The Fourth of July signifies summer is here. For so many
families, unstructured time and lazy summer days are a fantasy. Children today
are more over scheduled than ever before and the end of the school year brings
no relief. Often, summer is seen as a time to increase a child’s activities. A
recent article, The ‘Busy’ Trap speaks to some of the hazards of busyness. “ Idleness is not just a vacation, an
indulgence or a vice; it is as indispensable to the brain as vitamin D is to
the body, and deprived of it we suffer a mental affliction as disfiguring as
rickets.” http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/30/the-busy-trap/?smid=fb-share
Getting lost in a book transports a child to a world of
dreams and inventiveness. For example, Dr. Seuss was a botanist and zoologist
of the first rank. Never mind that the flora and fauna he described were
imaginary. A child headed for a career in science could do very well starting
with the plants and animals that populate the books of the madcap master of
biology.
Albert Einstein wrote: “The most beautiful experience we can
have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the
cradle of true art and true science.” At first, this might seem a strange
thought as it applies to science. We are frequently asked to believe that
science takes mystery out of the world. Nothing could be further from the
truth. Mystery invites curiosity. Unless we perceive the world as mysterious,
we shall never be curious about what makes the world tick.”
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