Gaining New Words Every Day

May 19, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 3 Comments

There’s a joke I tell about my own babyhood that although I started talking late, I’ve been making up for it ever since. At Sprout’s 18 month appointment, we thought he might be following the same path. He was a tiny bit behind on his verbal development – nothing to be concerned about, but significant enough to keep an eye on. My mom is a speech-language pathologist, so I knew if he needed an evaluation or services, I could get great advice and wasn’t worried. But it turns out we had nothing to be concerned about anyway. Lately, it looks like he’s closer to following Chris’s path, who was speaking in full sentences by his second birthday.

At the last doctor’s appointment, we realized that we weren’t entirely sure if he had reached the milestone or not because we hadn’t kept track particularly well. More importantly, we wouldn’t have any clue if he had reached the 2-year-old 100 word goal if we didn’t start some type of system. While some people do rather more elaborate methods (like this adorable “Word Wall”), we stuck with something simpler – a calendar. I took the free but beautiful calendar I recieved from the Nature Conservancy and started writing down every word he said independently (no repeating after us) on the day he said it. Although we could have just used a piece of paper, going slightly more complex was the perfect choice. Sprout really enjoys looking at the animal and landscape photographs, which themselves offer opportunities for introducing new words. He now can identify something on every page, from trees to water to monkeys.

While we were far from exact in writing down what word he said when, the calendar also offers us a way to look at patterns in his learning. We found that he tended to have “vocabulary explosions,” where he would suddenly start using 5 or 6 new words in a few days and then go back to a slower pace. It also helped us remember words that he used constantly for a while and fell out of use as he moved on to different ideas.

Besides timing, the most obvious patterns are in terms of subject matter – namely, his love of animals. In addition to the usual farm animals, he knows about different marine animals (sharks, fish, penguins, whales, octopus), flying animals (owls, bats, birds in general), insects (butterflies, or as he says it “flies,” bees), jungle and plains animals (lions that say “rowr,” monkeys, and giraffes). I think most of it comes from his books, the majority of which have animal characters. In addition, his cool wooden animal puzzles from Melissa and Doug have also helped reinforce those concepts. Other popular topics include body parts, household objects, and a few scattered verbs focused on how his body moves (jump, walk, march, hop).

Like most toddlers, he loves identifying everything he sees and knows the word for multiple times, especially cars, buses and birds. His joy at gaining knowledge and mastery over words is rather contagious.

In fact, we’ve actually stopped using the calendar in the last few weeks because he’s learning too many new words for us to keep track. He’s up to more than 200 and gaining new ones on a daily basis. While it’s no longer in active use, the calendar is a really nice (and compact) keepsake of this particularly exciting time.

With a solid foundation of single words, he’s started developing a larger vocabulary around concepts. He’s increasingly close to knowing the alphabet song, although he routinely skips letters. Hilariously, he recognizes when something is a letter, even when he has no idea which letter it is. He’ll go up to our Prius, which has the word Hybrid in raised letters near the door and say, “A…B…D…” He does the same thing with numbers. Occasionally when he’s babbling to himself instead of sleeping, he’ll count: “1…2…5….10.” It’s hard to both stifle my giggles (I don’t want to sound like I’m mocking him) and gently correct him while being encouraging.

He’s starting to link phrases together too, making it a little easier to have conversations. The other day, he said “Ow. Foot” to Chris. When Chris asked what happened, Sprout responded, “Hog. Sharp.” From that, Chris could figure out that he stepped on the dryer hedgehog (it replaces dryer sheets), which has sharp plastic spikes. Today, as he walked past the neighbors’ house, he said, “Dog. Scared.” They have a medium but very loud dog that barked at him the other day.

I know some people dread their kids learning to talk because it allows them to talk back. But I much prefer words – even sarcastic ones – to crying or whining. Plus, one of things that has always connected Chris and I is our love of good conversation. I hope that we can share that with him and have great things to discuss with each other in the years to come.

A Fine Whine

May 15, 2015October 15, 2022 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

A few months ago, the primary adjective I would have used to describe my son was “sweet.” While he’s still sweet most of the time, I have lately been periodically barraged by a cacophony of whining. I often wake up bleary, blinking to see a small person either yelling at me or just about to.

Lately, certain times of day are a series of efforts to hold off a meltdown. It had been mornings, which declined, only to be replaced by the return of the dreaded Bedtime and Middle of the Night Yelling. Sometimes I’m able to stave off the yammering by acknowledging his need promptly and responding in a reasonable period of time. I’m not going to drop everything – he needs to learn some patience – but I also want him to feel like I am listening. While less reliably effective than it had been, Dr. Harvey Karp’s Connect with Respect technique does help to an extent.

But some days, I just can’t help him. Sometimes it’s because I cannot under any circumstances figure out what the hell he wants. He’s up to more than 200 words, but that still leaves out a very large portion of the English language. This is an especially big barrier when he launches directly into whining with any prior indicator of need. I can’t parrot back what he wants if I can’t understand a word he’s saying. I’ve taken to looking him in the eye and telling him, “I can’t understand what you want. You need to use a different voice so I can understand you.” We’ve had mixed results. I think it works when he wants something specific and fails when he’s just randomly cranky, often under the influence of teething. Of course, it works the least at 4 AM, when neither of have any idea what we want except to go back to sleep.

