Using Arts and Crafts to help your child develop

Children are inherently curious and children naturally love art, painting, drawing , making music etc!! Arts and crafts provides a way for a child to create something unique which gives a child a positive, constructive way for them to express themselves and their thoughts. Physiologically, the human brain consists of 2 parts, the left and the right hemisphere. The left brain is used in logical thinking and analytical processes. This is typically what is trained in school work that consists of math, reading and science. The right brain is used in emotional perception, intuition and creativity. This is touched upon in schools but I believe we need to act on a childs creative development from babies as these skills will also be important to how they live their lives!

Arts and crafts are a great developmental tool for children: its fun and educational. Children can partake in groups to build confidence and social intergration. But they are also valued for their self expression and for their personal and unique masterpieces. Arts and crafts for children offers personal satisfaction and a child will feel proud of themselves for what they have solely achieved. At the same time as having great fun.

It is important that children understand it is ok to be unique, that we are all different , we all have different skills and unique talents. Providing this self belief and individuality appreciation at am early age will avoid the risk of getting a low self esteem, and will allow children to enjoy and explore themselves and their talents without the need to feel they must be the same as their friends or siblings!

Crafts offer new exciting experiences and sensations as well as improving fine motory skill. By controlling brushes, crayons, sculpting clay, building blocks etc a child will learn how to use their small muscles in their fingertips for example.

With arts and crafts the object is fun, mess, play and free personal expression. Your little ones will make unique masterpieces that they will be proud of, it is important that the masterpieces are valued and displayed in order to infuse their confidence. All children who make something personal and unique that is treasured will love their individuality and will be happy to try new things, explore more things and develop from strength to strength as a result. A child who has low self esteem will not take risks and will not reach their full potential nor live a happy,healthy life that a child deserves.

As well as offering children escapism , leaving the real world and entering a fun creative free creative world, it is also improving their coordination and manual dexterity. With lots of different crafts and tools many new skills and experiences can be tried.By taking part in arts and crafts a child will also improve and develop their concentration skills and perseverance. Both of which are useful skills to take into school and adult working environments. Pateince and an understanding that sometimes putting in the extra effort, extra time for the harder crafts will pay off.

The benefits of arts and crafts are:

· Creativity skills are important as it is through creativity children learn their uniqueness and express their feelings.

· Creative arts develop children’s fine motory skills

· Arts and Crafts offer new experiences and sensations

· Arts and crafts can be interactive and social if done in groups. A creative environment is a happy one for children.

· Arts and crafts allow for personal self expression and being valued and appreciated for their unique masterpeices

· Creativity builds confidence for unique personal expression

· Arts and crafts is a great source of quality time with parents, siblings

· Creative arts are fun and educational

· Arts and Crafts builds confidence and self esteem

· Arts and Crafts offer the chance to make choices and build decision making skills

· Creative arts allows children expresses their emotions

· Arts and crafts sessions are great escapism for children from the real world into a creative world

· Arts and Crafts improve coordination and manual dexterity

· The creative arts improve and nurture concentration skills and perseverance

· Arts and crafts teach patience and that to get excellent results it could take harder work and time

Tips to make the arts a part of your childs development:

• Always make arts and crafts supply available and accessible to your child - paper, pencil, crayons, etc.

• Celebrate your child’s artwork – hang their drawings on the wall or save it in a folder. That way, your child feels that their creation is important.

• Read books – Ask the librarian at your school or public library to suggest books about the arts. ( a great book to build self esteem and confidence is The Magic Sunglasses. www.themagicsunglasses.com )

• Notice the arts all around you – take your family to museums, creative days, toddler groups etc. Notice the art even in the parks, subways, and open spaces. Start a conversation about what you see.

• Enjoy the arts at home – share your artistic skills and interests with your children. Find out what your kids love about the art and crafts.

• If your kid shows great interest or talent in certain arts and crafts nurture their esteem

• If possible, remind your kid’s school authorities about the importance of art in her education.

How can you boost your children’s confidence?

When you feel confident you feel you can do more, when you lack confidence you subconsciously hold yourself back, and this is the same for children. To enable them to reach their full potential through their developmental ages and right the way through to adulthood, we need to nurture their self belief and confidence and make them feel good about themselves. Self esteem I believe to be a childs passport for life: It will allow them to live with a positive attitude, a will to try, to succeed, to live healthily , with self belief and respect for others. Even more importantly is, a healthy self esteem will encourage them to strive socially, intellectually, physically and grow into well-rounded and happy people!!

Gok Wan is helping our teens feel good about their bodies and self esteem which is great, but where is the help for our toddlers, pre schoolers and primary ages. As this is the most crucial when you think that this is their developmental age! Where they learn about themselves and others around them.

