What is Flexible Thinking? Flexible thinking is the ability to shift thinking or attention in response to a switch in rules, or to new or unexpected situations. Flexible thinking is also referred to as mental flexibility or cognitive flexibility. Why is Flexible Thinking important? Imagine driving without your GPS and you reach a “road closed” sign. You have no…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff This past Thanksgiving morning, when I sat on a yoga mat in a surprisingly packed room of yogis looking to find some calm before the storm, my yoga teacher mentioned something we should all be grateful for: our setbacks. We can learn a great deal from them if we listen to…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff You’re probably good at multitasking. I’m with you. I can address 120 holiday envelops while watching Househunters International and check email while I dry my hair. I can even drive while I negotiate a temporary truce between siblings. It’s task-switching, though, where I really shine. I’ve gone from downward dog to…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff And so we have come to this, a headline: “Let’s stop trying to turn lemonade stands into MBA programs.” In the post in Fortune that followed that headline last July, Dan Mitchell says, essentially, “enough already.” Mitchell’s argument is more nuanced than the headline but his point is blunt: let the…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff For the past month, I have been thinking about my interview with literacy expert, Peggy Kaye (LEARN WITH HOMER) who reminded me that children sometimes feel vulnerable when learning a new skill. I had forgotten that sense of fear; a worry that one will never understand. I’ve been reminded of it…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff We’ve recently returned to the twenty-first century having spent a few days hanging out with the settlers and revolutionaries of Jamestown and Colonial Williamsburg. My kids will be talking about the experience for days and years to come, and certainly testing out the new words they learned during our trip back…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff “I don’t have a chance of winning. I don’t want to do it.” Was this the attitude Google anticipated when it launched this year’s Doodle 4 Google competition? Probably not. On the surface, the competition is simple: children in grades k-12 are invited to submit a doodle version of the Google…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff When Peggy Kaye was first starting out in teaching, a parent asked if there was something she could use for the classroom. “Yes,” she said, “a tape recorder.” The parent got her one, and Kaye recorded herself reading books her students could later listen to on their own. Today, Kaye is…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff This past Wednesday, Nancy and I broke from our regular routine of packing lunches, hunting for missing mittens, and heading to our office in Tiger Labs, and made our way to Manhattan where we explored the 412,000 square feet of the American International Toy Fair. We walked the aisles, showcasing more…
By Sarah Vander Schaaff Ok, I admit it, I don’t know where Azerbaijan is on a map. I know where it is not, generally speaking, and where it is most likely, generally speaking, but that does little good when your eight year old turns to you during the Olympic Parade of Nations, and asks, “So,…