Other times, we’re physically incapable of meeting his request, most often associated with the plea of “Up!!” Chris tried to explain to him recently that “No, you can’t go up into the tree to chase the squirrel.” We have a similar problem at the park, where he seems to believe that we have the ability to lift him up high enough to make a basket. As I’m simply not that tall and even the smallest basketball moves only inches from his fingers, it’s simply not practical. I lift him up into my shoulders, but that’s the best I can do.

Then there are other times that I simply won’t give him what he wants because it’s against our rules and values. We have zero tolerance for anything that purposely hurts another person, physically or mentally. Unfortunately, this sometimes conflicts with a toddler’s desire to have All the Things, All the Time, regardless of their actual owner. A few weeks ago, Chris had to physically extract our screaming toddler from the park for the first time because he stole someone else’s ball and refused to give it back. Thankfully, that’s been an isolated incident – so far.

Other times doing the action once is fine, but I don’t want to set a bad precedent. A few weeks ago, I allowed him to sit in my lap once while I was eating breakfast. For the next several days, he was obsessed with wanting to sit on my lap instead of his own chair. As I need my space and like eating my cereal without a small child’s fingers in it, I really didn’t want to make that part of my morning routine. Similarly, he often wants me to read to him in the morning, which I don’t have time to do and get to work at a reasonable hour. These are some of the toughest things because while he knows the schedule in general, he doesn’t understand context yet and is confused as to why sometimes some things are okay and other times they aren’t.

The worst part of the whining is that it’s incredibly emotionally draining. While the noise hurts my ears, the idea of it sets off my self-judgment. Even though I know he’s frustrated by the general unfairness of the world, the constant “Mamamamama” sure sounds like it’s condemning me. The third day of him screaming to sit on my lap, I actually started crying myself. Thank God his public meltdown was with Chris – I might have had one with him.

Thankfully, the whining is declining a little bit, as he starts to realize it isn’t very effective. I hope this self-control of ours is going to pay off soon because I might need to invest in earplugs otherwise.

Tour de Cookie is Good Enough for Me

May 13, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

I am a big fan of food-based bicycle rides. Maybe it’s because I have fond childhood memories of biking to Lakeside Farms for apple cider donuts or along the Lake George bike trail for ice cream. Or maybe it’s because they combine two of my favorite things. Either way, the Tour de Cookie, which features 7 to 11 different cookie stands, depending on the route, is close to my ideal ride. Plus, it benefits a local group that connects abused and neglected children with needed services. Yummy desserts, biking and benefiting a good cause? A few months ago, I said, “Count me in yet again for this year!” Plus, I wasn’t the ride alone – my parents traveled down from upstate New York and I would be dragging Sprout in the bike trailer.

While I had done the Tour de Cookie previously, I was slightly nervous about my readiness level. While I was seven months pregnant the last time I did it, I wasn’t dragging a trailer with a nearly 30 pound kid. Even though I ride every day now, it’s only a mile each way to the Metro without kid-towing duties. In contrast, the Tour de Cookie is 12 miles, plus another four miles from my house to the starting line and back, for a total of 20. In addition to my own capacity, I was also a little paranoid about whether or not Sprout would be okay being in the trailer for that long. Sure, he loved the ride a few weeks back, but that was only 3 miles with a break in the middle. At least I wasn’t signed up for the 40 mile long route!

One executive decision that helped both of us was the choice for Chris to drive Sprout to the start and then home again after the ride. I still needed to drag the trailer those 8 miles, but it was around 30 pounds lighter. In addition, the section we rode back and forth on is bumpy and a glorified sidewalk at best, so I was very glad he wasn’t present.

Being a bike advocate for the Rockville Bicycle Advisory Committee, I couldn’t resist (or maybe get out of) volunteering in some way. Thankfully, I got the simplest job we had – the person pointing the way and cheering for people starting the ride.

From my viewpoint, I had a great perspective on the diversity of participating riders. The Washington Area Bicyclists’ Association’s Women and Bicycles group had a great turnout, with a bunch of women clad in their distinctive teal jerseys. I nearly yelped when I saw three people riding a triple tandem bicycle, something I didn’t even think existed. The family biking contingent was in full force, with tons of parents with trailers and kids on their own bikes for the short route. I wish I had Rockville Kidical Mass business cards to hand out.

My location also made a perfect meeting space. Earlier that morning, fellow blogger John (also known as Rootchopper) at a Few Spokes Shy of a Wheel tweeted that he was at the registration desk and – knowing I was going to be riding – was looking for me. A few tweets later, he walked up and introduced himself in person! Right off, he said, “I love your blog.” As I don’t have very many readers, it warmed my heart to know at least one fan (who isn’t my mom) truly enjoys it. (Plus, he said my kid is cute, so super bonus points there.) Because we’re bloggers, we obviously took a selfie. I was rocking the sweet neon ride marshall vest.

