Articles of Interest.

A round-up of interesting articles about books, parenting, creativity and education from around the web:

• A Father Creates Touching Time-Lapse Videos of His Kids Growing Up - Laughing Squid

• An Inspiring Letter from Keri Smith

• Backyard Science: Books for Youth Explorers - School Library Journal 

• 15 Amazing Playgrounds From All Over The World - Flavorpill

• Books to Celebrate Asian Pacific American Heritage Month - Reading Rockets

• "She's With Me": How a Lack of Resemblance Brought Mother & Daughter Closer: HuffPost Women

Happy Reading!

Articles of Interest.

A round-up of interesting articles about books, parenting, creativity and education from around the web:

• When Do Kids Stop Being Cute? Babble

• How Technology is Ingraining Creativity at an Early Age - PSFK

• The Book Review is Dead, Long Live the Book Review - Book Riot

• 10 Great Green Books for Kids - TLC Parentables

• Narcissism in Pink and Blue: Gender-Reveal Parties - The New Yorker

• Multiracial Children: Teaching My Children to Check The Latino Box on Applications - HuffPost Parents

Happy Reading!

She Blinded Me With Science: The First Science Project

Today AB turned in her science project, "What Shapes Do Bubbles Make?" This was her first major school project so it was kind of a big deal. Since she is in kindergarten, participation was optional. But I chose for her to opt-in as a challenge. Her project was quite simple. She wanted to find out what shapes bubbles can make. So, we made different shaped bubble wands out of pipe cleaners. Then she went outside and blew bubbles to her heart's content. It turns out bubbles are almost always going to be round thanks to surface tension. She had fun and there were lots of references to scenarios and songs from fellow mixed kid Sid the Science Kid.

The only snag was the writing. AB began to complain if there were more than four lines of writing. But, I felt that it was important for her to actually write everything, as opposed to using the computer. She needs to practice her printing and grammar. This was the perfect exercise for it. In addition, I wanted to make sure that it was evident that she did the project, not me. While it was not as neatly presented as the kids (or parents) who typed their reports, AB was extremely proud of the finished product.

Here are a few sites to for you and your budding scientist:

• TIME for Kids: The news magazine has an edition specifically for kids. Many of the articles are written by their kid reporters. (Bonus: There are 4 different print editions available based on grade level. Check out a sample of the K-1 edition.)
• SciGirls: This is a show on PBS that is targeted at girls (just as the name suggests) and designed to spark an interest in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM).
• How Stuff Works: This site answers pretty much any question that you could think of, as well as many that had never even crossed your mind.
• Science News for Kids: A great resource from the Society for Science and the Public. 
• Literacy in the Sciences: Reading Rockets' comprehensive guide to connecting literacy skills to math and science.
• National Geographic Kids: NatGeo provides 15+ science experiments that can be done with things you have lying around the house, as well as recipes and science news.

Happy Experimenting!

AB Pic of the Week.

Book Review: Looking at Lincoln

I am finally reading Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. It has been on my TBR list for awhile. So, I've had Lincoln on the brain lately. AB, eve\r the mini-me, found Looking at Lincoln by Maira Kalman. (I wish that we found it earlier because it would have been a great addition to the Historical Biographies Booklist: Politicos.)

Looking at Lincoln tells the story of a little girl who is curious about the man whose unusual face is featured on our money. She heads to the library, of course, to satisfy this curiosity. She gives the reader a nice overview of the main points of his life, with a few fun facts and speculations in between. Apparently, Lincoln's favorite opera was the Magic Flute. His favorite dessert was vanilla cake, so perhaps Mrs. Lincoln made it for him on the day he was elected. "But maybe he forgot to eat his slice. He was often too busy thinking to eat." 

The author also makes sure to touch on some of the less pleasant aspects of his presidency, namely, slavery, the Civil War, and his assassination. It would not be a true biography without them. However, she addresses them in a way that I found refreshing. They were not glossed over. She beautifully illustrates prominent African-Americans of the time, former slaves Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass. She also depicts what slavery was with an illustration of slaves picking cotton under a harsh sun while a white overseer on horseback yells as he cracks his whip. The slaves pictured include children and women, one of whom has a baby strapped to her back. It is a truly arresting illustration that you don't normally see in a picture book. In addition, there is a soldiers uniform with a bullet hole over the point of the heart, a pistol, and a empty upholstered rocking chair with a stovepipe hat laying beside it.

Maira Kalman's amazing illustrations are a crucial aid to her story telling. Her modern style is a nice change from the traditional illustrations that usually accompany historical picture books. Her writing style is also effective. She never mentions John Wilkes Booth by name, but simply refers to him as a "wretched man who did not want slavery to end." On the other hand, she makes sure the reader knows the name of one of the first soldiers killed in the Civil War. After describing his uniform with the bullet hole, she writes ,"The soldier's name was Elmer Ephraim Ellsworth. Terrible things happen in a war." The numbers of those killed in the Civil War (or any war for that matter), allow a certain dissociation. The numbers are far to large to truly grasp that each and every person killed was somebody's child. That each and every person had a name. That each and every person lived and breathed just as we do today. 

