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Cuvée Van De Keizer Blauw (Blue) - Brouwerij Het Anker
Displayed for educational use only; do not reuse.
Ratings: 1,481 | Reviews: 826 | Display Reviews Only:
Reviews by puboflyons:
New Hampshire
4.13/5 rDev -4.2%
I tried this during Julio's Belgian Beer Festival on August 14, 2011. It pours a handsome looking dark amber to mahogany brown with red hues affixed to the side of the glass. The head is thin but long lasting. There is an enticing balance of sweet malts and a zing of hops on the nose. The body ends up at about medium to good. As for the taste think of smooth candied sweetness and a slightly harsher finish to remind you of what you have just experienced. Very drinkable in the end.
08-14-2011 21:20:07 | More by puboflyons
More User Reviews:
North Carolina
3.93/5 rDev -8.8%
A beer that dont come around often,pours a deep brown with some reddish tints with to be expected a hug rocky head.Aroma is of spiced cherries and alcohol,taste is spices and of dried fruit(cherries) and ginger-like and the alcohol really comes thru as it warms.It would be tough to finish a bottle of this brew but it is very appetizing to say the least.
02-24-2004 03:03:17 | More by oberon
4.41/5 rDev +2.3%
1 pt 9.4 oz bottle poured into a glass.
Appearance: pours with a lingering head. Not obnoxiously so, was able to pour cleanly into the glass.
Smell: smells sugary with a little booziness. Some hints of cloves. Sweet smelling for sure.
Taste: first sip is... Different. A little less sweet and a little more boozy than what others have said. After waiting for a moment, another sip definitely gives that sweet, smooth delicious taste. So good. Wow.
Mouthfeel: very very smooth. Doesn't really linger.
Overall: wow. Just... Wow. Yes please more.
12-08-2013 01:38:22 | More by don1481
4.97/5 rDev +15.3%
Appearance - Dark, reddish-brown in color with a gorgeous head. This one looks serious.
Smell - This is grand cru heaven. The malt base is covered in sweet toffee, caramel, and orange flavors that are big as Mt. Rainier. The brown sugar sweetness is almost palatable on the nose.
Taste - This is perfection. The deep, sweet flavors of brown sugar, orange, liquid toffee, and caramel meld together in an incredible blend. The slightly toasted malt flavors are there as well, but this is all about that sticky, sweet taste of sugary perfections that is the Belgian Grand Cru. There's also just a hint of alcohol notes to warn of the typically high 10.0 ABV.
The chewy nature of this flavor is complimented by hearty plums, some tobacco, thick, rich apricots, and maybe even some apples. This is sugar at its best.
Mouthfeel - The slight carbonation, in accordance with the style, is complimented by the amazing buttery smoothness of the sugary ingredients.
Drinkability - If you have a sweet tooth and love fine Belgian ales, this is the one for you. God forbid you should be a Grand Cru fan - you HAVE to try this ale.
Comments - The label reads, "Gouden Carolus," over the top and, "Carolus D'or," on the bottom. There's a blue banner with gold writing that looks to be labeled diagonally across the bottle, although it is clearly part of the manufactured label, that reads, "Grand Cru of the Emperor." This is indeed fit for royalty.
Update - I popped a vintage 2000 in 2004. The aroma is even deeper than when it was fresh, but the flavors were washed out a bit. The musty, dirty, cellared flavors though were a delight. Four years is probably too old for this guy; maybe two or three max. It has been my experience that Grand Crus are usually good fresh and almost always peak at a year or two in the cellar.
Update - I had a 2005 at the end of the 2005 year. I'm convinced that this brew should not be cellared.
Fresh this is absolutely incredible! It's really one of the best beers that I've ever had. It represents exactly to me what I think of when hearing the term "grand cru". It's thick yet super sweet. It is incredibly complex. It melts in your mouth. It makes you feel like a king.
Update - I had a 2010 in 2010 just to test my theory that Grand Crus are really just cellared BSDAs and I think I proved my point. This is smooth, well-aged, with even some musty characters, and is incredibly drinkable after just a few months in the bottle.
10-30-2003 02:56:19 | More by RoyalT
4.25/5 rDev -1.4%
04-09-2014 19:23:44 | More by braugon
4.03/5 rDev -6.5%
2005 bottle purchase in 2006, cellared 6 months at 55-60 degrees F.
Pours a bubbly dark chestnut, almost mahogany with purple-ruby highlights. Lace is thick, clingy, and with minute yeast particles floating in it.
Smells very yeasty with rum, raisons, fruit bread, toffee, and some licorice. Kind of boozy and quite candy like.
Tastes immediately warming and boozy with a real sweet, candied sugar sensation. Smooth and mellows as you drink it but manages to keep a zesty edge. Toffee, orange-chocolates, sugarcane rum, cloveish spice, and raisons swell into torrents of flavor.
Very drinkable. Strong and boozy yet easy to down. A 750 is gone in minutes.
01-29-2007 22:10:03 | More by DaPeculierDane
Ontario (Canada)
4.25/5 rDev -1.4%
04-09-2013 13:02:58 | More by beerhunter13
3.88/5 rDev -10%
Bottle. 2009 vintage.
The pour is dark reddish brown with a big off-white head that leaves nice lacings.
The smell is big an spot on. Lots of malty aromas of caramel, brown sugar and toffee. Pleasant heavy fruit aromas, yeast and alcohol.
The flavor is really sweet. From start to finish this one is all about sweetness - toasty malts, caramel, brown sugar, toffee. Notes of vinous fruits, wood, yeast and grass. The finish has some bitterness to it, more sweetness and notes of alcohol, hops and spices.
It has a full body and quite a lot of carbonation, which is welcome here since it lightens the heavy character, if only just a bit.
All in all, a complex, balanced and tasty beer. Due to the sweetness, it gets quite demanding after a while.
11-09-2009 21:35:00 | More by ricke
Ontario (Canada)
4.75/5 rDev +10.2%
Had a bottle I brought from Amsterdam. 2007 vintage. cellared it and we decided to have it tonight.
Very little head upon pouring. it was a beautiful murky brown colour with a slurry-like consistency. you could see little pockets of carbonation in it. some yeasties floated to the top of our chalices.
I couldn't really discover a strong bouquet. Fig is present, but not punching me in the nose.
Flavour: I assume its the aging that did it. so tasty. it had a cognac aftertaste, or almost like Cherry Coke. That sweet with a weee bit of sour (not strong) was delicious. cannot taste any alcohol whatsoever. just told my wife that its an 11% alcohol beer and she adamantly said NO! The cherry coke comment could be felt in the aftertaste...that sour with some underlying cola bitterness. its a reasonably sweet beer with that dark molasses/fig flavour you expect from this type of dark beer.
Mouthfeel: very smooth.
Overall: i'd buy this and cellar it in a heartbeat. we had another bottle of this that we opened 2 years ago and we were relatively unimpressed. this cellared one, tho....yeah. me likies.
11-17-2011 02:02:46 | More by atomeyes
4.6/5 rDev +6.7%
2007 Vintage
A- poured red-brown with a small frothy head into a Chimay glass.
