Twyla Tharp said, “Creativity is not just for artists. It’s for businesspeople looking for a new way to close a sale; it’s for engineers trying to solve a problem; it’s for parents who want their children to see the world in more than one way.” Times are changing, our children are growing up in different times than we did. Turns out creativity is steadily becoming an important leadership skill set. So how do you nurture your child’s creativity?
There is a thin line between being an encouraging mom and a stage mom. It can be tricky. For us, creativity isn’t about building an elaborate lego set or drawing Picasso-like artwork. With the girls, we focus on problem-solving. Whatever your goal is, it’s something we constantly have to work on. Do I have a sure-fire way to nurture our children’s creativity? Of course not, we are still learning and here is what we have so far.
4 Simple Things You Can Do to Nurture Your Child’s Creativity
1. Feed Passion
If your child has an interest in a particular subject or activity, assist by reading books relating to the subject. If your child is interested in history, visit various museums, explore historic sites, etc If you’re just starting out, introduce your child to a wide-range of topics and experience. Make it part of your daily life, listen to different music, learn about other cultures, attend cultural festivals. Being exposed to a different culture is enriching and it can offer a different life perspective. During the summer break, maybe sign your child up for a themed based summer camp.
2. Go Outside
Gone are those days when all we did was play in the backyard or at the neighbor’s house. Explore the neighborhood, spend time in the woods, go for a hike, take a walk in the park or just let them pitch a tent in the backyard. For us, we are on a mission to hike more this summer. We have talked about it and the girls seem to be excited about it.
3. Befriend Technology
“The best way to create value in the 21st century is to connect creativity with technology.” – Steve Job. With that said, creativity will become essential as our children get older. There is a debate, as to the long term effect of our reliance on technology. When we rely on technology to do most of the thinking for us, we lose the ability to think for ourselves. I don’t necessarily agree with this, there are ways to make technology work for us. To do that, we need to be smart about the use of technology.
4. Provide Simple Toys
Think art supplies for your budding artist, food items for the culinary chef, journal for your future writer, or if you’re just starting out and your child is still exploring, then try the Creative Can. It comes in various subjects like music, literacy, etc. We got it as a gift a few years ago and the girls enjoyed constructing and reconstructing with it. Now that they are older, they have moved on to this.
Disclaimer: This is a sponsored post in partnership with Verizon FiOS.