< PreviousScience of the arts38CHILDARTTOO SMALL TO FAILLEARNINGHave you ever wondered why we sing the ABCs? Or why your teacher might set historical facts or state capitals to a tune or rap instead of just writing them on flash cards? It’s because music is a wonderful tool for learning and memory. Our brains love the repetition and the rhyming, and they especially love it when we put moves to those grooves. If you can’t get a song out of your head, or can’t help dancing when your favorite tune comes on, it’s not a bad thing! Researchers have found that music is important, especially for babies and toddlers, because it helps to activate different parts of the brain to form new connections. Our brains are like a 3-D map, with parts in the east, west, north and south that all help us in different ways. Often, these parts of our brain work all by themselves to solve a problem or store a memory. The best activities get the different parts to talk to each other and work together, such as the parts that help us sing and clap, or, put your right hand in and shake it all about. For babies and toddlers, early and frequent exposure to music improves vocabulary and understanding of language. While simply listening to music is good for the mind, the best kind of music for young children is the kind that they can actively participate in with actions like marching, clapping or swaying. Parents and older brothers and sisters can show little ones the way by dancing and keeping the rhythm themselves. As you probably know, incorporating objects like pots, drums or maracas into the singalong also motivates movement and activity. Too Small to Fail, a joint initiative of the Clinton Foundation and The Keep playing an instrument because this process improves your memory.Your auditory system connects the ear to the brain. Musical training improves our ability to distinguish tones and pitch.Dancing and listening to the same music with others decreases pain and increases social bonding.Dancing increases our cognitive acuity by rewiring the neural pathways as we use them.Sing out loud. Singing helps connect the left and right hemispheres of the brain.Opportunity Institute, is a nonprofit organization providing information and tools to help parents understand the importance of early brain and language development. The organization says you can also encourage a child to enjoy music and build their vocabulary by teaching them the words to your favorite songs, or making up new lyrics together. Young children benefit most from music—and many other activities—when they experience them with loved ones. To promote meaningful interactions among children and their loved ones anytime and anywhere, Too Small to Fail worked with the music streaming service Spotify to create playlists for families that apply this important brain research. The playlists compile classic favorite tunes with For babies and toddlers, early and frequent exposure to music improves vocabulary and understanding of language.Readabout itImperfect Harmony: Finding Happiness Singing with Others Stacy HornThis Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession Daniel J. Levitin new popular music for a unique listening experience for all ages. The playlists are themed for everyday activities, like bath time, driving in the car, meal time, dance parties and bed time. There are even breaks in between songs where a voice will suggest an activity or conversation starter of some sort that encourages interaction. Who is behind those voices? Some of your favorite celebrities like Fantasia, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Wiz Khalifa, Tyler Perry, Juanes, Diego Torres, Frankie J, Laurie Berkner, Busy Philipps and Ashley Williams.The voiceovers and playlists are available in both English and Spanish. Find them in the Kids and Family section of the Spotify app or web site. And, don’t forget to shake it all about. Try thisSing often, everywhere and as loud as you want--In the shower, in the car, when you are taking a walking. How does it make you feel?Create a playlist of the songs you love for listening, dancing to or sharing with friends. Share your playlists with friends and rate the most listened to songs.Literacy playlist on SpotifyMonkey Business Images / Shutterstock.comDESTINATION IMAGINATIONDestination ImaginationSCIENCETECHNOLOGYENGINEERINGARTSMATHSTEAM = 41THE ARTS + MINDJULY – SEPT 2017Every year, Destination Imagination challenges more than 150,000 students in 48 states and 30 countries to combine science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics with a little drama, storytelling and 21st Century skills to solve a problem. This year, students had seven challenges to choose from. They could build a stage to move a team member; encrypt and decrypt secret messages; tell a story about a color that disappears; build multiple load-bearing structures; create three different improvisational skits while using a box of props; address a real-life community need or build a complex machine. Depending on the challenge they choose, students spend two to four months developing and practicing