Once I made sure everyone knew where they were going and had been thoroughly cheered, it was time for our merry band to take off. Sprout tried to climb in the trailer without prompting and didn’t even fuss with his “bike hat.” My parents followed me like the world’s slowest peloton as we rode to the first stop at Thomas Farm Community Center. Even though it was first, it was probably my favorite cookie stop across the entire seven-stop ride. The Girl Scout troop running it made homemade versions of beloved Girl Scout cookies, including Tagalongs and Thin Mints. I tried to share a peanut butter one with Sprout, who wasn’t the most cooperative. At first, he only wanted the big piece. Then, once he accepted the smaller one, he just walked around holding it without even trying to eat it. The thought patterns of an almost two-year old continue to elude me.

The rest of the ride was a pleasant ramble around Rockville’s Millennium Trail, a bicycle beltway around the city. We got stuck behind a very large group of adults and kids who were far less familiar with the best practices of group riding (like passing on the left or riding in a line) than we would have preferred. That’s rather inevitable with a short, family-friendly ride like this though. My mom – who is used to a much quicker pace – said it was the most relaxed ride she had ever been on. Of course, she’s never been on one of our Kidical Mass rides! Sprout only whined twice, both times because his helmet fell in front of his eyes. Understandable, and a quick fix. He seemed to enjoy the whole thing, especially our second major stop, where he gobbled down a chocolate-heavy granola bar he shared with my mom. Multi-generational family cycling at its best. I enjoyed that stop too, as it was at the top of the biggest hill on the ride. Eventually, the movement of the trailer lulled him to sleep and he was snoozing by the finish line.

From cheering others on to the delicious cookies throughout the route, the Tour de Cookie was a great celebration of and for our local cycling community.

In (Belated) Honor of Mother’s Day

May 11, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

Knowing I’m the mother of a small child, multiple people this morning asked me how my Mother’s Day went. I could definitively say that it was wonderful. For breakfast – not in bed, too many crumbs – Chris made french toast with farmers’ market strawberries. At church, my friend Teresa took Sprout to kids’ class for the first time and said he behaved fantastically. The little bit of marker on his shirt was very much worth it for the hand-made card. In the afternoon, we hiked the Rock Creek Trail, a paved path that runs 20 miles from the suburbs into the heart of D.C. We saw a thick black water snake, ducks, three white-tailed deer, fish, and plenty of squirrels. Sprout loved his perch up in the baby backpack. Instead of a hotel or restaurant brunch, we went to Taiwanese dim sum for dinner, where we got a ton of food for $30, including as many noodles as Sprout could shove into his mouth. It was a Mother’s Day very much suited for this particular mommy, without any of the commercial trappings but with all of the love I could imagine.

But as lovely as my day was, I know Mother’s Day can be incredibly painful for many women. Whether because they wanted to be mothers and could not; have lost children to physical illness, accidents, or broken relationships; or have no contact with their own mothers, this particular celebration can feel very exclusionary. That’s why I loved the Litany for Mother’s Day that we printed in our church bulletin yesterday. My friend Rev. Deb Vaughn, was guest preaching, and I thought it was incredibly sensitive of her to include it.

Even if you aren’t familiar with the particular stories of these Biblical figures, I think their experiences ring true to many people:

We remember Sarai who was taunted by others in the household because of her inability to have children.
All-encompassing God, we pray for those who feel excluded when we emphasis one kind of family as normal.

We remember Esther, who was adopted and raised by her cousin.
God who embraces us all, we pray for those who cannot be raised by their parents, for a short time or permanently.

We remember Jochebed, the mother of Moses, who placed him into a raft on the river.
Saving God, we pray for parents who struggle to raise their children in oppressive circumstances.

We remember Hannah, who loved her child so much she handed him over to another to raise.
Loving God, we pray for parents who have placed their child in another family.

We remember Naomi, who grieved the death of her sons.
God, who grieves with us, we pray for parents who mourn the death of a child.

We remember Ruth, who gave up her family to be family to another.
Inclusive God, we pray for those who choose to be family to those isolated by culture or language or distance.

We remember Elizabeth, who had a child in old age and we remember Mary, who had a child as a teenager.
Ageless God, we pray that as a community we accept people of varying life stages and responsibilities and relationships.

We remember Rachel, crying for her children.
God of justice and hope, we pray for those whose children are killed, and look to a time when children can live safely in their communities.

We remember Lois and Eunice, who taught Timothy faith by example.
Faithful God we pray for those who teach us faith by their lives, may we remember that we also teach about you in the way we live.

We remember other people, not named in the Scriptures, like the mother of the prodigal son.
Companion God, we pray for those who wait for a phone call or a visit, cut off from family and friends by distance and disagreement.

Nurturing God, we give thanks for those
who enrich our lives by their presence
who teach us about your abundant love
who encourage us to journey in faith.

I hope that no matter your circumstance in life, no matter if you are a parent or not, that you have or are able to find a family – whether biological or not – who loves you as mine does. That is my Mother’s Day hope and prayer for all people.