S- Rum cake, dried raisiny fruit, port- like grapiness and a doughy yeastiness. Rich and complex.
T- Powerful plum and raisin notes, caramel and apple, fruity yeast character and light carbonation with full body hits about mid-palate, swift alcohol. Similar to a Rochefort 10 but with bolder flavors IMO.
A really solid, loveable Belgian. A pleasure, too bad it's the last one of these at my local store.
11-13-2009 04:07:00 | More by brownbeer
4.49/5 rDev +4.2%
2010 Vintage Sampled January 2014
APPEARANCE- Deep bronze with ruby highlights, chill haze that gradually improves with warmth, and low, off-white head with very poor retention and little lace. No legs.
NOSE- big spicy red grape aroma hits first, pinot noir?,...notes of licorice and of course, big, deep, caramel maltiness, cherry skin and plum skin, dates, creamy character of vanilla and cinnamon probably attributable to oxidized alcohol, some acetlaldehyde and a hint of fusel, complex, intense, and deep aroma. Lovely.
FLAVOR- thick base of caramel, cream, and amber honey supports very subdued phenols, moderate-strong dark fruit esters including a notable blackberry, and a brighter raspberry character. More licorice character, a dusting of walnut, hints of dark rum, very faint hint of orange rind lurks far beneath the surface, pleasantly minty here and there... damn. Huge vanilla in the finish. Maybe a little diacetyl, but you really gotta hunt for it w all the other stuff going on... no noticeable hop bitterness, though I suspect some portion of the licorice/mint/blackberry thing must be hop-derived. I swear for split second I get a note of kiwi. I'd do desperate things to get crème brulee next to this beer, cuz I swear theres one in it, garnishes and all.
MF- The hallmark of all Het Anker's ales is unquestionably the rich, luxurious, velvety, creamy mouthfeel. This is full-bodied, naturally, but never heavy on the palate. I will fault this vintage for retaining a little heat over the years, and going lightly astringent...probably from oxidation. Medium and beautifully fine carbonation.
OVERALL- I have at this point had 3 or 4 bottles of Cuvee van de Kaizer, both blue and red. I am in the habit of consuming them between 3-5 years old. I have been both beautifully rewarded and horribly disappointed. I'm sure it all comes down to storage practices. If you are into cellaring beer, this is certainly one to try, and I'm sure a vertical project would be a very enjoyable experiment. I am always caught off-guard over and over by how Het Anker's huge, full-bodied beers float on the palate and offer up so many bright and spritely flavors.
01-24-2014 07:38:56 | More by JudgeRoughneck
5/5 rDev +16%
12-07-2012 08:08:14 | More by theParish
5/5 rDev +16%
12-28-2012 03:21:48 | More by mplittman
New York
4.43/5 rDev +2.8%
A - It pours a purple brown opaque color with excellent lacing and a 2 finger head that hung around for a while.
S - Raisons, figs, brown sugar, green apples.
T - The taste follows the nose. This is a very sweet beer. Candied sugars seem to dominate, but yeasty breadiness couples with toffee nicely underneath. Flavors of dark fruits don't shine through as well on the taste as they did the nose.
M - Medium bodied, light burn from the alcohol in a good way.
O - A great belgian that I finally got around the try. Can't wait to try this with some age on it.
02-12-2012 15:36:45 | More by SkiBum22
New York
3.5/5 rDev -18.8%
07-06-2014 01:49:16 | More by kuishinbo_tantei
4/5 rDev -7.2%
750ml bottle with Jaargang 2007 on the label. Poured into a tulip glass, it was a pretty garnet color with a small white head. It had a pleasant dark fruit, spicy aroma. So far, so good. Downhill from there. It had a sweet, root beer taste. Noticeable alcohol, intrusive and medicinal. I had to work hard to finish the bottle.
I just had the 2008 version. I think I bought it without remembering my previous review. Which was a good thin, because this was far better than last year. The aroma was dark fruit and licorice. Taste was anise, dark fruit, and a good malt presence. Much more fun to drink.
10-31-2007 19:14:15 | More by lordofthewiens
4.75/5 rDev +10.2%
11-27-2013 09:45:27 | More by freshflesh
4.5/5 rDev +4.4%
06-29-2014 13:22:19 | More by DaftPatrick
4.75/5 rDev +10.2%
09-06-2013 01:23:20 | More by dieBlume
4.43/5 rDev +2.8%
Dark rootbeery with lots of carbination seen coming to the top where it rested at as a nice creamy, khaki milkshakey head that covered nicely made a thick ring at the edges. Scent of sherry and sasafrass, cola, slightly vineous-more merlot-like....
Intensely smooth... Sweet and honeylike. Bing cherries, red delicious apples. Medium carbination in the taste which is surprising since you can see so much rising in the tulip glass...
The sweetness is not cloying, just nice. Alcohol makes it's presence know, but is not overpowering and does not keep this from being decently drinkable. This is damn good stuff!
09-11-2004 16:02:19 | More by shapudding
4.25/5 rDev -1.4%
04-18-2013 05:03:08 | More by Callmecoon
Rhode Island
4.16/5 rDev -3.5%
08-16-2014 22:08:22 | More by Doomcifer
4.47/5 rDev +3.7%
Pours a dark ruby reddish-brown with a light brown head. Aromas of caramelized raisins, cherries, licorice, and alcohol. A lot of the same flavors with a touch of smoke and heavier on the cherry. Full body with lots of carbonaton. Semi sweet finish. This is pretty damn yummy.
02-13-2009 18:00:47 | More by tjthresh
4.58/5 rDev +6.3%
I'm not a huge fan of the Belgians but this beer was enough to almost turn my head around. Had it on tap at Max's this week and I'm glad I did. It came out in a goblet without any head to speak of but had a deep, rich mahogany color that hinted of complex flavors yet to come. This is probably the best smelling beer Ive ever had, lush and malty with toffee, plumy notes. It just wafted out of the glass. The taste was great, all kinds of malt, not sweet at all, jammy, pruney flavors and no real alcohol bite. Its a sipper but why hurry? The mouth feel was extremely smooth and drinkability was right up there. Wow! I like these pleasant surprises. Truly a great beer and a once in a long while on tap availability.
10-06-2006 18:07:13 | More by BeerIsland
New York
4.38/5 rDev +1.6%
2003 corked bottle. Cork explodes out. BE CAREFUL. This is a monster of a beer, not for the faint of heart. Currents, prunes and figs in the nose. sweet with very present alcohol. silky, oily mouthfeel. Tastes kind of bready. Lots of fruit. Makes you want to sip and try more to explore the complex flavors and layers of intrigue. would go well with hearty meats and dessert
01-31-2004 11:53:06 | More by Billolick
Cuvée Van De Keizer Blauw (Blue) from Brouwerij Het Anker
96 out of 100 based on 1,481 ratings.


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'Journal News' hires armed security guards – POLITICO.com
The Journal News of West Nyack, N.Y., has hired armed security guards to defend its offices after receiving a torrent of phone calls and emails responding to the paper's publication of the names and addresses of area residents with pistol permits.
