Show urge children to help plan own activities individuality should be recognized par ants should allow children to develop own tastes avith out imposing their own too much supervision dulls the edge of enthusiasm by RUTH KUTH ARNOLD NICKEL T JUST ran in to tell you that 1 I wont be at the meeting tomorrow said mrs mitchell as her neighbor came out on the porch to greet her im going to take lillian lililan to the museum how nice commented mrs gracie giving her a chair well its rather a hot trip mrs mitchell admitted and lillian very enthusiastic but I 1 think she ought to take advantage of such things besides she never knows what to do with herself during vacations I 1 simply have to arrange a program for her or she would waste her time or mope how did you manage to get gladys interested in so many worthwhile things mrs gracie smiled gladys oh she and I 1 take turns in choosing special undertakings now I 1 used to insist that she work out certain projects when she was 12 years old that was two years ago I 1 decided that the time had come come to teach her all sorts of things she had learned to sew a little and loved to make dolls clothes but I 1 wanted her to make something useful I 1 bought some fine white cloth and started her on a slip gladys never wore the slip said mrs gracie ruefully at least not until I 1 had made it over she disliked working on it this started a kind of struggle between us but she sews now she a yes she sews beautifully said M mrs rs gracie when the slip was finally finished I 1 said nothing more about sewing I 1 want to fix the dislike that I 1 had started then the next summer she begged me for a pink tennis dress it was early in the season and the ones she liked were too expensive then she said mother I 1 think I 1 could make one if help me with the binding around the neck I 1 tried not to show my delight we found a remnant of goods and she made the dress with very little help from me you see she wanted it she read the directions and made it carefully abut but that implies that mothers try to direct their children objected mrs mitchell imposing their own views 1 I wondered about that said mrs gracie and I 1 talked it over with tom he had been trying to improve her reading but when he brought books home from the library she never seemed to care for them then we concluded that we accomplishing our purpose we decided to stop imposing our tastes upon gladys and let her develop her own we decided that we had been supervising gladys too much wadys gladys had to do some housework of course and that kept her busy in the mornings during the first week she seemed a little bored in the afternoons then one day she asked me to teach her to knit a sweater the next week she began voluntarily looking for something to read and before long she was interested of her own accord in some of the very subjects her father had hoped shed like gracious said mrs mitchell rising 1 I think ill drop the museum outing perhaps if I 1 drag lillian lian there on a hot day when she want to go she will dislike cislik e it im afraid gladys would lau laughed ched mrs gracie ly she often joins me in my en thusia sms it if I 1 dont try to force them on her national kindergarten association service |