their solutions. Teams have the opportunity to showcase their solutions at local tournaments where the excitement builds throughout the year. When a team qualifies at the state level, they are invited to compete at Global Finals—the world’s largest celebration of student creativity, held in May of each year. The challenges are built around the creative process of recognizing a challenge or problem, imagining what the solutions could be, initiating the work and collabo-rating with others, assessing results along the way and finally, evaluatingand celebrating the results. Yale Shaw is a former longtime partici-pant in Destination Imagination. “Without the eight years of Destination Imagination that allowed me to conceptualize and build in a completely raw and creative environ-ment, I don’t believe I’d be accomplishing the things I am today,” he said. Yale is now an industrial designer and earned his master’s degree in industrial and product design at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, California. In 2015, he won an international award for his design of a life-saving epinephrine auto-injector. In addition to creating a smaller, sleeker design to help eliminate social stigma, his innovative device can trigger its smartphone-integrated application to notify 911 emergency services of the user’s exact location, allergy susceptibility and personal information. There are many stories like Yale’s –kids who build confidence and get creative through working with other kids and taking on a Destination Imagination Challenge. While using their brains and ingenuity, young people develop their creative skills and critical thinking, explore their curiosity, build on their unique strengths, learn how to design and manage a project and gain skills needed for the 21st Century workforce. Who knew learning could be so much fun!Where the jobs are - The number of STEAM jobs recently increased by more than 16 % and are projected to continue to rapidly grow. That “AHA!” moment you feel when you solve a problem is both emotional and biological.Childhood involve-ment in the arts can help you build essential creative and innovative skills important for success in school and life.Competition and team activities often drive learning better than going it alone.The Way Things Work + The Way We Work David MacaulaySTEAM Kids Anne CareyScience of the artsRead about itTry thisInvent a whole new solution to a problem. Using the materials found around your house, create a new tool, contraption or device. The sky’s the limit.What does it take to make it to the Global Finals? Just a team of your friends and your best imagination. Science of the artsPlasticity causes the brain to change with experience and is essential to learning.The prefrontal cortex of the brain affects how you make decisions, known as executive function.Soothe your amygdala. It is your reaction center and you are more able to learn when you reduce negative reactions.Creativity uses both the right and left brain.The limbic system of the brain is your emotional center.LineSoundMovementShapeLightRhythmColorSpaceTextureNew World Kids43THE ARTS + MINDJULY – SEPT 2017The Sensory Alphabet describes the building blocks for everything on planet Earth. Try out each element and see where it takes you. These are key clues to disco-vering your best ways of thinking, learning and creating. LINELines, essential to words and numbers, permeate our culture. Consider story lines, lines of code, timelines, lines on a map and lines of traffic. Try writing, drawing, making electrical circuits, creating lines with mazes or ballet. SHAPEShapes shape other shapes, like the doughnut and the hole. Putting puzzles together is playing around with shape. Shape makers include builders, sculptors, geologists and masons. Make shapes with modeling clay, cookie dough or building materials. Make collages with cut-out shapes.COLORColor is the visual language of emotion. Think about “green with envy,” “seeing red,” “feeling blue.” Painters use color to evoke our senses. Color is also important to biologists, florists, interior designers, chemists and chefs. Play with mixing colors and then consider what mood each has. NEW WORLD KIDSSusan MarcusSOUNDSound gets our attention. When we listen, we are present for an argument, a song, a whisper or a bird call. Ecologists, birdwatchers, linguists and physicians all use sound to diagnose, distinguish and define. Make an instrument with recycled materials or use an app for composing.LIGHTLight creates contour or mood: the sea sparkles, pearls have luster, silk shimmers. We “see the light.” Stage designers, cinematographers, photographers and architects are masters of light and shadow. But so are physicists, glass artists, poets and urban planners. Take photos to play with light and shadow.SPACESpace is everywhere. With space, what isn’t is as important as what is: the inside of a cup, the silences between the notes or the room inside the walls. Mechanical engineers, cartoonists, architects, dancers, cartographers and chess players all use space. Play with Google Earth, build interesting spaces