How to Introduce Books to Your Baby to Help Them Love Reading

May 8, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

Text: "How to Introduce Books to Your Baby to Help Them Love Reading / We'll Eat You Up, We Love You So" Photo: Four children's board books on a wooden table

“Where everyone is napping,” I read, as my baby crawled off my lap. Soon, he was across the room and out the door. With him gone, who was I reading to now? As cute as The Napping House is, it’s not the book I would pick for myself.

Babies are not easy audiences. Nonetheless, reading to them is essential. The American Pediatric Association appears to agree, with a recommendation to read to children – even babies – every day. While “every day” is tough, it’s still a good goal. But besides remembering to do so in a sleep-addled state, the idea of reading to a squirming baby can be intimating.

From my experience, here are a few tips for reading to very young children:

Continue reading →

Children’s Book Week: Bizarre Children’s Literature

May 6, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 12 Comments

Did you know this is Children’s Book Week? My posts this week are going to focus on reading to children and children’s books, from the weird to the patience-building.

There are some things you remember from childhood as odd, blurry phantoms, cloaked in a haze of nostalgia and strangeness. You always wonder if what you remember was less weird – or perhaps more! – than you recall, warped by a child’s view on the world. If you’re really lucky, some of those things are books. I had a book growing up like that about dogs that lived in a city like humans, a canine version of friends. The main character had a bulldog as a boss and moved to a little stone cottage in the woods at the end. These days, my Mom and I can find no trace of this book on the Internet, not helped by the fact that our best guess at the title is the rather obvious but most likely wrong Dog City. Perhaps due to the loss of this work of my childhood, my Mom appears committed to keeping Sprout’s bookshelf well-stocked with picture books that are just plain odd. Between my mom’s contributions and others, he’s starting to have quite the collection of surreal books. None of them are nearly so awful as the ones on this Cracked.com list, but I hope a few leave their fond, vague traces in memory.

Edamame and Edapapa: This book is about a mommy bean and a daddy bean with a pet sesame seed. The only things that distinguish them from each other is that the mommy bean (Edamame – say it out loud) has a pearl necklace and the daddy bean has a luxurious mustache. One day, a paper crane drops off a baby bean for them. The End. It’s short, it’s based on a very silly pun and it’s adorable. But anything that involves talking plants – especially ones that use phrases like “teeny weeny beany” – is inherently weird.

The Secret Life of Squirrels:This book tells the story of a “very unusual squirrel” that cooks on his grill, plays the piano, reads, and cleans his house more than we do ours. None of this would be that odd for children’s literature, except that the book is made up of photos of real squirrels interacting with tiny domestic tableaux. The author actually handcrafted little beds, chairs, bookshelves and ice cream stands, smeared peanut butter on them and took photos of squirrels when they came to investigate. It’s the sort of hobby that if it was your friend, you might suggest joining a Meetup group. But as the author now has a best-selling children’s book, what do I know?

Dragons Love Tacos: According to this book, dragons love tacos and parties. But not spicy salsa, because then they get indigestion and will burn your house down. What makes this one odd is how it blatantly and purposely ignores all cultural trappings around a renowned mythological creature, creating an entirely new take in only a couple of pages. Also, the fact that the kid actually has his house burn down is kind of shocking. The success of the kid’s dragon taco party also raises a lot of questions – How did he advertise this party? Where do dragons get their community calendars? Have dragons just been going to Taco Bell in disguise (like the animals in Little Dee) and we’be been missing it the whole time? While I thought this book was kind of dumb at first, I now respect how weirdly radical it is. Sprout has also given it his ultimate approval – Figment the Dragon has now been renamed “Taco.”

I Want my Hat Back / This is Not My Hat: It is very rare when a children’s book involves one character eating another, especially when the protagonist is the one doing the eating. In both these books, a top predator gets its hat stolen (a bear and a large fish respectively), finds the perpetrator, and then presumably eats them. While it’s possible there was a peaceful negotiation (as one hopeful child asked the author in a story he told at the National Book Festival, “What happened to the bunny?”), it seems extremely unlikely. Especially because the bear in I Want My Hat Back says, “What bunny. I would never eat a bunny.” Riiiight. Perhaps the most bizarre thing is that you totally feel like the thief deserves it, even (and especially) in the book where the narrator is the thief!

Any Maurice Sendak book besides Where the Wild Things Are: Where the Wild Things Are is odd by itself, but his other books make it look like Dick and Jane. When we were at the library, I flipped through some of his books and was frankly shocked – not offended, just surprised – at how bizarre they were. From full frontal nudity to children kidnapped by goblins to cartoon homeless people, his books mine the depths of dark innocence. Some of them have the same feel as the old fairy tales, with things that lurk in the woods and pose true dangers to children. I suspect they are an acquired taste for adults, so used to relatively simple ideas in children’s stories and not the surreal grotesque. I need to give them a second look, quite honestly.

What are your favorite weird children’s books?

Children’s Book Week: Passing Down my Beloved Books

May 4, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

Did you know this is Children’s Book Week? My posts this week are going to focus on reading to children and children’s books, from the weird to the patience-building.