RGA Investigations, a private security company, "is doing private security at on location at the Journal News as a result of the negative response to the article," according to a police report first obtained by the Rockland County Times (Nanuet, N.Y.) and shared with POLITICO. The guards "are armed and will be on site during business hours through at least January 2, 2013."
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I think we're very far off that level (NFC Conference Championship).We're close to being at the Bengals/Vikings (first round loss) level.
The Falcons are a perennial playoff team since hiring Mike Smith. Smith made the playoffs his first season after the team was horrible the year before. Schiano didn't sniff the playoffs with more talent than Smith had his first season. then again, the Falcons do have a franchise QB...
I watched the Falcons victory at the North Tampa Hooters.
You must have missed the Seattle/ Atlanta playoff game last week.
Quote from: The Anti-Java on January 16, 2013, 09:10:31 PMYou must have missed the Seattle/ Atlanta playoff game last week. wrong, my son
Quote from: JavaRay on January 16, 2013, 09:15:43 PMI watched the Falcons victory at the North Tampa Hooters.Were you wearing your Ruud jersey or your Tebow jersey?


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Well all of the waiting paid off. I found a milling machine. It was advertised in a local sell/swap guide . There wasnt much of a description except that it was a milling machine. Call the seller and arranged a time to look at it. To my surprise it is a well tooled CNC milling machine. It is a Bridgeport clone,an Alliant which is imported not sure of the country. it is 3 phase powered but there was a phase converter available so thats coming home too.
Couldn't be happier. Tomorrow I have arranged to meet with a guy that has a ramp truck to see what is involved with loading it! I uploaded pictures of the mill into photohost in my album idf anyone is interestd in seeing it . There wasnt any power in the garage where it was stored so they ar a little dark.


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01 February 2013
Posted in Science Park
Are you ready for some football?! Super Bowl fever is gripping the nation and the Science Center is no exception! Did you know that professional football players don't just have talent and luck on their side? There's also a science behind the perfect pass!
ESPN Sports Science partnered with NFL QB Drew Brees to find the scientific secrets behind his extremely accurate throws. Using a football outfitted with sensors and devices to measure everything from release angle to velocity, Brees tossed 10 perfect passes at a target only 4.5 inches in diameter.
The data showed that Brees' throws showed uncanny consistency. It appears that being an NFL star comes down to mastering a formula for the perfect toss.
Each of Brees' throws was released at an identical velocity of 52 mph and launch angle of six degrees above the horizontal. The spin of each throw was 600 rpm. Each throw even had the exact same "wobble!" Wobble is the small circle the nose of the ball traces in the air as it spins slightly off axis. Each of Brees' throws had exactly three small wobbles per five spins of the ball.
How many perfect throws can you spot this Sunday as you watch the Baltimore Ravens take on the San Francisco 49ers?


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WritingEssays, articles, and blogs about rap, literature, and science. Baba's first book of poetry "The Rap Canterbury Tales" was published by Talon Books in 2006.
Mailing List
PublicationsPublications The Rap Canterbury Tales (Talon Books 2006).
Illustrated facing-page paperback featuring Baba's rap lyrics and the original Middle English source, with illustrations by Erik Brinkman (Baba's brother).
Literary Essays
Darwin on the FringeBaba's entertaining blog written for Whatsonstage.com, interpreting the Edinburgh Fringe through the lens of evolutionary theory. 2009 – The Rap Guide to Evolution and The Rebel Cell
2010 – The Rap Guide to Human Nature and Rapconteur
Monthly Archives: June 2009
5 Rap Songs That Could Be Fringe Anthems
Here's my recent Scotsman blog outlining the five rap songs that capture something distinctive about the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
A Brief History of Rhyme
In early May I gave a talk at TEDxNavesink in New Jersey, entitled "A Brief History of Rhyme," detailing the emergence of polysyllabic rhyme patterns in both hip-hop and traditional literature. The talk was based on ideas I explored in the prologue to The Rap Canterbury Tales, published in 2006 by Talon Books. You can watch the TEDx Talk below.
New Shoots
Yesterday Jamie and I performed at the Octagon Theatre in Perth, the third stop on our nine-city Rap Guide to Evolution Down Under tour, including the Sydney Opera House June 18-21. Here's all of the tour dates if you're in Oz or have friends here who might want to catch the show. Check out the West Australian's glowing 4.5/5 star review of last night's show: The Evolution Will Not Be Televised.
In other recent events, I've been touring around the USA this Spring. We captured several more locations for the "Darwin's America" documentary, including Texas and Alabama, where we also began shooting the upcoming music video for "Don't Sleep With Mean People" with a group of conscientious college students keen to spread the evolutionary lovin'.
I also attended the Tucson Consciousness Conference where my wife Heather gave a talk and where I was performing as "The Reductionist Rapper," charged with "reducing" the conference proceedings into a series of digestible rap summaries. The conference delivered a full six days of neuroscience and philosophy exploring the mystery of consciousness and how it might be scientifically explainable, and a highlight video of my final "rap up" performance is now available to watch on YouTube.
If you're interested in the field, my raps were also integrated into a daily webcast called "Consciousness Central" which can be streamed here.
In other news, I wrote a piece about evolution and inequality for the Huffington Post which garnered 65 comments, a personal best for controversy, and I collaborated with the Perlstein Lab to explain the science of evolutionary pharmacology in an animated rap video, plus I gave a talk at TEDxNavesink about the history of rhyme from Chaucer to rap, which should be available online soon. Doing my best to keep it diverse over here!
Finally, if you've read this far you're about to be rewarded with a delectable bit of news. I'll be back at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this summer performing The Canterbury Tales Remixed at Underbelly, and also a new show, The Rap Guide to Religion, at the Gilded Balloon. No rest for the wicked!
So now that I'm officially working on a Rap Guide to Religion, I'm curious to hear from you all. What defines religious beliefs as opposed to other kinds of beliefs? How do you think the phenomenon is best explained, evolutionarily, psychologically, or sociologically? What religious behaviours do you think a "rap guide" needs to include to be comprehensive? I have a reading list I'm drawing inspiration from, but I'm open to suggestions as well, keeping in mind the show (and eventually the CD) can only be about an hour long.
Evolution and Inequality
I get emails from creationists occasionally, mostly good-natured ones rather than hate mail, but always disputatious in nature (of course). Recently I engaged in a dialogue with a family friend who is a creationist of the "your faith in science is no different than my faith in god" variety, and part of our disagreement came around to the question of whether the world is getting better or worse for people. This question isn't central to whether or not evolution is true, but it may have a key role to play in the question of whether knowledge of evolution is useful.
As evidence for moral improvement, I cited Steven Pinker's research on declining violence in The Better Angels of our Nature and in defence of moral regression my friend cited rising divorce rates and increasing narcissism, individualism, instant gratification, and the "subtle violence" that leads to "relationship breakdown." As evidence for his view, he sent me a New York Times article entitled "Is The World More Depressed?"
So is the world more depressed? And if so what does that have to do with evolution? Here's my response to my creationist friend in the form of a blog post.
