Kids VT, March 2015
Think Spring: Stylish Duds for Kids; Summer Camp Guide; Moms Read to Kids From Prison
Burlington-based Website Caters to Modern Parents
Believe it or not, moms and dads have interests besides raising their kids. Many online parenting communities rarely acknowledge this fact, but parent.co wants to change that. The website — backed by Parent Co., the Burlington-based company that owns private photo-sharing app Notabli — launched in January. Billing itself as a resource for the modern…
PBS Kids Writers Contest Welcomes Young Authors’ Submissions
“When I am blushful I feel pink like a pig.” That’s a line from The Colors I Feel, one of the winning Vermont stories in last year’s PBS Kids writers contest. Then-first grader Joshua Kafumbe of Middlebury wrote and illustrated the tale. Budding scribes in kindergarten through third grade who want to follow in Joshua’s…
UVM Study Links Music Lessons and Brain Development
Piano lessons may really pay off, according to a new University of Vermont College of Medicine study. A child psychiatry team led by Dr. James Hudziak analyzed brain scans of 232 kids ages 6 to 18. Their findings, published in the September 2014 issue of the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent…
Mealtime: Overnight Vermont Cheddar Crackers
I remember the moment I realized how capable kids can be in the kitchen. It was a late summer afternoon when my son Cal was 5 years old. His older brother, Eli, was in the middle of a complex Lego project, and I was trying desperately to put baby Sadie down for a nap. Cal…
Daddy Down: What an Older Dad Learned After a Playground Accident
I’ve never thought of myself as an older dad, though if there’s a clinical definition, I certainly qualify. Unlike the average American male, who becomes a first-time father at age 25, I was nearly 44 when my daughter, Manya, was born, and 46 when my son, Ezra, arrived. That’s considerably younger than comedian Steve Martin,…
Workshop Turns Middle School Girls Into Makers
Harper Oliver and Sydney Sears had almost finished their origami boxes. All that remained were the finishing touches: LED lights and batteries. The 10-year-old best friends from Browns River Middle School in Jericho participated in an all-girls circuitry workshop in Burlington last month. For one of their projects — creating light-up boxes — the girls…
Coloring Contest Winners
“Sealed with a kiss”: That pun-tastic title appeared on several of the 156 coloring contest entries we received in February. We must admit, it’s a perfect fit for a drawing of a seal balancing a heart on its nose. But, as usual, it was all of your one-of-a-kind embellishments we fell in love with —…
How Should Parents React to Play Fighting?
Kids love to play games that mimic shooting, fighting and killing, and that makes many parents very nervous. But Dr. Mary Ann Donnelly-DeBay, a clinical and school psychologist with the Winooski School District, says play fighting can actually be healthy for kids. This month, she explores what the current research tells us about how seemingly…
Books Behind Bars: Helping Moms Read to their Kids — from Prison
The mothers incarcerated at the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility in South Burlington can’t tuck their children in or kiss them goodnight. But sometimes, they get to read their kids a story. One Sunday in January, an inmate in a bright purple T-shirt — part of the uniform for her job in the prison kitchen —…
Book Review Winners: Write-Your-Own Contest Winners
Congratulations to these enthusiastic young writers who submitted their stories about kindness inspired by E.B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. Each wins a $25 gift certificate from Crow Bookshop in Burlington. We loved reading your warm-hearted tales. We’ve printed one of the winning stories below. “There was once a baby peacock. He was very sad because all…
Bookworms: Sibling Stories
The Chicken of the Family by Mary Amato, illustrated by Delphine Durand, Ages 4-8 Henrietta’s two big sisters love to poke fun at her. When they convince her that she’s actually a chicken, Henrietta heads to a farm to find her true family. The chickens welcome her into their brood wholeheartedly, which allows Henrietta to…
Springing Forward at Spare Time
For my son Graham’s ninth birthday last month, my partner, Ann-Elise, and I took him to Spare Time in Colchester for bowling, pizza and laser tag. He and his friends enthusiastically hurled bowling balls toward pins. They gobbled pizza. Then they strapped on black vests wired with sensors and entered the laser-tag arena, emerging 15…
Camp Directory, Part 2
It’s time to start planning for summer — school will be out before you know it, and your kids will be looking for something to do. Luckily, the Green Mountain State and the surrounding region are home to numerous camps and programs offering experiences you just can’t find in the classroom. At camp, kids can…
Local Color: Spring Fashion for Kids
Visit a neighborhood like Brooklyn’s Park Slope or Noe Valley in San Francisco, and you can’t walk a block without hitting a children’s clothing store. In Vermont, it’s a different story. Shops that specialize in children’s fashion are few and far between. Maybe that’s due, in part, to our long, harsh winters. Who cares about…
Superhero Gymnastics for Preschool Boys
Coach Jarrett Bergeron teaches classes for boys at Regal Gymnastics Academy in Essex. But his 3- to 5-year-old students aren’t enrolled in a gymnastics class — they’re signed up for something that sounds a lot more fun: Superhero Training. Bergeron uses obstacles and imaginative play to teach the fundamentals of gymnastics in his two weekly…
How Do You Express Affection With Your Kids?
George Leal, Burlington Teacher, Integrated Arts Academy at H.O. Wheeler, Daughter, Tatiana, 17 My parents expressed affection by hugging and sometimes kissing when I was a kid. But when Tatiana was born, we discovered she was very sensitive to touch. We even had to buy her seamless socks that wouldn’t rub and bother her feet.…
Black-Box Theater
The Fox family is really into theater. Hang around their Charlotte home long enough, and somebody’s bound to start singing show tunes — stage, curtain, lights and all. Parents Jeffrey and Sue are longtime community theater actors, directors and producers. The couple met on the set of Lyric Theatre’s production of Oklahoma!, and Jeffrey went…
One to Watch: Gavin Shamis
Age: 12 Town: South Burlington Gavin Shamis is super excited about luge. The enthusiastic sixth grader came to an interview at Frederick H. Tuttle Middle School wearing an official USA Luge T-shirt and toting all his gear: an aerodynamic skin-tight suit, a sleek helmet, pointed shoes and gloves with metal spikes on the fingers. You’d…
