Chit-chat

Lifelong Puzzling = Healthier Brain

Posted by Jen at 11:02 am

Apr 142012

Clueless in Alaska: Know More! cover, by Jen Funk Weber

Do you know that I keep a small inventory of my puzzle books and make them available on the Funk & Weber website. Well, now you do. Click the book image.

HA! We told you so!

Yet another study, this one led by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, suggests that lifelong puzzling is better at staving off Alzheimers than engaging in cognitive challenges only later in life.

That’s not to say that puzzling in one’s later years isn’t beneficial: it absolutely is. Cognitive engagement is always beneficial. Lots of studies exist to support that.

As I understand it, this study focuses on beta-amyloids, which are proteins. People with Alzheimers symptoms have larger deposits of these proteins in their brains than people without symptoms, and some people have no buildup at all.

The study shows that people who engaged in cognitively-stimulating activities—puzzles, reading, writing, learning—throughout their lives had fewer deposits of these amyloids. This is the first study to link cognitive engagement and amyloid deposits.

In addition, researchers now think that cognitive stimulation may not only provide resistance to Alzheimers, but that it may effect the whole pathological progression. If so, early intervention with cognitive therapies may effectively alter the course of the disease.

Now, genetics and aging also influence amyloid buildup, but we can’t control those factors. We can, however, control whether or not we engage in cognitive workouts.

My conclusion: Don’t wait. Begin exercising your brain now. Make brain exercise a habit in your children. There is never a downside to cognitive stimulation, unless, perhaps, you are so engaged that you forget to eat and drink for several weeks.

Go on now: read a book; solve a puzzle; write a thoughtful comment here. Put your brain to work.

Taku Graphics Project on Its Way!

Posted by Jen at 1:26 pm

Apr 102012

This is one of four different covers from the first book. I don't know yet what art will grace the cover of the second book.

Yee-ha! I just sent a new puzzle book project off to Taku Graphics in Juneau. There will be further proofing and possibly corrections to make, but the creation is complete.

This time, in addition to sudoku puzzles and facts about Alaska, I was asked to create original non-sudoku puzzles. Because I like non-fiction based puzzles, and because this is a book about Alaska, they are mostly word and logic puzzles that reveal something about the state.

I’m really excited because having done a first book, I felt free to branch out beyond the basic facts about the state (which were covered in Book 1) to include more random and possibly more-obscure information. Rather than referring to The Alaska Almanac or rattling off the store of info I use as a guide, I made a list of interesting topics to explore, and then I did some research. I learned new things!

For instance, for years I’ve quizzed people on the four Alaska animals that turn white in the winter. The answer: ermine (also called a short-tailed weasel), snowshoe hare, ptarmigan, and arctic fox. But get this: collared lemmings also turn white in the winter. They’re Alaska animals. I’ve been wrong for twenty-two years! Or at least I’ve been incomplete for twenty-two years. What—does the diminutive size of lemmings mean they don’t count?

I love learning new things. I love making original puzzles. I love designing puzzle books.

I can’t wait to start the next one!

Formatting Puzzles in Microsoft Word

Posted by Jen at 8:43 pm

Mar 132012

It’s been over two weeks since Linda and I did a puzzle presentation at the Dublin Literacy Conference in Ohio. As participants left to attend the next session, one stopped and asked, “How do you format puzzles?” I promised I’d answer that question here. I’m sorry it’s taken so long; better late than never, I hope.

Formatting puzzles could be a presentation all on its own—and one I’d be happy to offer (hint, hint)—but I can give you some basics and get you started here.

Though design and illustration software will provide endless possibilities and supreme control of minute details, it is by no means necessary for puzzle formatting. We can do very well with Microsoft Word. The puzzle below was designed in Word. It has little squares for letters, tiny numbers in some squares (like crossword puzzles), highlighted squares, text, blank spaces, color images, object alignment, and different fonts.

If you’ve made tables in Word, you can make grid puzzles with tables. Make your table lines invisible for word searches, let them show for logic puzzles, etc.

I tend to use Word’s drawing feature for everything, including grids. Not because it’s a better method, just out of habit. Learning to use the drawing tools is the key to formatting puzzles in Word.

I’m still using the 2003 version of Word, but these features are available in later versions; the layout is just a little different.

To draw, we need to open a drawing canvas in our document. To do that, click Insert – Picture – New Drawing.