The first thought that comes to mind is a question: once you've dismissed science as "a large, constantly shifting field of all kinds of contradictory theories," how can you then go on to quote scientific studies in defence of your view that the world is getting worse? It seems to me you must either accept the findings of science as a by-and-large reliable guide to what is true and real (including the scientific evidence for evolution), in which case you must critique the findings of science using the tools of science when you think it has gone astray, or else you must cease and desist all reference to its findings. Any attempt to have it both ways, dismissing science in general while also citing it in defence of your views, strikes me as deeply hypocritical.
Moving on, I have another observation: the New York Times article you sent me attributes rises in stress and mental illness and depression to "Our awareness of other people and where we stand in social space" and points out that "We know that social position affects both when you die and how sick you get." Note that the important thing here is social position, which means relative position. In other words, it doesn't matter how much you have, what matters is how much you have compared to others around you. When the article states with confidence "we know that…" the writer is talking about knowledge based on scientific evidence, and here's an excellent video that sums up the research admirably.
Now ask yourself: why would this be? What part of god's plan would explain the fact that relative differences in wealth and resources are so much more important than absolute differences in wealth and resources? Does this interesting fact about human nature have anything whatsoever to do with Adam and Eve, or Moses, or Jesus? Is it predicted by the bible you believe in?
My point is this: the details only makes sense in light of our evolutionary history. The observed pattern is just as true of baboons as it is of humans. In primates, greater inequality in social status usually means greater inequality in survival and reproduction rates, which is why our stress hormones have evolved to be consistently sensitive to changes in rank. We are the descendants of primates who followed those hormonal triggers to evolutionary success.
What we're observing is an evolved nature that's poorly adapted to the modern world, because technology, urbanization, and even agriculture are relatively modern developments, and genetic evolution can't keep up with cultural change. In some ways this is good, because cultural change has recently made us less racist and less sexist and less violent than the evidence suggests we used to be dozens or hundreds or tens of thousands of years ago. Culture can make us better people than we apparently evolved to be.
But the benefits of cultural change are not cost-free. Thanks to technology and media we have more people to compare ourselves to, more people to compete with, and more people to feel inferior to, and this constantly triggers stress hormones that harm our physical and mental health, just like it does in baboons only with greater intensity. So culture can also make us physically and mentally sicker than we evolved to be.
Jonathan Rottenberg's new book "The Depths: The Evolutionary Origins of the Depression Epidemic" explores these links in much greater detail. I haven't read it yet, but Maria Popova gives a nice overview in her recent Brainpickings post.
A better scientific understanding of the evolutionary factors at play here will help us to address the problems of depression and social disfunction more systematically and more effectively. I hope we share the common goal of increasing human wellbeing and reducing the amount of misery in the world. If so, science can help us towards that common goal, while the denial of science will only set us backwards.
So what do you think, is evolution worth a second look?
Darwin Day (Video)
A rap tribute to the countless biology teachers in the trenches of science literacy, teaching evolution to millions of students even in the face of religious objections. Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution, so they deserve our thanks and support.
Darwin's America
We're Making a Movie!
You heard it here first: we're making a feature documentary about the Rap Guide to Evolution. The film, provisionally titled "Darwin's America," will be produced by Creative Chaos Ventures, a New York company whose most recent doc "Casting By" was a film festival favourite and HBO selection. Darwin's America will follow The Rap Guide to Evolution as we tour the show to the places it's needed most: the American South and current hotspots of "creationism vs evolution" conflict. Our aim is to engage and entertain, not belittle, and to explore the question: can a performance succeed where traditional arguments and education have failed to make an impact on people's views about evolution?
The film commences shooting next week with my gig at Mississippi State University for their "Darwin Week" celebrations, followed by a show (for contrast) at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. The rest of the tour stops will be spread through March and April with some additional filming in July, and we are aiming to include gigs in Texas, Alabama, Tennessee, Louisiana, Kentucky and Oklahoma, plus there is still space to add more locations, which is where you come in. If you know of a venue or an organization anywhere in America (red states preferred, but not required) that would like to host a Rap Guide to Evolution performance in March or April, please get in touch. Because of the film and the short lead time I can do the gigs for a fraction of my normal fee.
It's exciting to be part of a project with a wide open and uncertain outcome, and I'll keep you posted as the tour and filming process unfolds!
Posted in Blog 2 Comments
Verbal Bling, Homicide, and Afrocentricity
When I was commissioned to write The Rap Guide to Evolution and challenged to communicate the key ideas behind Darwin's theory in hip-hop form, my first thought was to go through my record collection and see if I could find any rap songs that already centre around evolutionary themes. The three that seemed like the best candidates were "I'm A African" by Dead Prez, "Survival of the Fittest" by Mobb Deep, and "Hypnotize" by Biggie Smalls. So I set myself the challenge of re-writing these songs to make them explicitly instead of just implicitly evolutionary.
None of these three songs was written with Darwin in mind (as far as I know), but all three capture important ideas that are taught in biology classes the world over.
"I'm A African" by Dead Prez is an expression of black nationalist unity, reminding all black people, whether American, Jamaican, Haitian, etc, that they are children of Africa. As Dead Prez puts it in the outro: "It ain't 'bout where you stay, it's 'bout the motherland!" In my remixed version of the song (music video here), I remind all people of all races that they are also children of Africa, although some of us have to trace our ancestry back a bit further to get there. Since all humans lived in Africa (and had dark skin) as recently as 60,000 years ago, our current racial diversity is an evolutionarily recent "skin deep" phenomenon, and the Dead Prez anthem "I'm a African, and I know what's happenin'!" is a perfect synthesis of that scientific fact, which is increasingly supported by more and more streams of evidence. Also, it's hilarious when I can get white people, especially older white people (not to mention people of all other races) singing along with the chorus. The more diverse the audience, the more transgressive and cathartic the message. We are all African!
"Survival of the Fittest" by Mobb Deep captures the bleakness and danger of inner city ghetto life as well as any song I know. From the opening lines "There's a war goin' on outside no man is safe from, you can run but you can't hide forever…" the song reminds us that the world is sometimes a violent, hostile place, where strength and a hunger to fight for what's yours are all that keep you from being someone else's prey. This is also a perfect expression of the classic "nature red in tooth and claw" or "dog eat dog" understanding of Darwinism, in which organisms are locked in a constant and bloody struggle for survival.
The book "Homicide" by Martin Daly and Margot Wilson (summarized in this article) helps to explain how humans fit into this "war of nature" by exploring "the ways in which homicide rates respond to demographic, social and economic variables." Using an evolutionary psychology model to generate and tests hypotheses about human violence, Daly and Wilson conclude: "Our homicide research indicates that willingness to use dangerous competitive tactics depends in predictable ways on one's material and social circumstances and life prospects."
My remix of "Survival of the Fittest" (music video here and live performance here) combines Mobb Deep's perspective with Daly and Wilson's, showing how the male coalitional violence and desire to fight for status and dominance articulated so lucidly in the original song are in fact universal (though context-dependent) marks of our species.