Saying that I am attached to my books is an understatement. I have two large Tupperware containers of books in my closet that I’ve owned since I was a child, ones that I either believed would be out of print or that I valued so deeply it pained me to get rid of them. But because I was a very precocious reader, very few of them are picture books. In fact, I have few distinct memories of reading picture books at all. This leaves me at a bit of a loss for now when it comes to passing on my beloved books to Sprout. Fortunately, there are a few that remained from my young childhood, mainly because my mom “borrowed” them for her classroom and brought them home when she retired. However, some are a bit different than I remember them.

Squiggly Wiggly’s Surprise: This was definitely the most hilariously disappointing of the bunch. Squiggly Wiggly is a worm (according to the book – he’s actually a caterpillar) that is represented by a little finger puppet that you push through holes in the book. However, his brown coloring and black rings make him look suspiciously like part of the male anatomy. Less funny but more unfortunate, Squiggly has some serious body image issues. While the story is ostensibly about him learning about different colors, most of it is actually him complaining that he’s drab and ugly, opining he could be something else. In the end, of course, he’s transformed into a beautiful butterfly. That’s kind of a crappy message though, as not everyone actually gets to become a butterfly. Squiggly should love himself for who he is. If you want caterpillar stories, stick with The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

Bialosky Goes Out and Bialosky Stays Home: In contrast, these books were a pleasant surprise. I faintly remembered the books that used photos of a teddy bear as pictures, but before re-reading them, wouldn’t have been able to tell you anything about them. Bialosky is like Winnie the Pooh’s long lost cousin: he makes grand plans that go array, loves honey, and is “a bear of very little brain.” In Bialosky Goes Out, he spends so long deciding on where to go and what to bring on a walk that it starts pouring before he has the chance to leave. In Bialosky Stays Home, he attempts to make cookies, but “tests” so much of the batter via nibbling that’s there isn’t any left to bake! In both books, he responds to his dilemma with a shrug and declaration that he’ll do better next time. While they lack the moral ambiguity of Winnie the Pooh, he has an irresistible attitude even when his plans completely fail. I’m very glad my mom kept them – they seem to be out of print now.

The Day Jimmy’s Boa Ate the Wash: This is by far my favorite handed-down book, a tale of subversive fun narrated by a hilarious little girl (Meg). It has a sense of unbridaled, unashamed chaos. It starts off with the main character greeting her mother – who wears a very 1970s outfit combining no fewer than 3 floral patterns – after a trip to the farm. In the course of telling her mom about the trip, we find out that not only did a bale of hay fall on a cow, but that pigs ate the students’ lunches, motivated by the kids throwing their corn, due to the students running out of eggs to throw, all precipitated by Jimmy bringing his pet boa constrictor into the hen house. And the narrative – or Meg’s mom – doesn’t judge the kids at all for this behavior. Meg’s mom acts surprised, but far less than I suspect I’d be in the same circumstance. In fact, it’s very clear that Meg is a key instigator in it all of it – while she didn’t start it, the scene in the henhouse shows her with a full armful of eggs, ready to chuck at her classmates. The other thing I love is the fact the protagonist is female. Not only are girls underreprestened in children’s literature, but they tend to either fit into two stereotypes – full-on tomboys or very pink, very conventionally feminine girls. Meg and her fellow female classmates are neither. They all wear cute 1980s style dresses and skirts to the farm, but participate in the chaos as much – or more than – the boys. When Meg comes home, she changes into a car racing costume to pilot a homebuilt racecar with Jimmy (owner of the boa constrictor) and his new pet pig. But the best part is her non-plussed reaction to the day’s events -“I suppose it was exciting if you’re the kind of kid who likes class trips to the farm.”

A Very Young Dancer: I haven’t given this book to Sprout yet, as it’s rather text-heavy. Nonetheless, I look forward to reading it with him. It follows a young ballet dancer training in the School of American Ballet in New York and what she has to do before the big performance. Because my mom took me to the New York City Ballet every year (we lived near its summer home), I was a little obsessed with ballerinas as a kid. While I can’t force him to like anything, I want Sprout to be able to appreciate dance and theater, especially because they are often seen as “girly” interests. I hope this book can give him some insight into the hard work, athleticism, and beauty that goes into dance. Unfortunately, he won’t even be the second kid to use it. A little boy at my mom’s school was interested in dance and I gave her permission to take it to school. He then drew on it with crayon. At least I know it was loved.

What were your favorite books growing up? Did you have the chance to pass any of them on to your kids or kids you know?

Monkeys! Things I Learned from Watching Disney’s Monkey Kingdom

April 30, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment

This past weekend, we brought Sprout to his first movie in a theater. It was in the mid-60s and predicted to rain, but I also wanted to get out of the house. It was just the right day for going to the movies. While there are few movies I would show him at this age, we were in luck. Last week, Disney released the latest in their Earth Day Disney Nature series – Monkey Kingdom. I figured if there was any movie that would hold his attention, it was this one. Besides, we were fully prepared to leave the theater if he got too antsy. As he was enthralled for the first 45 minutes, we all got to pay close attention to that section. Here are a few things I learned while watching:

My kid really likes monkeys.
I already knew this one, but I couldn’t predict exactly how many times he would say the word “monkey!” during the movie. At least 30 or 40, although I wasn’t counting. Thankfully, there were only about 10 other people in the theater, none of them sitting close to us. Chris said there was another kid with running commentary as well, although I didn’t hear them. It helped that the the sound was really loud.