This gives you an outlined block on the page. You can drag the thick lines on the sides or corners to make the box bigger or smaller.

Now we want a grid to draw on. This grid is only in the background and will not be visible in the document. To turn on the grid, click Draw – Grid in the Drawing toolbar.

The Drawing toolbar looks like this. The Draw button is on the left.

We get a Grid Settings dialog box. These are the settings I use:

When we click OK, we get a drawing canvas with a grid that allows us to draw straight lines and align different text boxes and shapes.

From here, we draw. We can draw lines, squares, circles, and all sorts of regular and irregular shapes. We can highlight boxes, insert text in and around boxes, add images, and do pretty much anything we want using the Drawing toolbar.

To take you through all those tasks and their variations would take some time, so I won’t do that now. Sorry, pal. I recommend clicking on the different buttons on the toolbar and just trying them out. I know it’s not as easy or efficient as having someone walk you through the steps and explain their uses in relation to puzzles, so I hope to create a webinar or e-book in the not-too-distant future. Feel free to nudge me along or even nag if you’re so inclined. I want to do it; I just need to make it a priority. And, yes, I will upgrade to the current version of Word for that.

If you have questions, ask away.

Where Do You Get Your Ideas?

Posted by Jen at 2:37 pm

Feb 072012

Like the faeries in The Spiderwick Chronicles, ideas are all around us, whether we can see them or not. Do you see the ones here? Do you?

Every writer, artist, creator has been asked this question: Where do you get your ideas? And kids aren’t the only ones asking.

I confess this question boggles my mind: I see ideas everywhere—when I look out the window, when I open a book, when I do the dishes, when I close my eyes to sleep—don’t you? My husband recently reminded me that no, not everyone does see ideas everywhere. I guess it’s a little like seeing faeries in The Spiderwick Chronicles. There, a seeing stone enables people to see the faeries. Is there a seeing stone for seeing ideas? I think there is.

Philip Pullman has a great answer for the question, “Where do you get your ideas?” He says,

I don’t know where my ideas come from, but I know where they come to. They come to my desk, and if I’m not there, they go away again.

Philip Pullman’s seeing stone is the act of sitting at his desk.

I think I have a whole collection of seeing stones: doing dishes, traveling in any vehicle, gardening, walking, picking blueberries. But I think there’s a sort of master seeing stone in my collection, one that fits all situations: silence.

I don’t spend my days in a bustling office or school. I don’t have radio or tv on in the background. My phone rarely rings, and I’ve yet to send or receive a text message. My days are pretty quiet—by design. I want them this way. I want and need to generate ideas, and this environment helps.

If you want generate more ideas, if you want to be more creative, try turning the radio and tv off, tune out hustle and bustle. Maybe silence will be your seeing stone, too, revealing the zillions of ideas that I assure you are all around and within you.

There’s a learning curve to using your seeing stone, but keep working at it: Once you start seeing ideas, more and more will appear. Ideas beget ideas.

Study Correlates Arts with Science and Innovation

Posted by Linda at 4:59 am

Feb 022012

In March 2011, Michigan State University published a study showing that activity in the arts and crafts is closely related to success of scientists, engineers and other innovators who create inventions and new companies.

The study followed MSU Honors graduates who had earned a science or technology degree, and found a close relationship between those individuals who produced patentable inventions and started new companies, and their involvement with arts and crafts, which included painting, sculpting, dance, film making, photography, and woodworking, among others.

“These graduates had more extensive arts and crafts skills than the average American, and also believed their innovative ability was stimulated by their arts and crafts knowledge,” the study says.

Great study. Great findings. Let’s hear it for the arts!

Comment Challenge Contest Winner

Posted by Jen at 2:31 pm

Jan 262012

And the winner is... Woo-hoo! Thanks to all who participated in our Comment Challenge Contest. We’ve loved getting back into the Kidlitosphere, visiting new-to-us blogs, commenting, e-meeting other bloggers, and receiving comments here. It really does stimulate thought and discussion.

I think I made some real progress. While I can yammer away on my own turf, I tend to be shy about sharing thoughts elsewhere. It’s the same in my life, so not surprising at all. However, having an excuse to comment and forcing myself to do it has made me get more comfortable doing it. I think I can do without the excuse now; i.e., I think I can comment without feeling silly even though the Comment Challenge is over. I hope I keep up the practice.

Also, I haven’t yet visited all the participating blogs, and that remains a goal. I want to see who else and what else is out there.