Another insight of Daly and Wilson's is the relationship between life expectancy, income inequality, and age of first reproduction in young women. This suggests an evolutionary link between homicide in men and teen pregnancy in women, both of which can be understood as adaptations triggered by "one's material and social circumstances and life prospects." Over millions of years we have evolved the psychological tools needed to deal with certain challenges: scarce resources, dangerous enemies, and significant potential rewards (as well as high potential costs) for strategic youthful risk-taking. The bottom line is: in some contexts men who fail to risk violence and women who delay reproduction are the least likely to contribute genes to the next generation, and that's when Mobb Deep's "only the strong survive" perspective ceases to be "senseless violence" and starts looking like an evolutionarily rational response.
"Mr. Brinkman draws parallels between animal kingdom behavior and rap as a survivalist expression of power, pride, menace and sexual magnetism. And as he wryly points out, what is the ostentatious plumage of the male peacock but nature's bling?" The New York Times
The Notorious BIG's song "Hypnotize" mixes real, physical bling with incredibly fluid lyricism – verbal bling – creating a harmonious whole with "sexual magnetism" as its explicit raison d'etre. What is the song for? The ladies in the chorus leave no room for doubt, singing: "Biggie Biggie Biggie, can't you see, somehow your words just hypnotize me, and I just love your flashy ways, I guess that's why they're broke and you're so paid." According to evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey Miller, this isn't just what Biggie's song is for, this is also what "song" – ie the human capacity for music and poetry – is "for" in terms of its ultimate evolutionary function. If this is the case, then Biggie's words and their hypnotic effect on the female brain are fulfilling their precise Darwinian purpose.
For my remixed version of "Hypnotize" I had to tweak Biggie's message ever so slightly (lacking any real physical bling of my own to flaunt), by instead putting the emphasis on the verbal bling and its effects.
According to Miller, the ability to synthesize words and music into pleasing arrangements can be understood as a "costly signal" analogous to the peacock's tail, the nightingale's song, or the bowerbird's nest, a talent that was designed by evolution for a single purpose: attracting mates. And what do the ladies get out of the arrangement? They get an unfakeable guarantee of genetic quality, an assurance that the genes behind the display are top notch and will produce healthy and equally sexy offspring, well-equipped to fight diseases (because a disease-susceptible organism couldn't maintain the necessary brain and body power for the display in the first place) and attract the next generation of choosy groupies.
And what about the female talent for song? Well, human males are choosy too, especially when it comes to long-term investment, fatherhood, and commitment. Singing females may be displaying the same qualities as singing males, that is, well-developed brains and bodies and sexy genes, only their evolutionary goal may be to attract quality instead of quantity. Palaeolithic female pop divas might well have attracted stronger, smarter, higher-status mates than off-key female warblers in the Stone Age. Hey, it seems to have worked pretty well for Beyonce.
Posted in Blog Tagged dead prez, evolution, hip-hop, hypnotize, mobb deep, notorious big, rap, sexual selection Leave a comment
The Rap Up
What a year 2013 was! With your help we completed two crowdfunding campaigns, funding the first-ever three show hip-hop theatre cycle off-Broadway and a music video for the Darwin-inspired peace-anthem "Don't Sleep With Mean People" (look for the video release in 2014). The Rap Guide to Evolution toured the world, including stops in New Zealand, Germany, Spain, Canada, and all over the USA. We were nominated for an OBA Award for "Best Unique Theatrical Experience" in New York, and the NCSE gave me a "Friend of Darwin Award" for some reason.
2013 was also the year I kicked off a new kind of performance, the "Rap Up," in which I sit in the audience at a live event, whether a lecture, conference, performance, concert, award show, whatever, with my brain partitioned, part listening and part composing verses on the fly. Then at the end of the event I step to the stage and perform a fresh-minted satirical rap summary, unrevised and unrehearsed, which gets a great response since the content is tailored for the crowd, a transient zen rap that lives only for a single performance (unless it ends up on YouTube). Of course, you won't catch all the in-jokes unless you were there, but here's a collection of recent rap up performances that were filmed.
And what does 2014 hold in store? More Evolution touring (Norway, Australia, and the American South coming up this Spring), more rap up gigs, more Canterbury Tales (I'm looking into Edinburgh, fingers crossed), and more new music. I'm working on a solo hip-hop record and have a couple of new shows in development, so stay tuned for releases and announcements coming up.
Happy new year!
Rap Guide to Evolution in Vancouver
In two and a half weeks I'll be performing my first-ever public theatre run in my hometown of Vancouver, BC, and the first run of any kind there since the Vancouver Fringe in 2003. My early forays into hip-hop theatre have taken me around the world, but it took a full decade for them to bring me home again! The Rap Guide to Evolution runs from October 29 through November 10 at the Cultch in East Vancouver.
Posted in Blog 6 Comments
New Album: Irregular Spirits
Back in 2005 while I was performing at the Brighton Fringe Festival I met and made friends with a network of ridiculously talented UK rappers. Several of them were in a group called The Menagerie, and several others joined the group later on, and over the years I've had the pleasure of recording and performing with them around the UK. A few years ago several of us came together to record the album Irregular Spirits, which was just released on CD, vinyl, and digital download from the UK label Tea Sea Records.
Stream or Download Irregular Spirits Now
In addition to myself, the album features Dizraeli, Elemental, Dr. Syntax, Koaste, Longusto, Vecks, Teej, Jon Clark, Simon Mole, and Sadie Jemmett, with cuts by Nick Maxwell and production by Tom Caruana (of Wu-Tang vs The Beatles fame). The label describes it as "a wildly original album filled with ridiculous flows, soulful ballads, and hilariously twisted hip-hop phantasmagoria worthy of The Island of Dr. Moreau." I couldn't have said it better myself.
Watch the video for lead single "Are You Serious?"
Seriously, it's very difficult to do this album justice with a textual description, so I humbly implore you to just go check it out. It's a project I'm very proud of, and the artists on it are some of my best friends as well as the rappers I most admire, on the British Isles and worldwide.
If you write a blog or music column, please consider reviewing the record. Here's the press release.


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FRG is the most logical poster on this board. You guys just don\'t like where the logical conclusions take you.
When you say Ball and Lacy will go "too high" for the Bucs, do you mean they'll be gone by pick #13 or by the 3rd or 4th round when the Bucs might realistically think about drafting a running back?


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City Offices Closed
City of Killeen offices will be closed Tuesday, December 24, in observance of Christmas.
Emergency services and garbage collection will operate without interruption.
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City of Killeen offices will be closed Monday, September 1, in observance of Labor Day. ... Read More
The Mayor and City Council are accepting applications from residents to serve on various city boards and commissions. ... Read More
The City of Killeen is partnering with Metroplex Health System and All-American Chevrolet to host the Breast Cancer 5K Walk October 18 at 8 a.m. at the Andy K. Wells Hike & Bike Trail. Online registration is now open at www.eventbrite.com. ... Read More
For the sixth year, the City of Killeen has been named a Playful City USA by KaBOOM!, a national non-profit dedicated to bringing play into the lives of children. Killeen is one of just 16 cities in Texas and 212 cities in the country to receive this designation. ... Read More
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Lopez waved his hand to express his gratitude for the loyalty these young women were displaying. But at the same time, was wondering if these women would ever get the chance to see him in a Braves uniform ever again.
