Art Ideas

Got a nice email today about The Missing Alphabet, the book I coauthored that is about putting your kids on the path of creative thinking. IF you'd like to see more about the book, check out the website here.

Subject: book

Message: Hey Susie,
Just wanted to say that I recently gave your book about creative kids (what is the title- can't find it on your website..) to my niece as a present (with a burp cloth swaddled around it) for her newborn daughter. She and her husband both went gaga over the book! I finally just read cover to cover on the plane on the way there, so wanted to tell you how much I admire the thorough and inspiring job you've done with it. It looks beautiful, reads well, and the chapters are chock full of good stuff.
Congrats again!
Hugs,
Sue

THE MISSING ALPHABET

Explore the full spectrum of a child's strengths

A step-by-step parents' guide that demystifies "creativity, " and helps children grow up to be 21st century thinkers

AUSTIN – In a future that will require visual literacy and innovative thinking, today's kids will be expected to think across disciplines, come up with imaginative solutions, and have the capacity to invent with many media. And in order to succeed, they'll need to have creative thinking skills. Yet, we've been trained to think that some kids are "born" creative, while others are not.

But as the noted education researchers and co-authors of The Missing Alphabet: A Parents' Guide to Developing Creative Thinking in Kids (Greenleaf Book Group, October 23, 2012, 288 pages, $17.95) have discovered, this simply isn't true. Rather, every child is born with a rich creative capacity; parents can build on that by supplying the building blocks of the missing alphabet – also known as "Sensory Alphabet."

The Missing Alphabet is as basic as the traditional alphabet is for reading and writing, and is the foundation for understanding our sensory world: line, color, texture, sound, movement, sound, rhythm, space, light, and shape. By teaching children the symbol system first, then layering thinking skills on top of it, children gain a whole new repertoire for ways to express their ideas.

Over the past 40 years, co-authors and researchers Susan Marcus, Susie Monday, and Cynthia Herbert, PhD. have studied how children individually learn, and also how parents and educators can help them utilize untapped reserves of their creative potential. The authors were the co-founders of Learning About Learning Educational Foundation, a future-oriented organization in San Antonio, Texas. Responding to the needs of 21st century literacies, they have collaborated to produce "New World Kids, " a popular series of after-school and summer programs for children in pre-K through second grade, now being used in school districts, museums and creative arts programs. Today, parents can have access to this approach in The Missing Alphabet, no matter where they live.

Through vivid photographs and illustration, The Missing Alphabet helps parents and educators hone in on a child's natural strengths, and develop his or her particular brand of imagination. In a digital world where information is also communicated through pictures, icons, sound and video, tomorrow's adults will need to have creative thinking skills that are broader than those centered on text and numbers – and this is the guide to do it.

SUSAN MARCUS, SUSIE MONDAY and CYNTHIA HERBERT, PHD are the co-creators of the popular "New World Kids" program, as well as The Foundry in Austin, TX, producing programs in creative thinking for children, parents, and professional development for educators. Cynthia is a developmental psychologist, the former Director of the Texas Alliance for Education and the Arts, and a specialist in Differentiated Education. Susie is a children's museum designer, educational consultant, and an adjunct faculty member of the Southwest School of Art in San Antonio. Susan has worked as a consultant to museums and children's program designer. She is the co-author (with Herbert) of Everychild's Everyday (Doubleday), and When I Was Just Your Age (University of North Texas Press), and (with Monday) New World Kids (FoundryMedia)..