The city the movie is set in is real and looks awesome.
The movie focuses on a group of monkeys in Polonnaruwa, an abandoned ancient city in Sri Lanka. The scenery is spectacular, with monkeys swinging from natural rock formations, giant trees, and intricately carved buildings. The coolest part is that Polonnaruwa is a real place, designated as a UNESCO Cultural Heritage site. The movie doesn’t even show some of the most striking statues, intricately carved and full of evocative details in their clothes and headdresses. I’ll probably never get to visit, but damn, the Wikipedia article alone made me want to.

Macaque monkeys provide a great illustration of privilege.
The movie focuses on Maya, a lower-class macaque monkey. Macaques have a very specific, strict and regimented social structure. The top monkeys – the alpha male and his primary females – get the best food, sleeping places, and protection from predators. Because class position is inherited, their kids are extremely privileged as well. They get to climb all over the lower-class adult monkeys, even when they’re trying to sleep. Whether they want to or not, the low-class monkeys are forced to be defacto babysitters for the royalty. The movie’s explanation of the system was a great elementary description of privilege that I think could spark some really interesting conversations with older kids. (Especially if you ignored the rest of the plot. More on that later.)

By Kalyan Varma GFDL 1.2, GFDL or CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Baby macaques are seriously ugly-cute.
They’re super-wrinkly and almost completely bald except a little patch of old-man hair on the tops of their heads. Only other monkeys and people who think naked mole rats are cute could think baby macaques are.

Disney’s dislike of non-conventionally attractive people extends to monkeys as well.
Except for the babies – which obviously get a pass – every monkey with a disfigurement or a striking facial feature was a villain. Props to Chris for pointing this out. He also made the valid point that much of the “showdown” between the two monkey tribes was just the result of clever editing. The scarred monkey that was presented as the head of the warring tribe was probably from the same group as the heroine.

Nature documentaries are a great way to teach media awareness.
I remember being absolutely shocked the first time I realized nature documentaries are often staged. I maintained my naïveté about that particular subject for a pathetically long time – at least until high school. And those were “Planet Earth” type of movies, with straight-forward facts over vibrant, amazing images. “Documentaries” like Monkey Kingdom that have a plot and specific characters require the filmmakers to play even faster and looser with “what really happens in the wild.” One part of the movie claims that a number of traumatic events happen to our protagonist in a single day, when it probably took months to shoot. Similarly, some people have suggested that the main character and her “love interest” are never on screen simultaneously, their romance a result of clever editing. While Sprout isn’t old enough, discussing how nature filmmakers can use selected footage and editing to create or suggest events that never happened is an excellent lead-in to broader discussions into how the media does or doesn’t cover news. The idea that the media can distort the news or leave out major parts is challenging to consider, but nature documentaries offer a fuzzy and gentle introduction.

Disney seriously made a film about monkeys into a princess movie.
A key part of media awareness is being able to read the unsaid or implied messages in a story. Disney’s message in Monkey Kingdom – and I am not exagurrating at all – is that if you are poor, you can wait for your Prince Charming to come and overthrow the king. Seriously. The low-born monkey has a love interest come in from another group, the love interest takes over after the monkey King loses his position during a conflict, and Maya, her baby, and her monkey prince live happily ever after. Tina Fey does a good job narrating and the story is cute, but also pretty inane. Fortunately, the imagery and footage was so engaging that it was easy to forgive the silliness.

If you’re a toddler, movie theater seats are really fun.
The movie was so engaging that Sprout was captivated for a good 45 minutes – about 2/3 of the running time. After that point, he wanted to move around a little. As he clambered off my lap, I let him sit in the seat next to me. Not being a toddler myself, I underestimated both how little he would be in comparison to the giant seat and how much he could move the it up and down with his body weight. Thankfully, this new diversion was both quiet and pretty darn entertaining for him.

Letting a toddler walk up or down stairs in a movie theater in the dark is a terrible idea.
Unfortunately, playing on the movie theater seat didn’t last the entire movie. No, his next task to conquer was crawling up the stairs. Again, I figured it was quiet and relatively harmless. I parked myself on the stairs and planned to give chase if he went too far. Unfortunately, he didn’t get far at all. As he pulled himself up the third step and I glanced at the screen, I heard a wail. He had slipped, crumpled in a toddler-shaped pile. I scooped him up and hustled outside, trying to minimize both his pain and everyone else’s exposure to it. After a few minutes of calming down, we went back into the theater. Then, because I’m a brilliant, forward-thinking mom, I let him try to walk down the stairs. Of course, he fell again. Thankfully, it wasn’t as hard and the movie was pretty much over anyway.

What was the first movie in a theater you brought your kid to or that you remember as a kid? How did it go?