or re-design your room. MOVEMENTMovement is about change, getting from here to there, from up to down, from then to now. We talk about how ideas move us, how responsibility keeps us tied down, how our imaginations run away. Movers include explorers, meteorologists, dancers, athletes and construction workers. See how many ways you can move across a room or sit in a chair.RHYTHMRhythm is the heartbeat element, holding things together in big and little patterns. Rhythm can be audible: drumbeats, footsteps, finger taps, or visible: stripes, dots, dashes, zigzags. Without rhythm, who could be a pianist, a poet, an actor, a video editor, a basketball player or a juggler? Create a rap or percussion piece.TEXTURETactile information is right at our fingertips. It’s smooth, woven, slippery, shiny. We see texture, too, and hear it in a voice or song. Days are rough or smooth, moods are even or edgy. Surgeons, weavers, gardeners, designers and chefs all value texture. Do you remember exploring texture through a microscope, squishing toes in mud, or eating smooth, cold ice cream? Feed your imagination every day by using the Sensory Alphabet as a lens for people watching, tinkering, interacting with friends, singing or dancing. Soon you’ll have ideas for a project or an invention. Keep going—there’s a big future to invent! The Sensory Alphabet is the foundation of New World Kids, a suite of programs for pre-K through third graders that focuses on building creative thinkers through a focus on current research in neuroscience and cognition. New World Kids is powered by sensory-based diagnostic tools and strategies for teachers that zero in on each child’s natural resources and individual learning strengths. Find out more in The Missing Alphabet.Read about itThe Missing Alphabet Susan Marcus, Susan Monday and Cynthia HerbertMind in the Making: The Seven Essential Life Skills Every Child Needs Ellen Galinsky44CHILDARTLearning resourcesWHAT IS NEUROAESTHETICS? The Arts and Mind Lab www.artsandmindlab.orgYour Brain and Art www.philosophytalk.org/blog/neuroaesthetics-your-brain-art International Network for Neuroaesthetics www.neuroaesthetics.net/neuroaesthetics/Art and the Brain, Semir Zeki www.vislab.ucl.ac.uk/pdf/Daedalus.pdfBrain Facts – Explore the Brain and Mind http://www.brainfacts.org/The Arts and Early Childhood (A NEA literature review, as part of the Interagency Task Force on the Arts & Human Development) www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/arts-in-early-childhood-dec2015-rev.pdfHow Creativity Works in the Brain www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/how-creativity-works-in-the-brain-report.pdfHEALTH: THE ARTS HEAL USHealing Arts Program of the International Child Art Foundation www.icaf.orgCreative Forces, National Endowment for the Arts www.arts.gov/partnerships/creative-forcesMelissa Walker TED talk www.ted.com/talks/melissa_walker_art_can_heal_ptsd_s_invisible_woundsThe Therapeutic Science of Coloring www.medicaldaily.com/therapeutic-science-adult-coloring-books-how-childhood-pastime-helps-adults-356280American Art Therapy Association www.arttherapy.orgBrain, Learning, Animation and Movement Lab www.blam-lab.org/ Save the Children – HEART www.savethechildren.org/atf/cf/%7B9def2ebe-10ae-432c-9bd0-df91d2eba74a%7D/HEART.PDFEarly-life Stress www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878929315300451Can Art Reduce Stress? www.arts.gov/art-works/2013/can-arts-reduce-stress-childrenJohns Hopkins Hospital Healing Design www.archdaily.com/243120/the-johns-hopkins-hospital-perkinswill A Mind in Architecture www.anfarch.org/news/a-must-read-mind-in-architecture/WELLBEING: THE ARTS KEEP US HEALTHYChildren and Nature www.childrenandnature.orgVitamin N www.richardlouv.com/blog Children and Architecture www.architectureandchildren.com/index.php/about/designers-of-the-mindYoung Architects Explore www.youngarchitect.com Art with a Heart https://artwithaheart.net/ Be Brain Fit – Art Supports Everyone www.bebrainfit.com/the-health-benefits-of-art-are-for-everyoneHow Does the Brain Process Art? www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/how-does-the-brain-process-art-80541420/ Inspiration for Your Signs www.qz.com/888554/a-linguist-explains-how-to-write-protest-signs-that-everyone-will-rememberYoung Activists www.youthactivismproject.org/success-storiesWide Angle Youth Media www.wideanglemedia.orgThe Stress Response and the Teenage Brain www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4274618/MICA Social Design http://designawards.core77.com/Design-for-Social-Impact/33075/BARF-Beer-and-Alcohol-Ruin-FuturesMaking a Difference Through Design https://design.ncsu.edu/designlife/making-difference-design/ Arts Olympiad of the International Child Art Foundation www.icaf.org/ArtsOlympiadLEARNING: THE ARTS TEACH USOrchKids through the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra www.bsomusic.org/education-community/young-musicians/orchkids/ Music For All – Quick facts on benefits of music www.musicforall.org/who-we-are/advocacy/quick-factsNAMM Foundation – supporting research on the impact of music www.nammfoundation.orgLearning Landscapes www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2017/01/05/urban-thinkscape-using-the-city-as-an-agent-of-change Supermarket Speak http://www.kathyhirshpasek.