Pandemic | The Wonder of Words

“The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.”

—Marcel Proust

We are now officially in the height of the holiday season but most of us will not be celebrating as we normally do. We are all nourished by tradition but, children, in particular, build important foundational security on the repetition of cherished rituals. The holidays mean parties, friends, and extended family. They mean laughter, hugging, sitting shoulder to shoulder at a candle lit table.

How do we make this year, this strange and unprecedented year, a time of peace, joy, and hope for our children? How do we rise to the challenge and the opportunity to learn to express our love in new and different ways?

I believe that the most important idea to convey to school age children is that we are celebrating differently this year precisely because we love our friends and family. We love them so much that we want to be absolutely certain that we do not put them in harms’ way. No matter what is said, children, with their innate emotional intelligence, are adept at seeing beyond words. In the innocent gaze of a child we see our reflection. Children lift us through their need for us to lift them. This is one of the many blessings of being responsible for children.

Children look to us to be their guides through this brambly world. We know, with our years behind us, that there is daylight and starlight above the densest of forests, but children don’t know this. Knowing that time will bring change and that hope is sustaining are realizations that only maturity can bring.

This year we can soothe our children by embracing the intimacy and simplicity that this time demands, by allowing ourselves to be vulnerable and, in this allowance, showing trust. Teach the wisdom of knowing that we are in the throes of something beyond our control and must adjust our sails and travel on. Teach them to understand what giving really means and the joy that comes with giving from your heart.

This year is a perfect time to try to forget our own problems for the moment and remember others less fortunate. Does counting blessings sound haplessly cliché? Try it. You’ll be surprised. And have your children try it, too.

It is also a perfect time to reflect on gratitude for what we have, not what we will get. To embrace simple pleasures – walking around the block to look at birds and clouds, planting nasturtiums seeds (they sprout quickly), cooking, or reading side by side.

“To see a World in a Grain of Sand And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,

Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand And Eternity in an hour.”

—William Blake

It is a perfect year for children to experience the transience of time in a visceral way. To let them know that they are living history-that one day they will tell their own children that they were part of the great global pandemic of 2020.

Take this opportunity to discuss hardships that people through the ages have experienced, and how they worked to overcome tremendous difficulties. Discuss the importance of science! Let your children know that scientists and doctors all over the world have worked together to discover a vaccine that will help the Corona Virus disappear. Inherent is a great message of a global connection that this virus brings to the forefront. That we are all in this together (as we are all in this together in every other way, one might add) and that only by working together can we fix it. What a beautiful lesson in the brotherhood of man.

So, this year we may not be able to sit our children on Santa’s lap, fight crowds at the airport, stand in long lines at the mall, get caught in holiday traffic, or wait forever in a crowded restaurant for a table….Hmm, actually, that’s not so bad. Let’s bake some cookies, light a fire, and read about flying reindeer.

Classic Holiday Books:

The Polar Express – Chris Van Allsburg

The Wish Tree – Kyo Maclear

Great Joy – Kate DiCamillo

Snowmen at Christmas – Mark Buehner

The Snowy Day – Ezra Jack Keats

How The Grinch Stole Christmas – Dr. Seuss

Let’s Celebrate-Special Days Around The World – Kate DePalma

The Snowman – Raymond Briggs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5A3THighARU

BE SAFE * WEAR A MASK

©donnaesgro

Reading, thoughtful reading, is more important than ever for children during this time of social distancing and on-line learning.

Deep reading is the giving up of oneself to a story, falling into the character’s lives, sharing their hopes, fears, successes, and failures. Whether the characters are wizards, orphans, bullies, hedgehogs, or heroes, we experience their trials as universal.

Early childhood experts and social scientists agree that reading fiction (from picture books to classic novels) helps build Theory of Mind. TOM is the ability to understand the desires, intents, and beliefs of another. To be able to identify with another is a key cognitive skill that begins developing early in life.

Humans, as the current state of distancing has brought into sharp focus, are social beings. Social beings who, for the sake of themselves and others, are living now in a state of modified distancing for the near distant future. But just because we are physically in a bubble, our minds, hearts, and souls do not have to be.

As the brain reads it becomes very active. It literally sparks! Neurobiologists have discovered that the same regions of the brain are stimulated by reading about something as they are by experiencing it. While reading, hundreds of neural connections are made that include recognition, understanding, awareness, and acceptance of different points of view. New thoughts and feelings arise, as we read, that nurture our ability to feel empathy.

Reading, because it has the power to shift perspective and encourage one to think outside normal bounds, has the power to change society. In this binary time, when there is a tendency to believe that one is on one side or another, reading opens minds and develops the art of listening.

As we are well aware, most of the healing needed in our society will not be solved by a new vaccine. By reading often to our children and, as they grow, encouraging them to read, we can, in our own homes, be part of a process of building the necessary compassion for all people that is vital to our future.

https://Twitter.com/@stoneinthepond

The Wonder of Words

Tag Archives: Pandemic

Tis The Season

The Importance of Reading Stories to Your Child During the Pandemic