Baltimore, White Privilege and Who I’m Really Worried For

April 28, 2015October 17, 2022 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 10 Comments

Trigger warning: Racism, police violence, children in harmful situations

With the conflict coming to a head in Baltimore, a few people that know we live in Maryland have asked if we’re all right. Fortunately, we live nearly an hour away from the affected area. But all of the recent protests, stories of injustice, and tragedies have inspired a lot of thought in my mind, especially because we live in a historically African-American neighborhood. These stories have brought into relief both how much I don’t experience due to white privilege and my concerns for families other than my own.

Until the last few years, I wouldn’t have said I had white privilege. Class privilege, certainly – I knew I had loads of unearned advantages by being born into an educated, upper-middle class family. But racial privilege? Nah – I had black friends who seemed just as well off as I was. That was all solved with the Civil Rights movement, right?

Then I started reading, a dangerous action if you want to keep your misperceptions of the world. I read about how Lavar Burton – the host of Reading Rainbow! – had to teach his son to be submissive to the police. How a young man couldn’t bring a TV to his friend’s house in Dupont Circle for fear of being mistaken for a thief. How black women (and men) regularly have people touch their hair and bodies without asking. How the African-American community was barred for decades from purchasing houses by federal law. And of course, reading recently about the police brutality and exploitation against people of color in so many communities. In short, I started learning about how systems of oppression work, that class and race discrimination work both independently and hand-in-hand.

But it never quite got personal until I moved to my current neighborhood nearly five years ago. Early on – perhaps the first week I was here – I was walking to the Metro to a friend’s party in DC. I was bringing a six-pack of semi-expensive beer and forgot to grab a reusable bag. A few blocks in, one of my new neighbors spotted me and waved me over. They explained that I really needed to put the beer in a bag, as the police had a heavy presence in the neighborhood and would surely notice it. They kindly gave me a plastic bag to hide it. While I knew carrying a six-pack right in public was kind of gauche, I was pretty sure it wasn’t illegal and would have never considered getting police attention for it. The very idea that the police could reprimand – or worse, arrest me – for something tacky but legal, was both horrifying and incomprehensible.

Similarly, I was walking through my backyard in the early evening a few months later, when a cop yelled at me from his cruiser in the street. As I was just looking at the flower box on our shed, I was completely caught off guard. At first, I didn’t even acknowledge him, as I had no idea he was addressing me. He angrily demanded to know what I was doing there, while I struggled to explain that I was at my own house, still baffled as to what potential crime he was accusing me of. Apparently, he thought I was scoping out our shed to steal something, when I was just observing the sorry state of our flowers.

In both cases, I realized my shock was a huge sign of white privilege. Black people are uncomfortably used to having these interactions, driven by suspicion, on a regular basis. So many things I assumed – that I could peacefully walk down the street or in my own backyard – are assumptions people of color never have the luxury to make.

In the context of those experiences and the stories of so many, I don’t worry about my son and my family. I worry for the children in Baltimore who are missing their free lunches because school is closed and are instead watching their neighborhoods being taken over by martial law. I worry for the kids in hundreds of D.C. homeless families and the many risks they face, the potential of being lost forever to their parents like Relisha Rudd. I worry for the black and Hispanic kids in my neighborhood who go to the park alone, not worrying because their parents are neglectful (they aren’t), but because police have been calling Child Protective Services inappropriately in our county and they’re even less forgiving of people of color. I worry for the black kids in my church whose mom has to yell at them for running between the pews (after church) because she understandably wants them to respect places of authority. I worry that the submission to authority will become all too needed in their everyday lives.

So while I appreciate people’s concern, I ask for that concern to be turned elsewhere. If you want to help, the Baltimore Sun has a list of opportunities both for local volunteers and giving money to important community organizations. While education and books can’t stop systematic racism, libraries can offer vital community services and refuges for kids. The Ferguson, MO library accepts donations through their website. And of course, the NAACP has been working for racial equality and justice for decades.

One of Martin Luther King Jr’s less well-known quotes is: “Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” If we care about justice, about equality, about vulnerable children, we too must demand that freedom for all.

An Open Letter to Kids Who are Bullied: How to Fight Back

April 24, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 5 Comments

I believe in being positive, especially as a parent, but sometimes I get frustrated. I get angry when people are being oppressed, when someone is reinforcing prejudicial societal patterns, or when people are putting others in unnecessary pain. These Open Letters are either to the people making me mad or those suffering.

Dear kids that are bullied,

I know how you feel. It was many years ago, but I still carry the mental scars – of having gum stuck in my hair, being told that I “needed a facial,” having my poetry notebook stolen repeatedly, having a boy send another girl to tell me that he would rather cut off his dick than go out with me. These memories still sting, ring in my ears when I look in the mirror. But I survived. And more importantly, I learned some hard-earned truths. While my son is too young to be bullied – and I hope he never is – I’ll share them with him if necessary. In the meantime, I hope can help some bullied kids – and maybe adults – today.

