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Time to Flow
March 14, 2011
Beneath the Veil lay right and wrong, vengeance and love, and sometimes throwing aside the veil, a soul of sweet Beauty and Truth stood revealed.
-W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America
From time to time I share with you Ted Talks that are relevant to our work.  Recently I stumbled onto a Ted Talk by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.  Csikszentmihalyi says creativity is a central source of meaning in our lives.  He has devoted his life to studying what makes people truly happy.  From interviews with high-performing engineers, musicians, Navajo shepherds, nuns, athletes, and business people, he has concluded that when we are involved in a creative activity that we care deeply about, we enter into what he calls a state of "flow":

"There's this focus that once it becomes intense, leads to a sense of ecstasy, a sense of clarity, you know exactly what you want to do from one moment to the other, you get immediate feedback.  You know that what you need to do is possible to do, even though difficult, and sense of time disappears, you forget yourself, you feel part of something larger.  And once those conditions are present, what you are doing becomes worth doing for its own sake...".

"[There] is an interesting little quote from Masaru Ibuka, who was, at that time, starting out Sony without any money, without a product — they didn't have a product, they didn't have anything, but they had an idea.  And the idea he had was to establish a place of work where engineers can feel the joy of technological innovation, be aware of their mission to society and work to their heart's content.  I couldn't improve on this as a good example of how flow enters the workplace."




Beginnings Workshop:

The Intentional Teacher

The Beginnings Workshop unit, The Intentional Teacher, includes these insightful articles:

  • Think before you (inter)act: What it means to be an intentional teacher
    by Ann S. Epstein
  • Best brains in science under five: Helping children develop intentionality
    by Judy Harris Helm
  • Using the principles of intentional teaching to communicate effectively with parents
    by Jody Martin
  • Program practices that support intentionality in teaching
    by Pam Schiller
  • Training suggestions
    by Kay Albrecht
Beginnings Workshop units, including The Intentional Teacher, is now available in both print and online formats.

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The Creative Curriculum® System For Preschool: research-based resources and daily plans for a full year of effective teaching

 

TeachingStrategies.com/system

ABC and Beyond™, Hanen’s newest guidebook, brings to life the most current research on promoting children’s emergent literacy in early childhood classrooms, teaching educators not just what children should learn, but exactly how to help them learn it.

 


Comments (2)

Displaying All 2 Comments
RITA ABBOUD · March 14, 2011
BEBE CALINS
Beirut, Lebanon


LIKE TO BE UPDATED WITH ANY NEWS CONCERNING CHILDHOOD

Judi Pack · March 14, 2011
United States


and children experience flow through deep play.



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