After hitting an abysmal .233 with 11 homers and 52 RBIs last year, Lopez was fortunate to have a player option in his contract that allowed him to return to the Braves this year and collect $7 million. Without that option, he would have been seeking a new employer during this past offseason and collecting a far less envious salary.
Throughout Spring Training, he persevered while knowing in the back of his mind that the Braves would like to trade him and free themselves of the financial responsibility they had for a player, who over the first half of this season has gone from washed up has-been to All-Star once again.
"I never questioned my ability," Lopez said. "Watching Benito Santiago last year making the All-Star Game after not going for 10 years, made me realize I could come back. I knew if he could do it, I could too. I just always thought positive and never let myself give up."
Lopez reported to Spring Training weighing 30 pounds lighter than he did last year and displaying a new sense of confidence that has enabled him to hit .307 with 23 homers and 52 RBIs. He once again looks like the offensive force he was while being named to his only other All-Star Games in 1997 and '98.
"I really don't know what to tell you," Lopez said. "All I know is that I'm feeling really good about myself and want this to continue throughout my career, wherever I play."
Had Lopez been forced to go elsewhere during the offseason, Braves fans would have been denied the opportunity to fully enjoy what might be baseball's comeback story of the year. He already has six multihomer games, including one in his native Puerto Rico.
"Javy has always been able to swing the bat," Gary Sheffield said. "He's one guy who you always feared as an opponent when he came to the plate. He's showing this year that he still has something to prove."
Lopez's perseverance and production will be awarded when he assumes his role as the National League's starting catcher in Tuesday night's All-Star Game at U.S. Cellular Field. This is the first time fans have ever elected him to start the Midsummer Classic.
"When I go out there to play, I'm going out there to win," Lopez said. "All of us who go out there to play in an All-Star Game, go out to do our best for the fans."
Lopez and Sheffield are joined on this year's National League squad by fellow Braves Russ Ortiz, John Smoltz, Rafael Furcal, Andruw Jones and Marcus Giles, who is unable to play because of a concussion he suffered on Friday.
"It's great to be able to enjoy the All-Star Game anytime," Lopez said. "But it's especially nice to be able to do it with a lot of your teammates."
Lopez is just happy that he still has the opportunity to call these fellow Braves his teammates.
Mark Bowman is a reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.


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Families are drawn to Montessori schools for many different reasons. Sometimes parents are looking to continue in preschool the child-centered environment they have established at home. Others wish to see their children thrive in the our enriched classrooms. Still, other families choose Montessori preschools because they want their children to learn and socialize in a non-competitive environment. Whatever the reason parents choose Montessori, they often have many questions during their child's first year.
To help answer these questions, MSGL offers a 1 ½-hour Montessori Basics class each Fall and all new families are expected to attend. Preprimary teacher Kelly Sallee presented this year's class on September 25th to a packed house of over 40 parents and grandparents. Kelly focused her presentation on the Prepared Environment, the Sensitive Periods of a child's development, and the Role of the Teacher. If you were unable to attend this year's Basics, follow this link to read more about Kelly's presentation. Below are a few tips for new parents.
Kelly's Tips for New Montessori Parents
Do your best to control the environment, not the child. Organize the child's belongings to help him be independent and successful.
Don't worry if your child is unable to sit still or to focus for long periods. "Even when we feel they're not listening, they are learning."
What's in your child's cubby does not necessarily reflect their work because many activities have no "paper" component. Look at classroom photos and videos on SmugMug to see what the children are working on in class. Your child's teacher will also have this information available for you at parent/teacher conferences.
Give your child the gift of time. Try not to rush her through tasks. When a child is allowed to dress herself in the morning it may take longer but she will develop the skills necessary for independence.
Allow your child to work without interruption, when possible. Periods of uninterrupted work strengthen a child's ability to concentrate for longer periods of time.
Allow your child to complete tasks without correction. "I don't know any adults who walk around with their shoes on the wrong feet. They will figure it out with time."
Give your child the opportunity to be a third-year student. Our mixed-age classrooms allow children to move from being the youngest who look up to role models to being the role models themselves. "Children who are the youngest in their families need the third year to be the leader that they don't get to be at home."
Photo courtesy of Lena Atkinson
What is Montessori?
Rather than explaining what Montessori is, I am offering an excerpt from an article that does a beautiful job of describing what Montessorians do. Maria Montessori's Decalogue is a set of 10 rules for adults working in a Montessori classroom. It is relevant to parents, grandparents, and caregivers of all types who strive to relate to children peacefully and respectfully in any environment.
I hope you will enjoy this expanded version of the Montessori Decalogue as written by The Mammolina Children's Home Montessori Kindergarten in Beijing, China.
The Montessori Decalogue
1. Never touch the child unless invited by him (in some way or another).
Unless there is a very strong reason to (like avoiding an accident, for example), one should never touch a child unless a child requests it. Picking up a child without the child's consent, even if in a playful manner, or grabbing her hand, pushing her, etc., should always be avoided. If children are engaged, looking at a book, working, playing, resting, the same principle applies. Children invite contact in many ways, and parents and adults in general, who work with children, know how to interpret the signs they send. It is important also to respect a child when she is angry and does not want to be touched or picked up.
2. Never speak ill of the child in his presence or absence.
Speaking ill of a child, or making negative comments about a child, either in the child's presence or absence, denotes lack of respect for the child. It also sets a frame of mind and denotes an attitude that is negative and conducive to confrontation—and not always open! Preconceived ideas often linger as negative thoughts and breed reactive behavior. If an adult falls into this trap, it is very easy for a lack of patience and negative attitudes to creep in and damage the relationship with the child.
3. Concentrate on strengthening and helping the development of what is good in the child, so that its presence may leave less and less space for what is negative.
If adults focus on negative behavior, children will feel inadequate. This will result in low self-esteem, and a self-fulfilling prophecy like behavioral patterns will take over. Negativity will become second nature. Instead, by focusing on what is positive, the child will feel safe and confident. Children are learning what is and is not acceptable behavior can and cannot be done, etc. They do not need punishments or rewards. Simply to be shown what is and is not acceptable, by adults that model appropriate behavior.
4. Be proactive in preparing the environment, take meticulous and constant care of it. Help the child establish constructive relations with it. Show the proper place where the means of development are kept and demonstrate their proper use.
If the child is presented with a prepared environment, there is little need for much more. Again, modeling appropriate behavior is essential. A child that is shown an orderly environment will likewise feel encouraged to keep it orderly. If a child has available manipulatives she can handle, play and work with, rather than things she cannot touch, she will feel at ease to explore the world around her. If objects are at reach, that the child may break or hurt herself with, she should be shown how to handle them, rather than told "don't touch!" A kitchen is a world full of wonder for a child! Cutting, cooking, stirring, pouring, etc., are all activities the child will want—and need!—to master in order to become independent. Include the child in as many activities as possible at home, from cleaning to cooking; there is enough to keep any child busy and engaged all day long.