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Supermarket_Ridge-et-al.-2015.pdfThe Ultimate Block Party www.ultimateblockparty.orgToo Small To Fail www.toosmall.org/blog/the-power-of-music Use it or Lose It! – Dancing and Your Brain https://socialdance.stanford.edu/syllabi/smarter.htm Society for Music Perception and Cognition www.musicperception.orgNew World Kids www.newworldkids.org Partnership for 21st Century Learning www.p21.org Destination Imagination STEAM Challenges www.destinationimagination.org STEM to STEAM www.stemtosteam.orgVirtual Reality and Learning www.baltivirtual.comHOLO TATS www.holotats.com AEMS www.aems-edu.org Girl Approved www.girlapproved.us Out of Eden Walk – Harvard School of Graduation http://learn.outofedenwalk.com/ World Bank http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/edutech/brief/evoke-an-online-alternate-reality-game-supporting-social-innovation-among-young-people-around-the-worldFront cover, back cover + What is neuroaesthetics images: Shutterstock.com Girl, guitar, palette, dancer, brain, man smiling, fireworks illustration. Unsplash.com Roses, yellow leaf, banana, pizza, frog, sydney opera, red flower, empire state building, video camera, polaroids, music sheet, paintbrush, ballerina. Pexels.com Camera, green leaf, fish, puppy, electric guitar, buildings.VOL. 17, ISSUE 3, NUMBER 51PUBLISHER AND EDITORASHFAQ ISHAQ, PH.D.Ashfaq Ishaq is the founder and chair of the International Child Art Foundation (ICAF) established in 1997. He is an experienced entrepreneur, educator, manager, researcher, and civil-sector leader. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from the George Washington University, where he later served as adjunct associate professor of economics. Ashfaq is spearheading a children’s revolution that treats children as creators (not merely pupils or consumers), takes their imagination as seedbed for invention and innovation, and respects their art as the most honest and purest form of human creative expression. The past two decades we have been fostering children’s creativity and empathy, since creativity and empathy are key attributes of successful learners and leaders. These two are also preconditions for sustainable prosperity and peace. GUEST EDITORSUSAN H. MAGSAMENExecutive Director, International Arts + Mind Lab, Brain Science Institute, Johns Hopkins University School of MedicineSusan Huganir Magsamen is a learning sciences expert with a focus on the arts. She has created social impact programs and products for the private and public sectors ranging from birth to aging adult populations. Susan has more than 35 years of experience bringing academic research to practice to maximize learning, health and wellness through scalable initiatives.SPECIAL THANKSINTERNATIONAL ARTS & MIND LAB (IAM)A multidisciplinary research-to-practice initiative with the goal of amplifying human potential and accelerating the field of neuroaesthetics.Join the neuroaesthetics conversation.www.artsandmindlab.org facebook.com/artsandmindlab twitter.com/artsandmindlabWILL GEE AND HIS TEAM AT BALTI VIRTUAL AND WWW.HOLOTATS.COMA virtual and augmented reality experience design studio that created the playful holotats on the front and back covers. CONTRIBUTING EDITORS, WRITERS AND DESIGNERSLEE A SCOTT Educational AdvisorLee-Allison Scott has more than 35 years of expertise in educational programming and services. She is chairperson of The Goddard School Education Advisory Board, the author of many curriculum programs such as Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s Bound for Success and is the developer of the Partnership for 21st Century Learning early learning framework.SARAH PITCOCKWriter, Editor and Nonprofit Consultant Sarah is a former nonprofit CEO who is passionate about telling good stories and generating support for important causes. For more information, visit: www.sarahpitcock.com. TANYA HEIDRICHCreative Director and Graphic DesignerTanya is a multi-disciplinary freelance graphic designer. www.tanyaheidri.chEMILY STINEStrategist, Cunningham Collective Emily has nearly a decade of experience working with technology companies large and small. A communicator at the core, Emily is passionate about crafting content for a wide array of audiences that are, above all things, impactful. GUEST WRITERSWe would also like to thank the following contributors for adding their insights and expertise to this issue:RICHARD LOUV, Journalist and author Use your hidden superpowers!FREDERICK MARKS, AIA, LEED AP BD+C, Six Sigma Green Belt Visiting Scholar, Salk Institute for Biological Studies President-elect, Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture The art + science of architectureERIN COOPER, Junior at Riverdale Country School Signs of the timesSUSAN MARCUS, New World Kids The ABCs of you and meCreditsTHE ARTS & MINDJULY – SEPT 2017P. O. Box 58133Washington DC 20037Next >