I know, hush up already and announce the winner. I hear ya.

Thanks to the handy-dandy random number generator at random.org, our winner is:

Beth
from the Library Chicken blog

Congratulations, Beth! We look forward to creating a custom puzzle for you, and, of course, we’ll share something about it here. I don’t want to say we’ll share anything in particular about the puzzle because it could be top secret. Or very private.

You know…I made a crossword puzzle for my husband once.

Angry Birds Birthday Party Ideas

Posted by Jen at 2:56 pm

Jan 232012

Party hat, noise maker, and confetti. In the comments recently, Janelle asked for ideas for an Angry Birds birthday party that doesn’t actually involve having kids play the game. I’m interpreting that to mean not having them play it on individual devices.

Party plans are something Linda and I enjoy creating and they one of the services we offer here at Ari’s Garden. Kids’ parties are an opportunity for endless creativity, in the planning, in the preparation, and in the events themselves.

Since I haven’t haven’t gotten around to pitching some ideas in the comments, I thought I’d use my blogging time today to do it. These will be off the top of my head, not researched or planned in detail. I know this is a creative bunch, I’d love to hear what you like to do for kids’ parties, and I hope you’ll all pitch in and give Janelle tons of ideas for hers.

Decorations

Bird paper chains pop immediately into my mind. Paper chains, where you fold, accordian-style, a sheet of paper (the longer the better—think rolls of paper), and then cut out a shape, leaving the folded edges intact. When you unfold, you have a custom garland.
Angry Bird invitations.
Angry Bird centerpiece made out of a paper bag.
Angry Bird pinata–I could do something passable, but Linda could make an awesome one!
Snack bowls could be hidden behind “walls” that have to be broken through (balloons, streamers) or knocked down (paper cups).

Party Hats

Cut out the center or cut to the center to make ring or cone hats from paper plates.

Cut out the center for a crown-like ring hat, or make a cut to the center, overlap the cut edges, and staple in place for a cone hat.

When I was a kid, at my own birthday parties, my parents sometimes had us make our party hats. We started with paper plates and were given ribbons, markers, craft doo-dads, scissors, tape, glue, hole punches, and staplers and set free to create. I loved this!

For an Angry Birds party, you might add some colorful feathers to the craft doo-dads mix, or you might use small plates to make cone bird noses. I can think of some silly games that would be made sillier with the addition of bird noses! Attach ribbons to the plate edges to tie hats and noses onto kid heads.

Crafts

Well, the party hats could be a craft, of course, but I like the idea of a make-it-take-it craft project that can serve as a party favor for kids to take home.

Craft foam Angry Bird backpack tags.
Toy slingshot. Of course, these have the potential to be dangerous, so use with care. I’d say it’s appropriate for upper elementary and older.
Linda once made an awesome dragon eraser out of eraser-clay. An Angry Bird pencil topper/eraser would be cool, and those birds are pretty simple shapes.
Make angry birds happy by spreading peanut butter on pine cones and rolling them in bird seed to make yummy bird treats. Attendees can take them home and hang them on a tree.

Games

Knocking-down and breaking-through games. Good old Red Rover comes to mind, as do egg and water-balloon tosses.

If you made slingshots for a craft, you could have contests knocking down Dixie cup walls and towers with fabric or paper “birds.” Have distance competitions, too.
Popcorn (birds eat popcorn, right?): Divide kids into two teams, and line as many balls as you can round up in the center between the two teams. When the whistle blows, teams race for the balls and launch them over to the other team’s side. Players retrieve balls sent to their side and hurl them back. The object is to have the fewest balls when the whistle blows next, which will be at an unknown time.
If playing indoors, use nerf balls, ping-pong balls, sock balls, cotton balls, etc. and maybe restrict players to butt-on-floor positions.
If you made a pinata, that doubles as a game. Make your blindfold an Angry Bird mask.
You know that orange-under-the-neck passing game? Give players safety glasses and do it with bird noses on! If a nose is knocked off, the orange goes back to the beginning.
Dangling donuts: hang mini donuts on strings from a beam or rod. Divide kids into teams for a relay. One kid from each team races (bird style, hands behind back to make wings) to the dangling donuts and eats one, no hands (birds don’t have hands), bird nose on. When she’s eaten her whole mini donut, she races back and the next teammate goes.
Feelings charades. The game birds may be angry, but have your little birds act out a variety of feelings, including anything that fits the phrase “I feel ___.” (We’ll go beyond emotions to provide more possibilities.): sad, happy, depressed, worried, nervous, scared, impatient, hungry, tired, cold, sick, etc.
Or come up with movie, song, and book titles that include an emotion word or the word “bird.”
Bird call contest. Listen to recordings of bird calls and try to imitate them. Have each kid choose a call of her own and create a song together.
Of course, I can think of all sorts of puzzle possibilities. A puzzle can be solved in a group or sent home as a party favor.

