Tuesday, May 21, 2013

Local History

Today we went for a visit to Te Papa Museum. We were going as a Playcentre excursion to hear stories for celebrating Matariki, but once we were done that, we decided to hang around and check out some more things. There are loads of things to do and see. There is even a space where kids can just sit and read books and do puzzles which is a great place for me to sit and feed the baby while the boys keep themselves busy where they won't be tempted to wander off.

Today A. wanted to have a look at the Earthquake House. It was a blast from the past for me, as it was a house that was kitted out with a TV and radio that were the sort of things common in houses when I was growing up. It was a little odd to see something from my childhood in a museum, which are supposed to be places where old things are, right? I suppose it's all relative. The other thing that was a little odd was that I have now been in an earthquake more vigorous than the one simulated in this display, and the earthquakes in my hometown were the reason we moved away from Christchurch.

S. took great delight in pressing the buttons that play recordings of children describing native birds. He liked some of them so much that he would listen to them over and over again, especially the ones with children laughing.

After we had explored Te Papa a bit the boys told me they didn't want to go home. I asked them where they wanted to go and, because we had nobody to visit, I decided to take them to see the Massey Memorial. We took a scenic drive around the Wellington harbour and a short bush walk up to the memorial. On our walk we saw some signs and discussed poisoning possums and rats, and how to keep ourselves safe from poisons. We also saw some poisonous fungi. The boys loved running around the giant marble edifice. They asked me to help them climb up on things, something I wouldn't normally help with. I generally don't help my boys climb up things because I want them to be certain that they are judging the risk of being up that high, and so that they know if they can climb up by themselves it's not impossible to climb down. This keeps them from climbing in places that they are too little to handle... but in this case it meant that S. couldn't see the fantastic view of the harbour, so I set aside my rule of thumb.

I explained to A. how I used to visit this place to play games with some of my friends. I don't know if he realised that I was an adult when I used to do this, but he was interested to hear all the same. I said we played a game where this was a huge castle and the walkway was a long corridor, and on the walls hung beautiful tapestries and hanging on the marble pillars were the great banners of the noble houses... and the ceiling was at some times a huge painting and other times was a mass of brilliant glowing stars... "you were pretending?" he asked, and I told him, yes.

We went for a bush walk further up the hill and it took quite some convincing to get S. to turn back rather than going through the gate that had an expansive warning about how this land was for Ministry of Defense persons only and if we were caught we could be locked up and searched. A. found a different path and S. was very enthused to be able to climb up and down the hills, looking at the sea and the plants. He has been very interested in cute little things lately, and today (after stuffing my bag pocket full of little rocks), he took a few minutes to investigate bright yellow broom flowers (which he called buttercups). He wanted to walk right to the end of the track but his older brother was keen to get home for lunch so we compromised and S. got to sit for a few minutes in the shade of a mahoe tree, before we turned back for home. A. is getting quite good at spotting tui in the trees.

Something that I have been thinking a lot on since I was reminded of it in a book the other night, is preserving passion in our kids. I am a pretty passionate person and I can easily squash my children's explorations by just taking too much interest myself. There is modelling fascination and methods for working with things, and then there's being more interested in it than they are, to the point where they give up and leave you to it. The way I see it, kids never get to feel like they are discovering the secrets of the universe if every time they share their discoveries with you, you say "oooh! yep that's right... and not just that... but this, this and this!!!!". They never get to feel like the expert, if there is someone with more experience ready to take that title from them. Now I have to walk the narrow path of being interested, but not stepping ahead - taking their hands, but letting them be the guide. Now all I have to do is give them these experiences and find out what makes their heads turn.

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