The best ways to promote confidence is through:

· Making your baby/child feel loved and valued with affection and love.

· Be a good role model , be confident, positive and happy yourself.

· Give quality time to each child. Play with them, read with them,etc

· Help your child realise their talents. Develop these talents and applaud their strengths

· Give your child responsibilities. Their own special jobs within the home. So they see they are an asset to a group.

· Encourage your child to be expressive and show their feelings. Releasing inhibitions is a great way to tackle low self esteem and will develop confidence. Communication skills and socialisation will become second nature to a child whom expresses their own feelings.

· Do not give your child attachment issues, show your baby/child that they are safe cuddling other people and not just mum and dad.

All of this can be achieved through the creative arts! Here are some ideas of what and where!!

· Reading creative books with your children is a great method for boosting self esteem and confidence. It gives you and your child quality time together which will make them feel special. It is allowing a child to learn words and language. It will improve your childs reading skills and will also allow conversation and feelings to be discussed in relation to the topic in the book. If you choose a book that is fun but also targets the issue of being brave, being confident, trying your best, not giving up etc a child will take that onboard. To help your child boost their self esteem and confidence I recommend the The Magic Sunglasses . This wonderful book written by Auriel Blanche discusses this very theme and there is also a workshop and interactive website to help children and parents dealing with esteem. www.themagicsunglasses.com

· Join baby toddler groups, these are great for social interaction. Musical toddler and baby groups are ideal. They allow children to be creative and have fun in a safe and relaxed environment. At the same time as building confidence and self esteem, they explore the musical instruments, nursery rhymes and action songs. Through doing so they learn to build the co-ordination skills, develop physically, socially and emotionally. A music class encourages interaction with other children, group activities, socialising, joining in and sharing. It also allows them to express themselves and a fun way to escape to a fun musical world away from the worries them may have. They may make friends and learn musical talents aswell. All in all they will feel valued as part of a group, gain self esteem and happiness as they are applauded for getting actions right, knowing the songs, playing the instruments and playing the games.It is also quality time with their parents so they will feel special. One I recommend is Musical Minis, they are all over the country . http://www.musicalminis.co.uk

Benefits of CREATIVE PLAY for children

When we think of helping our children to develop we usually think of academic qualities like reading, writing, maths and concentration. But we really need to add creativity to that list of beneficial qualities. It is with creativity our children not only have fun and explore skills to make arts and crafts, play instrument’s, write songs – but more importantly it is through creative play that children learn skills that will help them tackle everyday life. It will help them solve problems, learn about themselves and learn to live successful, fulfilling and happy lives.

Creative Play has: Intellectual Benefits , Physical Benefits , Emotional Benefits , Social Benefits

So with this in mind CREATIVITY is an asset we need to help all of our children nurture and develop. But I stress to parents with shy children more so….. Interactive Creative Play is essential self esteem building, confident boosting and positive thinking for their own self expression which ultimately will help them adapt to a social world where communication and connection to others will help them live fulfilled and empowered lives which will embed the notion of self respect, respect for others and the ambition to reach their full potential.

Creativity helps children reflect and understand their own feelings and inner thoughts, which ultimately helps them deal with issues and develop with a healthier outlook on their own strengths and abilities.They will try new things, learn new skills and be happy!

Being creatuve nurtures a childs emotional health as they explore personal feelings and experiences in a fun and playful way, without judgement. We as adults love “ME” time – the same is for children. Creative play allows for uniqueness , exploration of special talents and a fun playtime that draws the child away from stresses in their lives into their imagination and happy/safe place.

Creative learning shows children its fun to be spontaneous and impulsive. It allows children to have fun, to be playful without regimentation.Through which they can escape away from the real world.

How to help your child be creative:

Inspire them to be creative by being creative yourself. Perhaps act out scenarios which will explore their feelings and allow them to express themselves in a playful way.

Provide creative environment, provide equipment such as paints, moulding clay, pens, colouring pencils, props, puppets, costumes, toys , mud clay , plastersine, lego, building blocks, cuddly toys, musical instruments etc. Make time for creative play. And make it colourful with stimulus for inspiration and imagination.

Make objects, homemade things, great to find special talents and spending time escaping real life.

Dramatic play & improvisation, acting out scenarios will help children express their true inner feelings.

Creative movement playing games like head shoulders knees and toes , follow the leader and simon says is not only great for co-ordination but it teaches listening skills and interaction if in a big group.

Classes and groups – These are great for interaction as well as exploring their own self expression. These build social skills and emotional skills. A winning suggestion!!

www.themagicsunglasses.com has great interactive workshops for children. It also has a great creative workbook for parents and a great book which will help children imagination and self esteem.

