The little man had Thursday and Friday off school. So I pulled his sister out of pre-school, and treated them to a special day in the city. First stop, the Picasso exhibit and the de Young.
I feel very fortunate to live so close to San Francisco, and all the culture it has to offer. I try to expose my kids to as much as I can (within reason). I rarely invest in things like audio headsets (too much work, sensory overload for little brains) but instead, spend a little in the gift shop, treating the kids to something they can take home and remember their experience by, like a book, or in Picasso's case, a postcard to hang in their rooms.
These sorts of exhibits can be tricky. The kids may think they want to go, but upon arrival into this exhibit, everything appeared to be turning South, rapidly. My quick save went like this: "If I hear anymore fussing before we are out of here, we will not be visiting the Japanese Tea Garden as requested. K? All right, now everyone pick your favorite picture in this room and tell my why you like it the best!" And from there, our time at Picasso became a series of games - "I see a chicken! Who can find a chicken in this room?" "Try to find a picture that you think would be easiest to recreate and home and tell me how you'd do it." "Show me an example of one of Picasso's abstracts and tell me if you can figure out what any of the shapes represent."
But the best lesson of the day came with the story of Picasso himself, and how he chose a path different from everyone else, how he was told his contributions were worthless and how he persevered regardless of what people said. "Because everyone is different and unique and every one of us has something wonderful to contribute to this world. Got that?!?"
The kids ended up having fun (I'm pretty sure) and I'm certain they learned a itsy-bitsy-tiny-wini bit about Pablo Picasso and what it means to just be proud of the person you were born to be. After that, it was off to the Japanese Tea Garden for lunch!
i like your creative parenting technique. Mine would have been more like: if you guys don't shape up, i'm going to call over that police man over there and have you arrested.
Posted by: teri | 10/04/2011 at 02:23 PM
So NOT buy that, Teri!! You are WAY more creative than me in EVERY area, and you little angels would certainly have been begging you to take them there!
Posted by: Suburban Homestead | 10/04/2011 at 02:27 PM
Let me rephrase - now with correct grammer: So NOT buying that, Teri!! You are WAY more creative than me in EVERY area, and your little angels would certainly have been begging you to take them there!
Posted by: Suburban Homestead | 10/04/2011 at 02:28 PM