Reading this book with AB forced me to discuss some less pleasant aspects of race and history with her. To explain that her ancestors were slaves. To explain to her that her ancestors were also likely slave owners. I didn't dwell on it, because she is only six. (I mean, it's not like I'm reading Roots to her at bedtime.) But, these are things that I want her to be aware of and I want to be the one to introduce her to them. Yet, at the same time, I do not want to burden her with race. As the black mother of a biracial child, I do not want to skew her perspective of the world to be "black" perspective. So, I struggle with finding the right balance to allow her to find her on way, hopefully as color blind as possible. 

We need more historical picture books that introduce history to younger readers in an interesting factual way that is not overwhelming. Books that encourage curiosity and research. Books that encourage discussion and engagement. Looking at Lincoln is a perfect example of that type of book.

Empowering Video: Thandie Newton

On Wednesdays I share a video that facilitates empowerment; because when you know better, you do better.

Actress Thandie Newton speaking about her journey of accepting her "otherness" at TEDGlobal 2011.

In The Absence of Kinks.

AB's  hair is chestnut brown with streaks of auburn that only show up when in the right amount of light. Her curls are loose yet defined. They are the curls that the kinks of my hair long to be. Her hair can be brushed into subtle waves. When wet it will spring back into its natural curl but longer.  Thankfully, she will never experience the burn of the hot comb, curling iron or relaxer. I live vicariously through her and let it lie as she flips it back out of her face with a grown up flair that it is apparently inherent in those with blessed with long hair. My mother worries that AB will become vain about her hair, while I worry that I will become (or have already become) vain about her hair.

While pregnant, I wondered incessantly about what she would look like. What would her coloring be? Would she have her father's blue eyes and my kinky 'fro? Would she be a beautiful mix of the two of us, or would the concoction of the two of us come out all wrong, uneven, a sign of our failed relationship?

I gave birth to white baby with straight hair and big brown eyes. I deconstructed her parts into mine and his until she was no longer a baby but simply another belonging to be divided. I got the eyes, the nose, the smile. He got the ears, the eyelashes, the feet, the build. We split the hair - the curls from me, the texture (or lack thereof) from him. Her complexion has darkened thanks to sun and age; however she is still, and forever shall remain, darker than him but lighter than me.

Despite finding these elements of me in her, I still fail to see the resemblance. But then, I think about how I don't really look like either of my parents. There are no "spitting images" in my family. There are glimpses and fragments that  appear and disappear. Wispy ghosts of resemblances.

This hair gives her anonymity. I like that she can slide through cultures with an ease that I cannot. She has been mistaken for a Latina (Dominican, Spanish, Mexican, you name it), an Indian (her surname, apparently, is quite common in India), and a Native American ("Oh, she's got that Cherokee blood, right?").

This mixture of African, Irish and Italian has given her a worldwide hue. I imagine her with her long multicultural hair tied up in a knot at the nape of her neck, backpack filled to the brim, notebook and pen in one hand and a camera in the other, traveling the world. I imagine that I have presented her with a key that will allow her to traverse this globe and be accepted by all. I picture her slipping in and out of cultural identities as she currently slips in and out of imaginary play  worlds.

She is the physical manifestion of what I wanted to experience in my youth. There is no pressure upon her to be black. There is no pressure on her to be white. She can be a chameleon and choose whatever she wants to be. This is my unintentional gift to her. This freedom that stems from the absence of kinks.

{Originally posted on Black Girl Investing}

Circus Freak.

So, is she yours?


Perhaps,they are thrown off her bone straight hair and light complexion in contrast to my kinky 'fro and dark complexion.

Brown-eyed babe is 50% African-American, 25% Italian and 25% Irish. But essentially she is biracial. Half black. Half white. However, she is not the one whom people see as abnormal. I disappoint them by not responding, "No, she is just my charge. I'm the nanny." Instead I give them a simple definative, "Yes."

So, she looks like her dad then?


Such a polite way of asking if he is of a different race. To this inquiry I responded quite cheekily, "Yes, she has his ears.", which is the truth.

I hope that her peers are less put off by her mixed heritage. And then there is the whole can of worms with regard to her own sense of identity. It has been my observation that most kids with a black parent identify themselves as black. Not that she has to identify with one or the other, but we all know how society loves to try and place people into boxes. What if I were to enroll her in an Irish dance class, would she be regarded as an outsider due to her darker skin tone? I wish I could just pass these worries off on blue-eyed babe but his sense of race is a bit murky as it is with regards to black and white. When we lived in Massachusetts, I had such anxiety about her only being surrounded by her white family members. I was quite resentful of it actually. Now that the tables are turned, I have anxiety about her not seeing her white family members. I guess we shall cross the racial identity bridge when we come to it. However, that does not mean that I won't be fretting about a possible furture identity crisis in the meantime.