Encourage Creativity

My youngest daughter (Aly) has an old Super Nintendo System in her room. Yes... only the latest, coolest and most high tech video gaming systems for OUR kids. : ) Aly and I have just recently started getting into some of the older video games (Even thought we have a Gamecube. Woohoo... see what I mean?). Just playing "Mario All-Stars" with her (which she ROCKS at... by the way) really took me back in time. The graphics... the music... the controller all took me back to a time when my other 2 kids were little. Now if I had been referring to MY childhood... it would be more like an ATARI system. (OK... I am now showing my age.) Back to the story: So the two of us are really getting into this game... and suddenly I realize... that BOTH of us are singing along with the music to "Mario" as we are playing... and I can remember every note!! It didn't matter if we were in the castle... or the desert... or under water... it all came back to me. For Aly, they were like brand new tunes. She had already memorized the melodies in just the couple of weeks that she had pulled the old game out. Is that cool... or what. I can remember Brandon and Abby both singing along with those same games when they were her age. NOW... THEY are both music lovers. One is a singer and the other is a musician. I can't help but think that there is some sort of connection there... and that Aly is yet another artist in training. Right now she is learning from the soundtrack of life. She is taking in everything around her. Who would have thought that video games would have played such significant part in shaping our musical creativity over the years. The early years are so important in the creative development of our kids. We really to be intentional about encouraging creativity in them. I am convince that they are not going to get it anywhere else. Nancy Beach is the Programming Director at Willow Creek Community Church. In her book "One Hour On Sunday", she talks about how all of us were artists when we were kids... but at some point along the way... we were told that there is only one way of doing things... and creativity was no longer encouraged. That is when FEAR began to keep us from trying new things. We must encourage creativity in our kids. We should compliment our child's creativity with some detail instead of just a simple "Hey... that looks great!" or "I love it!". We should say things like "I love the shade of blue that you used for the sky" or "My favorite part of that song was when you..." You get the idea. They need to know WHY... their creativity matters. We need to be our kids biggest fans... and cheer them on. Who knows what they are going to be someday... or what they are going to create.