Food

Popcorn balls by Linda. We made these for another project. They have fortunes inside them!

Cake: Oh, this is easy—Dirt cake with gummy worms served in a flower pot!
Sunflower seeds or things that look like seeds.
Licorice “worms.”
Popcorn balls—birds eat popcorn.
Bird-shaped anything.

It’s really hard for me to stop when I get on things like this, but that’s off the top of my head. What ideas pop into your mind?

Living in the Creativity Age

Posted by Linda at 4:53 pm

Jan 192012

While most of us are well acquainted with the Information Age, the world we have been familiar with for quite some time now, I have spent a lot of time recently thinking about the following age—the Conceptual, or Creativity Age, as some people have called it. And I’ve been thinking about the 21^st Century skills that educators are concerned about as we prepare the younger generation for their future.

In 2005, business writer Daniel H. Pink published his book, A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age. In it, he asserts that we are moving out of the Information Age, a left-brain (logic and linear thinking-oriented) dominated world where information is easily attainable, to a more right-brained (creative, aesthetic-thinking, inventive oriented) dominated world. He feels these changes are happening due to three things:

Abundance. We are living at the top of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs

Outsourcing. Much of the left-brain work our country needs is being outsourced to keep costs low.

Automation. Many left-brained tasks can be done by computers.

Pink goes on to discuss what he calls “the six senses”—rather, six areas that will increase in importance in this Conceptual Age:

1) Design—making things pleasing as well as functional

2) Story—developing a compelling narrative from available data

3) Symphony—looking at the big picture and creating harmony from its many parts

4) Empathy—creating caring relationships with those around us—from family to co-workers

5) Fun—the need for enjoyment in what we do

6) Meaning—finding a purpose and greater good in what we do

Dan Coughlin calls the current age The Creativity Age. He lists five most important elements that matter now:

1) Add Value—Must have a genuine drive to create and deliver value.

2) Observe, Listen, Read, and Combine–to create something new and of great value.

3) Care Immensely about What You Do–’nuff said.

4) Connect to a Purpose—love what you do, or who you do it for.

5) Fit within a Larger Picture–What you create and deliver must fit into the larger picture of your organization, your community, and the world’s market place.

I see a lot of similarities in these views, as shown in the diagram below.

These are the connections that seem apparent to me. Do you see others that I’ve missed?

It makes a lot of sense to me that we would shift from the information age to the age of creativity. After all, we now have more access to information than at any other time in history. Our computers and e-readers can deliver nearly all known bits and pieces to the world’s puzzles to our living rooms at the click of a mouse. Doesn’t it make sense that the next step would be to combine what we have available to create something new or improved?

If indeed we are living in the Creativity Age, and some people believe we are well into it, what does it mean to us? As businesses, there can be no doubt that a great deal of work has been outsourced to other countries or automated. How do we make ourselves valuable to others? As parents and teachers, we have a staggering amount of information available to us, which is good. But when educators speak of 21^st Century Skills, what, specifically do they mean, and do they genuinely fit with the above models? I believe they do, and I’ll explore that further in my next post. In the mean time, what do you think? Are we in the Creativity Age, and what does it mean to you?

Puzzle-Based Learning

Posted by Jen at 3:47 pm

Jan 162012

One of the finalists in the 2010 Instructional Innovation Award Competition held by the Decision Sciences Institute was a team of university professors pioneering Puzzle-Based Learning to teach critical thinking and problem solving.

Logic puzzles are some of my favorites to create.

Huh. Imagine that. Educators think puzzles might help students learn to think and solve problems. Genius!

The team claims, “Today’s marketplace needs skilled graduates capable of solving real problems of innovation in a changing environment.” They feel that students “are often constrained to concentrate on textbook questions at the end of each chapter, solved using material discussed earlier in the chapter. This constrained form of ‘problem solving’ is not sufficient preparation for addressing real-world problems.”

