Mind in the Making

Got the Winter Blues? Time to Plan a New Project!

January 25, 2012

Julie A. Riess, Ph.D., is the Senior Advisor on Child Development and Education at Families and Work Institute. She is a developmental psychologist and the director of the Wimpfheimer Nursery School at Vassar College.

This article was originally published in the Poughkeepsie Journal by Gannett Publications on January 22, 2012.

Two years ago, my son started a “365” project. He wanted to improve his skills as a photographer and made a pledge to himself to take at least one picture a day for the calendar year. On New Year’s Eve,  2010, we watched them as a slide show on our TV. We had had many sneak previews, including following along on his Facebook photo album. Yet the whole show, a year in pictures, was poignant in a new way.

There were some obvious things that made us smile, such as family blowing out birthday cake candles or the annual posed picture at our family’s summer vacation spot. Surprisingly, the more salient photos for me were the unexpected moments in daily life. There was the light switch in a darkened room at 11:59 p.m. (determination to keep the project afloat on a day he forgot to take a picture). There was the half full glass of water on a nightstand, from when he was sick in bed. There was a photo of a train window and another of car tail lights, as he traveled to interviews for graduate school.

Research on children’s memories, including interviews with children, often highlight the snapshots of our daily lives more than the center stage events. Memorable moments come in all shapes and sizes, yet the details sometimes tell the story better than the canvas. It isn’t as much about the trip to Disney World as discovering the little chocolate on a hotel pillow. It isn’t as much about a new bicycle as the moment a parent let go and you didn’t fall.

UPDATE: Ellen Galinsky on NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams

January 19, 2012

 Update: The segment on 24-7 child care has been postponed. Check back here for updates on an air date.

Modern ECE Professional Learning Communities Webinar with Ellen Galinsky. Join us!

January 18, 2012

On February 1, 2012 at 2pm EST Ellen will be doing a webinar called Modern ECE Professional Learning Communities hosted by Early Childhood Investigations. The presentation draws in part upon lessons learned from Mind in the Making learning communities work. 
Here is the link for more information and to register.

1. Bring new players together.
2. Seek to reach the most “in need” among us.
3. Focus on learning from and with each other and share a belief that there is expertise among us all.
4. Focus on active learning that is experiential  and engages participants in self-reflection and self-discovery.
5. Use new media to connect in creative ways.
6. Actively create new curricula based on sound principles of child and adult learning and development.
7. Focus on assessment, but tie assessment to child development.
8. Reframe teaching as teaching AND learning together.
9. Connect policy to practice.
10. “Play it forward.”
     

Learning Communities: An Emerging Phenomenon by Ellen Galinsky

January 18, 2012

The current edition of NAEYC's Young Children, pages 20-27, has an article by Ellen called Learning Communities: An Emerging Phenomenon. Here is a link to the issue.

Raising a Puppy: A refresher course in Basic Parenting 101

January 09, 2012

Julie A. Riess, Ph.D., is the Senior Advisor on Child Development and Education at Families and Work Institute. She is a developmental psychologist and the director of the Wimpfheimer Nursery School at Vassar College.

This article was originally published in the Poughkeepsie Journal by Gannett Publications on January 8, 2012.

On December 11, 2011, our family life changed forever: we adopted a 13 week old puppy.   Like classic expectant parents, we were excited and a little bit nervous.  What would we name him? How would our lives change?  Were we ready? 

As a veteran parent of three children, I was most focused on impending sleepless nights or at the very best, interrupted sleep. Coping with being sleep deprived has never been one of my strengths as a parent.  I was confident that expecting to be sleep deprived was half of the adjustment.

We are now at day 22 and I’ve only been awakened once during the night. Chai Latte sleeps through the night like a perfect puppy. My biggest worry turned out to be no worry at all. Hum, I thought, this is just like when I became a parent for the first time 25 years ago; nothing was what I expected.