5. Be ever ready to answer the call of the child who stands in need of you, and always listen and respond to the child who appeals to you.
There is nothing worse for a child than to feel insecure and ignored. Abandonment is a feeling no child should have to live with. "If a child asks for attention, then that child needs attention," stressed Montessorian Margaret Homfray. When people brush a child aside and say, "she just wants attention," that person is missing the point: a child only wants attention when she needs attention. Children who feel cared for and do not have to worry about being abandoned, even if for a short time, are far more likely to care for others and show concern for and trust others, than those who experience this sort of "cold shoulder" treatment. Also, "timeout" and "go to your room and stay there" approaches are also expressions of abandonment.
6. Respect the child who makes a mistake and can then or later correct it herself, but stop firmly and immediately any misuse of the environment and any action which endangers the child, its own development or that of others.
Avoid rushing to correct mistakes a child has committed. Children are learning to cope and function. They will persist and practice to their heart's content whatever skill they need to acquire, until they master it. If a child starts throwing things around and disrespecting the environment, by all means, stop her. Yet, explain why you had to stop her. Reason and listen to what the child may have to say. Maria Montessori said that "a child's first tantrums are the first ills of her soul." There is always a reason for everything. Try to bring the reason to light. Punishing, isolating the child, etc., will only feed her pain, and burry deep those reasons—she will learn to hide rather than communicate.
7. Respect the child who takes a rest or watches others working or ponders over what she herself has done or will do. Neither call her nor force her to other forms of activity.
A child that is idle is often not idle at all… Children need to be given space to find what it is they are interested in and want to do. Once they do, they pursue their interests with unrestrained passion and perseverance! A child that is observing other children or adults is also learning. If the child is resting, she is not being lazy and doing nothing just lying there—she is most probably processing information, observing, reflecting on something she did, or saw, or is planning on doing.
8. Help those who are in search of activity and cannot find it.
Be sensitive to the needs of the child including differentiating when apparent inactivity is inner activity, or in contrast, a child is simply lost. A child in search of activity and unable to find it is usually restless. If sitting or lying down, it can be noticed that she is not "engaged;" she is not resting, but simply lost and prostrated. There is a thin line that separates these two worlds. It is the adult's responsibility to observe carefully and find out the signs—often very different from child to child—that can reveal what the child is experiencing. Abandonment differs from rest and contemplation.
9. Be untiring in repeating presentations to the child who refused them earlier, in helping the child to acquire what is not yet her own and to overcome imperfections. Do this by animating the environment, with care, with purposive restraint and silence, with mild words and loving presence. Make your ready presence felt to the child who searches and hide from the child who has found.
A child may need to be shown the right way to do something, say a word, express her feelings or acquire any sort of new skill, many, many times. One should never grow tired of repeating it, such as reading the same bedtime story or singing the same jingle. Children seek perfection in all they do until they reach a level which meets their needs (not what the adult may think "perfect" is, or means.) To be always available but not intrusive is an art. When a child needs help, she will ask for it. When a skill has been acquired and the child no longer needs assistance, adults should respect the child's new acquired or reached level of independence.
10. Always treat the child with the best of good manners and offer her the best you have in yourself and at your disposal.
Children who are respected will learn to respect others. Giving the child the best one has to give helps the child learn that you are someone she can count on, and teaches her to also give others the best she has to give. It is important the way Montessori puts it, "the best you have in yourself," as if to say, always reach higher, but do not feel dismayed if you fall short, and "the best" that you can give is not the best you think or know you should give. If your best manners are not always what they should be—a common feeling parents harbor when children seem to be pushing their patience beyond the limits, do not lose heart. The way Dr. Montessori put it, is basically this: have realistic expectations towards the child, and yourself too. Give the best you have to give, but don't feel guilty if you fall short. Simply keep striving to improve and always do your best. If you commit a mistake, giving the child your best may well be recognizing it and apologizing. "Amy, Mommy got upset and shouted. That was not nice of me. I am sorry." Children also need to recognize mistakes, learn to apologize, and that parents are not always perfect.
These are basic principles. What Montessori strives for is to protect the child from all sorts of negative influences that can create deviations in the child's spirit and psyche. To preserve the natural curiosity of the child, help her find her interests, protect her passion for learning, foster it and let it grow in a healthy way. In this way, the child can contribute her best to society. This is conducive to world peace, as Dr. Montessori envisioned it, and Montessorians believe is possible. It takes passion, it takes commitment, and it takes working together.
- Excerpted from Montessori: Committed People with a Passion for Children by the Mammolina Children's Home Montessori Kindergarten in Beijing, China.
Grace's first day of Montessori preschool, 1997.
Last summer, my 19-year-old daughter was getting ready to move into her first apartment. I was excited for her to have the chance to live on her own and had been setting aside household items that I thought she could use. One day, after admiring the "steal" of a chair I had found at Goodwill, she asked me, "Aren't you sad that I won't live here anymore?"
"Well, honey," I said, "I always imagined that you would grow up and move out of the house. That was our goal all along for you to be an independent, self-sufficient person."
"I know," she said. "But I'm kind of sad that I won't be sleeping here anymore."
I reminded her that she had hardly slept at home at all since she started college last year. She lived in the dorm, four hours away from home and we often didn't hear from her for days.
"Yeah, but this is different. I just can't believe this won't be my home address anymore. Are you going to change the garage door code?"
A-ha! Then I figured it out. She was worried about cutting the cord from the house where she grew up. I had been concerning myself with making sure she was comfortable "out there" and she was worried she would no longer be welcome back at home.
It occurred to me that not much has changed between that day and the day sixteen years ago when we were preparing to send her to preschool here at the Montessori School of Greater Lafayette. Back then we were so excited to help our "baby" pick out a new lunch box and indoor shoes but we had little idea what to do to help prepare her (or ourselves) emotionally for this new chapter. She sailed through preschool and is now working through nursing school just fine, but we have learned a lot since then. Today I am sharing some tips and advice gathered from teachers and parents here at MSGL to help you and your child prepare for the first days of preschool.
Talk about school - mindfully.
Talk with your child about preschool when he is in the mood. Maybe he will bring it up or you can start the conversation, just don't push too hard. If your child seems "done" with the conversation or is becoming anxious, let the topic drop until later. And be honest about your feelings when you do talk about school. Some children worry that their parents will be sad or lonely when they are gone. When you say, "I am going to miss being with you in the morning, but it makes me happy to know you will be enjoying yourself at school," it lets him know that you will miss him but you are confident that school is a good place for him to be.
Check out the new environment.
MSGL's Parent Work Day is Saturday, August 16th. This is a great time to get familiar with the school and classroom environments and to be part of the school community. Children are encouraged to help clean lockers, pull weeds, and load and unload wheelbarrows full of mulch right alongside their parents and new classmates. And, each family member's time counts towards your volunteer hours requirement.
You will have another opportunity to get familiar with the school when your child attends her New Student Orientation visit on Monday, August 18th. This is her first opportunity to see her teachers and classmates in her new classroom. She can put her indoor shoes in her locker, locate her cubby and extra clothes box, and see where the bathroom is. The whole family can attend the Parent Orientation later that evening and maybe your child can give a tour of her new classroom.