The goal of these professors is to teach students to frame and solve unstructured problems using puzzles to explore and encourage critical thinking. This is intended to be a foundation on which other learning and “domain-specific” problem solving is built, a foundation that gives students a general ability to think about any topic, situation, or problem and consider the best way to approach it. As such, it seems to me this foundation should be built as soon as possible. This team is working with college students, as are some twenty universities worldwide (at the time the article was written), and the article says two high schools are experimenting with Puzzle-Based Learning curricula, as well.

I think we can start much earlier. Sharing age-appropriate puzzles with kids and teaching them to enjoy them can begin whenever we and the child are ready. Until kids are about seven years old, they tend to think very literally, so word play may not register, but maybe they can match and manipulate colors and shapes, follow paths and instructions, sequence events, and so on. Kids are amazing thinkers; let’s give them challenging puzzles to ponder.

A diagram or picture puzzle.

Since the goal of Puzzle-Based Learning is to build a strong generalized (as opposed to domain-specific) foundation, experiencing and practicing a wide variety of puzzles seems a good approach. Look for physical puzzles (like Rubik’s Cube), picture puzzles, word and story puzzles, number and math puzzles, logic puzzles, etc. Everyone has strengths and weaknesses. Don’t just play to a child’s strength; develop areas where she’s weak.

Try not to emphasize getting a right answer. Enjoy the process of solving. Laugh at wrong answers, and then try again. The best way to get kids thinking and puzzling is to make it fun. Some of the university Puzzle-Based Learning classes have waiting lists longer than the class lists. There’s a reason for this: puzzles, critical thinking, and problem solving are fun.

Friends, don’t forget we have a contest running through January 25. You could win a free custom puzzle for yourself, your family, your class, your website, your business, your ___ (fill in the blank). If you think you don’t want or need a personalized puzzle, well, this post and contest is especially for you!

Creativity–One Key to “Sucessful Intelligence”

Posted by Linda at 3:10 pm

Jan 122012

I am fascinated by the work of Yale University Psychology Department Professor Robert J. Sternberg and what he calls successful intelligence, along with its applications to teaching, and to the general population. Interesting term, successful intelligence. We often think of intelligence as automatically bringing with it success. Within the school system, intelligence sometimes seems to be the goal, but we’ve probably all known that astounding person who is shockingly intelligent but lacks other skills we consider the norm. Sternberg defines successful intelligence as:

recognition of and capitalization on strengths and remediation of or compensation for weaknesses through a balance of analytical, creative, and practical abilities.

That definition resonates with me. It’s actually a bit comforting because, let’s face it, we all have weaknesses. Sternberg acknowledges this fact up front along with the idea that our weaknesses can be compensated for. Makes sense to me.

Successful intelligence, Sternberg goes on to assert, is the combination of conventional (analytical) intelligence, practical intelligence, and creative intelligence.

Conventional intelligence, Sternberg says, consists of those things we most commonly associate with traditional teaching—fact recall and recognition, and analysis– the who, what, where, when, and hows of things, coupled with comparing and contrasting, evaluating, explaining, judging, and critiquing.

Practical intelligence consists of being able to apply the outcome of the work to real-world situations—is it feasible? For instance, when the Empire State building was being built, the original plan was for the needle at its top to be a mooring mast for a dirigible. But a dirigible needs to have a ground crew to catch its dangling lines and then attach it to the mast. So where were they going to stand? Not feasible.

Of course the part of this model that excites me most is the Creative intelligence part. Teaching or practicing Creative intelligence involves:

Creating—it could be writing, knitting, crafting, creating a new puzzle or game
Designing—an investigation or study, a room in your home, a carpool, a plot for a novel
Imagining and Supposing—what would it be like to live in a remote part of the world with limited natural resources. How could you cook? Suppose the world’s overall temperature rose 5 degrees, what would happen?

Sternberg goes on to state that Creative Intelligence allows people to (among other things):

redefine problems
ensure that they are solving problems and have good solutions
sell their ideas
persevere to surmount obstacles
tolerate ambiguity (this is huge—how much of life is truly black and white, and if children today are taught to find the “right” answer rather than the best answer, how does that translate when they are out of school and functioning in the world of gray?)
continue to grow, and develop a sense of perspective on themselves and their work.

In a world that is changing so rapidly that it’s hard to keep up, let’s hear it for creativity. It’s good for us, for our kids, and for the world around us.

Older Entries