Creepy or Cool?

I can't decide.

To see more:

http://www.kentrogowski.com/

Our first NY journey on short-term hold

Wow, I could not have predicted the three-way tie that resulted from the poll about where the girls and I should go first in our recreation of Up & Down New York. Nor could I have foreseen that Molly would receive an invitation to a friend's birthday for this Sunday, the planned day for our first outing.

So, the location and the date of our first outing is TBD for now, stay tuned!

Who Knew So Many New Yorkers had Blogs?

I found this site today. It has blogs organized by which subway stop they were closest to. I of course immediately signed-up to have my blog added.

For all you New York City bloggers, this is a great place to add your blog or find other Big City bloggers.

Check it out here: NYC Bloggers.

A website everyone should check out

I rarely find a site or organization I feel compelled to pass along, but I am a really big fan of an organization in Boston working to curb marketing and advertising to children. They are Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC), and I cannot believe some of the things the corporate world is doing. Some examples:

• McDonalds being allowed to advertise on public school report cards in Florida


• Bratz and other commercial items being sold by Scholastic at School Book Fairs


• BabyFirstTV, the first TV channel aimed at infants as young as six-months old.

The CCFC successfully protested against all these attempts by the corporate world to truly act against the best interests of children, and I am just genuinely grateful these folks are out there looking out for children and doing something about the ridiculous marketing to kids that is so incredibly widespread these days.

If you feel like getting angry about the state of the world, definitely check out CCFC's website and the links to current campaigns. And then, you can click "take action" on their campaigns, and feel a little better about this little over-producing, global warming, materialistic chunk of dirt and water we call earth.

1920s music suggestions?

I thought to help the girls get into the mind-set for Sarg's New York ,I'd introduce them to some greatest hits from the 1920s. Not knowing too much (and by not too much, I mean nothing at all) about 1920s music (what was in then, anyway? big band? jazz?) I was hoping for some ideas about what might make a good listen.

Who has the desert island discs from 80 years ago?

Where should we go first on our New York journey?

The choices are endless in an endless-if-24-is-the-new-infinity kind of way. I am inclined to do one of the easier locations first, but no reason why we can't try to do one of the more difficult to reach places, or one of the harder to document landmarks. Some places have changed more than others since the book's publication over 80 years ago.

A few options are in a poll, but let me know other ideas you have about where the girls and I should head in our first stop from Up & Down New York!

New Year, New Ideas - Time for Up & Down New York

With the whole toddler poetry thing coming to a standstill, I've moved on to bigger and better things for my little students for 2008. I've revised our curriculum... we will be reading Up & Down New York, a beautiful book by Tony Sarg from the 1920s. Remarkably, most if not all of the places Sarg featured back in 1926 can still be visited today. So one by one, Kelly, Molly and I will visit these 24 New York landmarks. In this social studies-based learning approach, we will also incorporate art, literature, science, etc. as it relates to that week's location. We'll also compare and contrast the then and now. I'm really excited, and hope the little ones share my enthusiasm for our revamped educational agenda!

Click here to read a review of Up & Down New York.

Click here to order Up and Down New York from Amazon.