Simple Science is the new sexy!

Say, what!? Simple science is the new sexy!? What does that have to do with toddlers?

Stick with me for a minute. 🙂

Have you seen the movement about strong being the new sexy? And moms being strong and that it’s a good thing to be healthy and strong? Strong is the new skinny? Great, right? Body positivity and being capable is a good thing.

Target made headlines for getting rid of the gender specific labels in their toy department. Now, the toys are for whoever wants to play with them, rather than an aisle labeled as being for boys while the adjacent aisle is for girls. Great, right?

So, how does all this impact us as parents?

Let’s think about what we’re doing with our kids. Are we avoiding the activities that we don’t like or feel we weren’t good at?

I know for many moms, that’s math and science.

You might be doubting me and thinking, “well, it wasn’t my favorite, but I’d never stop my kids from doing math or science.”

I agree. No one sets out to sabotage their kids. That’s not our goal and not who we are.

But, what if we’re doing it inadvertently?

What if, by avoiding it, we’re showing our kids that it’s not important or isn’t something worth doing?

What if by saying, “oh, that’s for boys.” or “We don’t do science because we don’t have time/Mommy’s not good at it/it’s not my thing,” we’re sending the message that she shouldn’t be interested either?

By NOT doing these things with our kids, we’re doing them a disservice.

How?

By showing them:

• It’s not important
• It’s not worth our time
• We’re not good at it
• It’s hard.
• If it’s not easy, it’s not worth doing.
• It’s for other people.
• It’s not worth our effort.
• There are too many steps and too many variables.
• It’s not fun.
• It’s boring.

Not a good message to send, right? So, let’s change that! Let’s show our girls that they can do anything.

I want it to be my daughter’s choice,  her decision, to like or dislike science.

That’s not something I should decide for her. And, it’s not something I’m going to decide for her. The world is filled with enough negativity and enough messages about what girls should be and what they should like. While I can’t fix all of that (though I wish I could!), I can give her a strong start. I can show her new things and help her explore the world around her and form her own opinions about what she likes and doesn’t like.

The world is harsh enough. Peer pressure and the media will do a fine enough job all on their own of telling her that she’s not good enough, it’s not for her, she’s weird, and a whole slew of other negativity. That doesn’t need to start at home.

Let’s build our kids up.

Give them a solid foundation to go off of.

Let’s raise independent thinkers and creative kids who can come up with their own ideas and solve their own problems!

We do this by actually DOING science with our kids. Keep it simple. That’s fine. In fact, I’d argue that it’s better. Do what interests you. That’s fine too. Start where you’re at or where your child is at and build up from there. You won’t mess up your child by doing MORE with her. You’ve got this. You’re enough. And, you can do this!

Someday, she may hate science.

(But that day is not today. That day might come in the future, but for now, we are their main source of information and their main influence. Let’s use that to start building those solid foundations for our toddlers!)

She may dislike it as much as I did.

But, what she’s learning now from doing science activities and science experiments will help her later in life.

She’ll have….

• a better understanding of how things work,
• how to solve problems,
• how to find answers,
• what effects something might have,
• how things are related,
• how to communicate,
• follow directions,
• how to share her findings,
• how to formulate her own ideas and support her own hypotheses and ideas.
• how to weed through the BS
• how to find the truth
• be able to discern if something is reasonable or if someone’s full of crap.

What’s wrong with that!? Isn’t that the stuff employers are looking for?

For now though, Sweet Pea  likes science. It’s one of her favorite things to do. She often asks, “Mommy, can we do a ‘speriment?”. I’m going to use that and keep following her lead and keep coming up with different experiments and science activities for her to do. She enjoys asking, “what’s happening?” and setting up activities for her dog or pretending to do science with her baby doll. How awesome is that!?

So, we’ll keep doing science. It’s worth it. She’s worth it. And, so am I. I shouldn’t have to sit on the sidelines and neither should you. I am capable of helping my children learn and explore through science. So are you! I deserve to have fun with my children and so do you.

And, we’ll keep play with HER gears and HER marble run. Because that stuff isn’t just for boys either.

(And, there’s lots of learning involved!).

Click the picture to find out more about making it EASY to do activities with your toddler. Learning through play is key, as is your child actually DOING the activity. FInd out more!

And, yes. This totally applies to boys too. We just don’t see boys being told not to do science or build things like we do girls.

So, while there’s nothing really all that “sexy” about science, I hope you can see that it is worth doing. It is fun. It is entertaining. It’s a great rainy day activity or for a blistering hot summer day, and all the days in between. It’s a process, but it’s a worthwhile process. It’s what’s good for our kids. And, it might even be good for us. 🙂

Now, I know coming up with science activities isn’t for everyone, which is why I included them in The Academy. The Academy is my new program, designed specifically for moms who want to do activities with their toddlers, who want their toddlers to be ready for preschoolers, but could use some help coming up with activities that are inexpensive and easy to do. It takes a lot of time and hard work to be a mom and sometimes we fall flat of our best intentions because there simply aren’t enough hours in the day to find activities, plan them, gather the supplies, and then actually do them with our kids. That’s where The Academy comes in! Let me do the legwork for you. Plus, you won’t just get science activities. You’ll get math, reading, art, crafts, music, movement, and more! What’s not to love about that!?

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