Lets get our children outside, enjoying nature and keeping fit

Do we blame societies nervousness, parents busy schedules, or the rise of technology? Im one for taking my dog for a walk first thing in the morning. One reason is because he needs exercise and it is my responsibility that he gets it. But also, I benefit from the outdoors; it clears the cobwebs, refreshes me and sets me in good stead for a productive day. Not only this but long term its keeping me active, fit and exercised aswell. With lots of parks, fields, greens, lakes and farms around me I feel very privalliged. But will our children grow to love the outdoors like I do?
Do we have a problem where our children are playing inside on computers and watching tv, instead of exploring and taking fun adventures outside? Will this have an impact on their health for the future? Do our children get the exercise they need? Is it a result of urbonised, electronic homes? Or due to parents now creating a risk-adversed world with nature-deficit disorders all round?With so many questions I can only show you my research from the experts.
Consultant Tim Gill, author of the report Sowing the Seeds: Reconnecting London's Children with Nature, "The way I unpack the idea is that regular contact with nature is part of a balanced diet of childhood experiences.
"If children do not have those experiences then they are not going to thrive to the same degree as if they did," he added.
"They are also likely to grow up not caring about the world around them; while it is not a clinical condition, it should be something that worries us." http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16963807

The National Trust chief executive Dame Fiona said "Children are missing out on the sheer joy and physical and mental well-being of being able to play outside and experience nature in all its messiness.
"It's partly technology and it's partly a sort of nervousness. The freedom for children to roam unsupervised has shrunk by 90% since the 1970s.
"The world is a different place and people have become very anxious about the risks - real or perceived." http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-17257562

Health services are starting to take notice and organisations are now helping to get our children outside, exercising and away from the computer screens . A few to take a look at are listed below.
Play England http://www.playengland.org.uk/ - an organisation that focuses on giving children access to free play areas - has funding from Natural England to run a programme to re-engage children with the natural world. "Fundamentally, we believe that kids should be outside playing for a good proportion of the day because it is how you can stay happy, less stressed but it is also good in a whole range of ways," said Play England director Cath Prisk However, she added: "Research we carried out last year showed that parents think taking their kids to the park is something you do as a treat instead of something you do everyday.” . http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16963807
Change for life for children http://www.nhs.uk/Change4Life/Pages/up-and-about.aspx “Activity is good for kids' health. It raises their heartbeats and helps pump blood around their bodies. It’s like a mini workout for their lungs and muscles! It also decreases their chances of getting life-threatening diseases. A good dose of fresh air and exercise also helps us all sleep better. So tiring out kids with activity every day will help them nod off at a good hour and make them feel alert for the next day.”

Transform my patch charity, with Denise Van Outen and pother celebrities involved in a national competition to improve children’s playgrounds and parks in different areas. http://www.transformyourpatch.com/projects

With the olympics just around the corner we have many organisations and websites also getting children fit and active. Youth Sport Trust, Youth Ambassador Britain , Get Set London
I will be looking more into this issue and will keep blogs coming as we get closer to the olympics – so watch this space.

Can we help our children love to read?

Yes we can with the help of fantastic authors that inspire childrens imaginations. If a child identifies with the characters, or a book makes them feel good about themselves and improves their selfesteem , they will choose to read books and enjoy to read books.

Why do we need to encourage reading you ask? Because it improves literacy levels , it is educational , it offer stimulus for creative imagination , it is a great source of entertainment away from the computer/tv screen, it will improve concentration , help children explore new opportunities, adventures , experiences. When a parent reads with a child it is great for quality time - one to one - and strengthens the personal relationship and bonding. ,Reading together improves a childs communication skills and helps them learn about language and speech , rhythm for reading and and understanding that reading can be fun and sociable.

So how do we encourage children to love to read? Well I looked first at the Love 2 Read website which offers the opportunity to create personalised books , that children will love.

“The aim of each unique book is to help your child develop a love of reading. It does this by presenting photographs which reflect your child’s world and relating them to simple words. Research shows that if your child loves books they will learn to read much faster and you will be encouraging a lifelong love of reading.” http://www.love2read.co.uk/

A personaised book will make a child feel special and boost their self esteem. It will motivate them to read more books im sure.

There are many other options to inspire reading, not just personalised books. Parents are the most fundamental role models for children, so if we could just encourage them to offer a book to their child, read to them or with them , then the hard work will be done by the time the child goes to school.

