers are experiencing blood shortages, so consider heading to a local blood donation center this week.

Shelley Sperry and Teri Sperry
 

Media Monday: Don't be afraid of the dark! A solar eclipse roundup

The countdown begins! It’s just one week until the 2017 solar eclipse hits much of North America midday on August 21. So today we have a roundup of some of the best resources for kids, parents, and educators about this rare event. Some schools around the country have struggled to decide whether kids are better off at school or at home, but everyone seems to agree that the event is an opportunity for incredibly diverse learning to happen around the science, math, and history of eclipses. For this overview I looked at some excellent web and video material for a general understanding of the what and how of it all. Then I look at how to find specific opportunities for students in the Alt Ed solar system: Austin and New York City. And at the end: a couple of my favorite extras.
 

If you just need a quick, thorough eclipse explainer, Vox comes through with a great five-minute video.

I hope that for this particular Media Monday, educators, parents, and students will consider sharing their eclipse plans, photos, and experiences with us via social media so that we can learn from each other. If New York folks could share via Alt Ed NYC’s Facebook page and Austin folks could share via Alt Ed Austin’s Facebook page, we might end up with some wonderful alternative stories and some tips for the next eclipse!

PBS has put together a clear, easy-to-digest set of materials designed for educators but equally helpful for parents who are looking for activities, basic information, and videos. The site links out to many NASA materials too.

Speaking of NASA: Really, where else would you start your search for all things eclipsical? Comprehensive and authoritative, NASA has created a guide that’s great for those who don’t live near the path of totality, because they are offering so many terrific online options for learning. Kids can see a 3D simulation before the eclipse and then watch NASA’s  livestream on Monday. The site links to several exciting Citizen Science opportunities.

My favorite option for kids (well, and for me!) is probably Science Friday’s Spotlight: The Great American Eclipse. The Spotlight guide is printable, perfectly illustrated, and includes lots of links out to additional great resources.

KQED’s Science team has also put together a terrific set of explainers, and I love Anna Kusmer’s discussion of the citizen science angle of the event. For example, kids can help gather data for the California Academy of Sciences, Life Responds project, which looks at effects of the eclipse on animals and plants. If you have a student who is into this topic, take a look at a news story from a few years ago about how insects, squirrels, and other animals respond to eclipses.

Scientific American’s comprehensive coverage is superb, and best suited to teens and educators. The magazine’s interactive graphic is one that you can geek out over for a long time.

For older grade school kids through high school, National Geographic’s coverage is great fun, and their map is accessible and elegant. Among their offerings are photos taken over a hundred years of eclipse-watching and a great new article on animal reactions to eclipses.

More into the cultural and historical side of things? Take a look at Maria Popova’s Brain Pickings posts about astronomer Maria Mitchell’s thoughts on how to watch an eclipse and her account of the 1869 eclipse, Mabel Loomis Todd’s 19th-century guide to eclipses, and writer Annie Dillard’s essay on how strange and magical an eclipse is. The Atlantic reprinted the full Dillard essay last week. Round it all off with a New York Times story about the big impact of the 1919 Eclipse on the world of science.

To end Eclipse Day 2017: Gather around and watch PBS NOVA’s documentary, Eclipse Over America.

In Austin: Peak eclipse time: 1:10 PM (partial)
Taylor Goldenstein of the Austin American-Statesman has put together a very helpful list of eclipse events in Central Texas. It looks like the Round Rock Public Library is among the best options for viewing and learning fun.

In New York City: Peak eclipse time: 2:44 PM (partial)
The Hayden Planetarium is hosting an all-afternoon event that is sure to be fabulous. And many NYC libraries and museums are participating. Amy Plitt of Curbed.com put together a viewing guide that’s helpful.
 

More awesome stuff:

• The scientists of NASA have even created an eclipse musical playlist—because of course they did!
• My favorite astronomer, Phil Plait, did a short video Q and A.
• Want to go even deeper? Phil does an hour-long colloquium on the eclipse that’s available on video.
• Time magazine explains how to watch an eclipse like a 1960s schoolkid.
• And please tell me you’ve already bought the coolest postage stamps ever.

Shelley Sperry