No art for you today....just random Momness...As a mother of twins, most days I feel like I’m living in a real life nature vs. nurture theory experiment. Will two children who popped out of the same womb three minutes apart, and who live in the same house with the same parents, and attend the same schools with the same teacher in the same classroom be basically the same child? I am here to give you a resounding “No way, Jose!”
Take a look at these graphs. This was a homework assignment in my girls’ math awareness series. Can you believe they actually have math homework in Kindergarten?! I taught a class Monday night, and DH left these sitting out on the kitchen counter for me to see when I got home. Both girls followed the directions: color in one number 1 on the first row, color in two number 2’s on the second row, color in three number 3’s on the third row, etc. And both graphs are technically correct, yet look at how different they are. This was fascinating to me! And what fascinated me more was which graph belonged to which child. To date, Olivia has very much been a “color in the lines” kind of girl. All her drawings are typically very well thought out and organized; Sarah, on the other hand, has been a vertible Jackson Pollack. Looking at these then, I assumed that the organized picture was Livvie’s and the all over the board picture was Sarah’s. What that’s saying about the true meaning of assume? You got it. This time, the organized picture was Sarah’s and the all over the board picture was Olivia’s! I need a child psychologist to figure this one out.
Since I work in education, I hear so much about nature vs. nurture and how it affects not only our children’s success in the classroom, but moreover their success as creative, positive contributors to society as a whole. I've been visiting classes at the girls' school over the past couple weeks just to get a feel for what elementary school is all about. Through my visits and my talks with those teachers, parent involvement is certainly crucial to children’s success; that’s the nurture part. Yet, though elementary, these simple math exercises seem to also point to the major differences nature sends us out into the world with. Interesting, don’t you think? Being a leadership development trainer, I’m always fascinated by personality differences and how we all look at the world through different lenses, particularly for me when it comes to my twin girls. So what are your thoughts? What have you learned from your children’s differences in personality or your siblings differences in personality? This should be an interesting exercise in creativity!
And yes, I know you've been waiting for pictures from the wedding! I hope to get some uploaded this weekend!
2 comments:
I was fascinated by your girls when I was LUCKY enough to babysit them the other day! I as you know do not have children but was AMAZED by their attention and concern for each other. Growing up with a sister who was 9 years yonger than me I have yet to this day really bonded with her the way your two bond. I was surprised to hear who colored each graph...I would have thought Sarah's was the all over the board graph! -Whitney
i am fascinated by the all over the board one. this is clearly a big picture thinker and outside of the box one, too. the usually pollack one may be expressing trying to follow the rules of the assignment closely. seems to me both are creatives, while one may seem to be at one end of the spectrum from the other.
this exercise may be more an indicator of how information is processed through their individual minds - a fascinating topic for me with my experiences parenting and aspie and working in special education.
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