A child could be motivated into books by workshops, activities and fun classes that would co-inside with the book. One I would recommend would be The magic sunglasses , written by Auriel Blanche. Who not only has a story that many children enjoy , but the book also offers stimulus for workshops to run along with the book. The Magic Sunglasses itself promotes the encouragement and connection of children. It helps boost confidence and self esteem for each individual. A great read!! www.themagicsunglasses.com

My Top Tips to help your children love reading :

Make books accessible for your child, read to them, have books around the house, take a child to a library (many are children friendly)

Show your child that you also read books. Children see their parents as role models and like to imitate what the see their parents doing.

Give a book as a gift ! children love gifts, it makes them feel special. They will love a book , given with love.

Make Reading Fun!! This can be with how you read a story together, perhaps play games, have activities related to the story. Make sure the books are inspiring and fun themselves. Maybe use puppets, song, etc

Children will find spending time with a parent a good reason to read - turn off the TV and any other distraction and give full enthusiastic attention.

Written by Kaley Herrick ,researcher of child development related to the creative arts.

Making Children Happy

Children need to be supplied with as many positive and influential affirmations as possible to encourage them to be happy and live bright and meaningful lives, with endless opportunities. They can only be enticed to do so with help from the adults around them. Different forms of positive encouragements have been researched, especially for the cases where children do not necessarily have great role models at home.

Research has shown that children develop best through their own discovery and self-learning. For this reason when a child looses themselves in their imaginations – of course guided by a positive medium like a book , a film, a workshop, an activity – this is their best time for learning.
Through my studies I came across ‘The Magic Sunglasses project’ lead by the children’s author Auriel Blanche. Auriel Blanche successfully taps into many children’s spirits on a global scale, making them visualise desirable outcomes and make positive connections with their inner purpose. She does this through her skill of creative and innovative writing which engages children of all ages. Along with her interactive workshops and programs, The Magic Sunglasses, her acclaimed children’s fun fantasy book is a must read for all children in today’s society. Especially for those who are saddened with a low self esteem and those who seem unhappy. The meaning and purpose of The Magic Sunglasses - is fundamentally to motivate a child by imagination and creativity. Make-believe is important to intellectual development and mental health. It is an integral part of childhood, it is this that will inevitably make them happy.

The main character in the book, namely Samantha, is a character that a child with a lack of confidence can relate to. She too hasn’t fully discovered that she has a special value all her own. Throughout the story she finds a power that the reader will be inspired to find in themselves. The books motivation is to show we all have that special value, which we can use to help us live the lives we really want and to be happy. The magic sunglasses in their physical form mysteriously find their way to Samantha. They have wonderful powers which support her and show her what you can do if you really try! The important notion behind the story is that these possibilities are still achievable when she no longer has the glasses, as she forms her own abilities and the confidence to try. The results this book entails is seen in the readers improvement of personal motivation, their positivity for their own capabilities, their respect for their own special values and the optimisms for their own self worth. The main and key ethos being, helping children to live happy lives.

When a story actually transforms a child's life, bringing joy and happiness to them, you know the story is a winner. This touching, inspirational and heart-warming plot has repeatedly been transformed into optimistic true life stories for many children who have read it. From some of which, Auriel has been inundated with positive testimonials, rewarding reviews and written letters of compliments. Auriel invites children globally to explore their dreams, strive to their potential, to not limit themselves and independently enrich their own lives. With The Magic Sunglasses, they are free from objective restraints with encouragement to explore possibilities. As they read how another child (Samantha) plays and dreams they do the same. They too imagine themselves to be a superstar, singing to the adoring crowds. They too can pretend to be dressing up as a princess or a super hero. They too can imagine being able to eat as many sweets, cookies and ice cream as they like. They can also make play of their own nightmares of witches and goblin, and overcome them with confidence and ambition enthused throughout the book.

A child with this negative attitude will never achieve resolutions without an assisted positive view point. It is important that a child can understand that any problem is temporary and can be resolved if you just try. With these positive qualities a child can be happy and motivated to live life with confidence and enjoyment. When a child sits down with a book, they are in a comfortable environment, in an imaginative place away from the negative aspects of life. This is the most perfect time to inspire upbeat outlooks and encourage the use of optimism.
I find Auriel Blanche to be an extremely influential writer and The Magic Sunglasses should be in every family household. We hope she will be inspiring and empowering children for years to come.

To explore many more interesting projects as well as the other amazing inspirations The Magic Sunglasses holds, all you need to do is click on the link – http://www.themagicsunglasses.com/ Please encourage any children you know to read this book or visit the website. We can then help many other children to trust their own abilities, to respect others, to believe in themselves and create a humble, happy and positive world to live in.
For more information and up and coming events, workshops and book signings – Please go to http://www.themagicsunglasses.com