1) Know that you aren’t alone.
Bullying is a huge problem – more than 20% of kids report being bullied. Even if you don’t know it, the same people who are bullying you are probably bullying others too. Unfortunately, no one wants to admit to being bullied; society sees it as shameful. So we blame ourselves, even though we’re the victims. And even though adults don’t want to admit it, bullying is a problem way beyond schools. Bullying is an abuse of social power, plain and simple, and there’s way too much of it in our society. From police brutality to victim-blaming rape culture to institutional classism, we have a culture that condones and even promotes bullying. Knowing how to fight back against bullying is an invaluable life skill.

2) Ignore the well-meaning advice to “ignore bullies.”
This is bullshit. If bullies don’t get a reaction, they will not stop – they’ll just scale up their abuse until they do get a reaction. Instead of diffusing the situation, this tactic actually ends up escalating it. Plus, as anyone who has ever tried to ignore a bully knows, it’s incredibly hard to actually do so. Inevitably, you’ll give even the smallest reaction away, providing a foothold for them to dig into.

3) Find your people.
Many people say to go to an authority figure if you’re being bullied. This is not entirely bad advice, but it’s highly flawed. In many cases, the authority figure is on the side of the bully, either because the authority figure is a bully themselves or the bully has a high social status. In other cases, the authority figure wants to help, but can’t do much about it, especially if it’s psychological, not physical abuse.

Instead, I suggest making friends with everyone who will be friends with you – no matter what their social status. In school, it’s exceptionally tempting to make fun of the kids below you on the social ladder, in hopes that you’ll be seen as “cool” by kids higher up. This is utterly false. Bullies, of every type and age, want to divide and conquer; they want you isolated. Even if you could earn their respect, you shouldn’t want to. They are terrible people; you deserve better friends. One of the best things I did in junior high was befriend a couple of people who were even more outcast than I was. While I did it at first out of pity, it turned out that I needed their friendship as much as they needed mine. Unless you’re at a really small school, you can probably find at least a couple of other “weird kids” to hang out with. Don’t forget that you can be “just friends” with people of the opposite gender. Most of my high school friends were guys and I wish I had gotten to know them earlier. I’m actually still friends with most of them.

If there are a few adults you trust, you can bring them into that circle of support. It’s up to you to them about the bullying or not, but knowing there is someone you can talk to openly is incredibly valuable.

If you’re on the absolute bottom of the social ladder, try to find your tribe elsewhere. See if you can meet people in a club, like a gaming group, church youth group or non-school sport. If you’re geographically isolated or truly can’t find other outlets, the Internet has a massive number of online communities where people do truly offer support to each other, such as the commenters on Ana Mardoll’s blog. While these can be essential, it’s still the best in my opinion to have in-person friends. It’s terribly difficult to offer a real hug through the Interwebs.

4) Find your purpose outside of popularity or mass social acceptance.
While finding your purpose is something adults struggle with for years, it doesn’t need to be that complicated. It’s just a matter of finding something you truly love and can spend time doing. This could be playing an instrument, reading a certain type of book, or being into gaming. Having a hobby or fandom can connect you with groups of like-minded people (see step 3) and give you something you can truly enjoy even when people are being terrible to you. If you’re a nerd, it’s extremely likely you already have something like this and it’s something bullies make fun of.

5) Show your strength in your own unique way.
This is basically the point at which you give bullies the middle finger. This is a completely voluntary step, especially if the bullies are especially strong or you’re a special target of theirs. But bullies hate nothing more than feeling like someone is apathetic about their opinion or actively working against them. They want passive people who grovel or at least dare not speak. Unfortunately, this is not as simple as telling them that you don’t care what they have to say. Mainly because you probably do care a little and apathy is extremely difficult to fake.

Thankfully, you don’t have to be completely apathetic – just enough to show that their bullying can’t change your behavior or who you are. It’s saying that, “I oppose what you are and your actions, but I refuse to stoop to your level.” While it’s obviously much more serious than most things anyone will face in high school, I draw the most inspiration from the Civil Rights movement. Those protests and sit-ins weren’t just to raise awareness – they were a direct challenge to those racist institutions. Those protestors were reclaiming their dignity, saying, “No matter how much you push us down, we will stand back up and look you right in the eye.”

Probably one of the most obvious ways of doing this is to be an unabashed fan of something that the bullies have teased you about, whether that’s video games, being in band, musical theater, books, music or whatever. Instead allowing them to shame you, be proud of it. Wear t-shirts, carry books proudly, start a club. At first, it will be incredibly hard because it may draw more attention. But if you show that you will love it despite their opinion, I think they’ll eventually stop. Instead of lack of emotion towards them, it’s an active embracing of a topic despite their social pressure. This is different from ignoring bullies because instead of a lack of emotion towards them, it’s an abundance of enthusiasm in the opposite direction.

There are other ways to subvert the social order as well. I never did it myself, but I think greeting bullies with a giant, enthusiastic greeting every time you see them would be a total mindscrew. This requires an obscene level of self-control and acting skill, but a theater kid might be able to pull it off. Anything that upends their social control will reduce their power and minimize the hurt they can cause others.

I hope that this helps a few people. Any advice that you have for kids or anyone else being bullied?