Kids and Culture

by Andrew Schulman

Curtains Up!
One of the joys of vacation is sharing time with our children and discovering new worlds. Taking kids to cultural events -- a play, ballet, movie, or museum -- can be a wonderful experience for children and parents alike, as long as you do a little "vacation homework" beforehand. We talked to some experts on the subject for their ideas on keeping the experience fun.

Imagine the scene: a giant peach threatening a small child. Sound frightening? It comes from James and the Giant Peach, a movie and children's theater production. But just imagine how that scene might affect a young child who is unprepared for it.

One suggestion, says David Alexander, education adviser to the Boston Ballet, is to learn something about the production you're going to see. Rent the video, read the book, talk to a neighbor who's already seen the production. Alexander urges parents to explain, "This is theater; this is make-believe; this isn't real." He suggests parents help the child anticipate what's going to happen. Doing your homework will help guarantee you won't be surprised in the middle of a packed theater.

Alexander also suggests discussing cultural events ahead of time, and trying to connect them to your child's own frame of reference. Talk about the costumes of the time, and tell the story in ways your child can understand.

Parents should be sure to remind the child that he'll be going to a strange building, and possibly sitting next to people he won't know. Just going to a big theater can be intimidating to some children. For that reason, younger kids might enjoy smaller community productions. Plus, these performances are usually less expensive, and it won't be as hard to walk away if a child can't handle the performance or the crowd.

Museum Guides
"Less is more" should be the rule in museum-going, as well. "It really comes down to parents taking their clues from their children and trying to avoid imposing what they think their children ought to be interested in," says Janet Olson, chairwoman of the Art Education program at Boston University.

Olson says parents should try following their child around a museum instead of leading him. She suggests limiting the visit to one gallery, and staying for a half-hour instead of trying to do a three-hour stint.

David Alexander agrees. "Parents tend to think they'll get their money's worth if they do the whole thing. In fact, that could backfire and end up creating such a bad taste in the child's mouth that he or she has no interest in having anything to do with it again."

Art Attacks
Cognitive psychologist Jessica Davis remembers taking her youngest child to an art gallery and seeing him throw himself on the floor, saying "You can make me come but you can't make me look." Davis, the director of the Arts and Education program at Harvard's Graduate School of Education, has developed something called the Generic Game, which can be played by museum-goers of any age. The game is a set of ten questions that can be asked about a piece of artwork. It demonstrates how most people innately have all the information necessary to make sense out of art.

"Parents should think about asking children questions about what they're seeing, rather than trying to fill them with information," says Davis. The questions should be simple and should suggest to the child that she is an explorer -- discovering the world of art on her own.

Moments of Discovery
Above all, Davis says, "Be open to moments of learning that are happening all around you that are so easy to overlook; and know that no questions are wrong." She recalls overhearing a young boy ask his father if a certain painting at a Picasso exhibit was from the "box period"'. "The father just said 'no' and didn't even think about it, when actually the child was very close to Cubism. Maybe he had heard something, and was trying to put it together."

Parents rarely get to see those wonderful moments of discovery firsthand, so try to become attuned to them. Despite his advice to plan ahead, David Alexander says "There are some things you'll never be able to anticipate, and they can be fun." These moments "can tell you a lot about what your children are interested in and what they're like -- when they see something you didn't even know was there."