Make new friends.
You will receive a class list via email in August. Consider contacting a few families on the list to set up a playdate before school starts. Even if you can't get together with any other families, you and your child can look over the names on the list together. You may discover that one of his classmates lives on your street or maybe someone has the same name as a sibling or a friend.
Help her dress for success.
Our Montessori classrooms are prepared to encourage your child's independence and you can help by providing your child with shoes and clothing that she can put on and take off by herself. Belts, suspenders, and jumpsuits look smart but they can be difficult for your child to use successfully. Provide your child a choice of clothing that allows her complete independence in her self-care routines. And please remember that preschool is a time to jump in and explore. Paint, snack, sand, and dirt from the garden can stain your child's clothing, so please send her to school in clothes that can stand to get dirty.
Plan a morning routine.
Now is a good time to do a mental run-through of your morning routine. Consider how much time your child needs to wake up, get dressed, and eat breakfast. Allow time for packing lunches, finding coats and shoes, and getting on the bike or in the car. Then add a few extra minutes. Parents and children who are not in a rush tend to have much better experiences at drop-off. Some families even do a few "practice runs" in the summer to see if they can get to school and work on time.
Create a goodbye routine.
Discuss with your child how you each want to say goodbye at drop-off. Some families say, "After you put on your inside shoes and put away your lunch box, we will walk to the classroom and I will give you three hugs and two kisses before I go to work." Some children like to wave to dad out the window and some parents leave their children with specific plans for what they will do after school. "Sonia is picking you up today" or "we are going to the Farmer's Market on our bikes after school today." Children have so little control over their daily lives that they appreciate at least knowing what is happening and when.
And while we're talking about goodbyes, let's take just a moment to consider the specter of separation anxiety.
What if my child cries when I walk away?
Separating from your child that first time can be heart-breaking, but remember - it's only for a few moments. The majority of children who are sad when they separate from their parents are able to calm themselves and choose an activity within a few minutes. If you have gone through the goodbye routine and are finding it hard to turn around and walk away, ask your teacher for help. Sometimes parents say, "Please help me. I need to leave." That is the teacher's sign that she needs to hold your child's hand or pick her up so that you can walk away. Teachers don't want to step in before you are ready to go but they are happy to help when you ask them.
The best thing you can do for your child at drop-off is to be consistent and walk away when you say you will. Lingering tends to just prolong the heartache for the parent and the child. The first few times you drop your child off may be difficult, but trust that with consistent repetition you and your child will develop a peaceful good-bye routine.
Talk with the teachers.
Talk with your child's teachers about how the adjustment period is going. The teachers help dozens of children adjust to school every year but this may be your first time. They expect you will have questions and concerns. Email is a great way to communicate with your child's teachers and all of the contact information is available on the classroom web page at Msgl.org.
Help your child talk about his day.
If this is the first time your child has been away from home you will no doubt be very eager to know what he did all day. Unfortunately, preschoolers often say they "did nothing" or "just played." A lot of things happened between the time you dropped him off that morning and when you picked him up several hours later, but he might not yet be able to give a sequential list of his activities. Here are some ideas to help your child tell you about his day.
Take care of yourself!
The best thing you can do during these last few weeks of summer is to give you and your child the gift of a regular bedtime that allows enough sleep to wake up refreshed and ready for the big days ahead. Fill up with a good breakfast each morning and be extra patient with your child and especially with yourself. Parenting preschoolers, like college students, is hard work and there is no right way to do it. Follow your heart and follow your child, and in sixteen years, or so, you will be very proud of the people you have both become.
- Thanks to Jennifer Tyrrell for this guest post. Jennifer is a Montessori teacher who worked in the Spruce Toddler class at MSGL from 2003 - 2005.
One of the arguments I hear most often when I'm describing Montessori is that the open workspace—in particular the freedom to move around, to work where you do best for a specific task, and the ability to make a snack when you like—is not properly preparing children for the realities of life or the workforce: at some point they will have to learn to stay at their desk and do their work like everyone else. I think my husband's workplace shows the opposite to be true.
My husband Jeremiah took the family to visit his "office" in Cummins's COM building. Cummins is a well-known, large, international, Fortune 500 company that makes diesel engines, and they've recently built this COM building in their Columbus, Indiana, headquarters with a "collaborative workspace" design. They have converted several spaces in other buildings to this open style, as well. With this collaborative workspace, departments are located on the same floor, as much as possible. Though employees can work wherever they like on any floor, they are encouraged to work amongst their department's floor.
He showed us his locker (hook and cubby) with a couple drawers for his personal items and work laptop (each employee is given one as their primary work tool), and a thin cabinet for his coat and outerwear. Then we walked around a huge floor with areas that have a variety of tables, some standing height, some for chairs; other areas with couches and coffee tables; other more intimate areas with armchairs and footstools (Jeremy's favorite). A couple of kitchenettes with long counters and stools (snack tables) are located centrally with no walls enclosing them. There are cabinets (shelves) that divide some places and contain files and materials for everyone to access.
There are even treadmills with laptop spaces and hookups for those who need movement as they work (they are calibrated for walking, not running . . . we walk in the workplace :) There are walls to divide the elevators and small conference rooms (which can be used and reserved by any employee), but other than those areas, there are no rooms, no "offices", no cubicles, it is all shared space: managers working amongst underlings. It looks like, well . . . a grown-up Montessori classroom :)
They are doing this to encourage collaborative problem solving and to make the workday more pleasant so that Cummins continues to retain younger employees. Please share with anyone who questions the appropriateness of Montessori's open workspace. :)
You can read a news article about more of the company's redesigned workspaces see additional photos, here.
It is important to say that you are your child's most important and influential teacher. You set the tone for your child's love of learning from the very start and it is you who bridges the gap between school and home. Sometimes this can feel overwhelming.
So please join us for "Bringing Montessori Home," a Parent Development Opportunity on Wednesday, October 9th from 6:30-8:00 pm. Kelly Sallee will be presenting ideas you can use and materials you can make to prepare a home environment that will nurture your child's independence. We hope you might also share how you use the Montessori philosophy to help your child be successful in your home. Register in the office or call or email firstname.lastname@example.com today!
Date: Wednesday, Oct. 9th
Time: 6:30-8:00 pm
Location: MSGL
Classroom: To Be Decided
Childcare available - call,
sign up in office or email Lena at firstname.lastname@example.com.
We hope to see you there!
I had the great pleasure of working in my former classroom today and it reminded me of why the three-year cycle in Montessori classrooms is so beneficial, not least of all, to the teachers.
Our Montessori preschool classrooms are composed of a mixed-age group of children who remain, ideally, in one classroom for three years. A child starts at age three and stays through her Kindergarten year. This is called the three year cycle. Each of those years brings new and unique learning opportunities for the child. As a three-year-old, the child observes her older peers and benefits from their experience. As a four-year-old, she starts to see herself as one of the "big kids" and expands her social circle. In her Kindergarten year she is recognized as a leader and takes pride in helping others.
When I took a sabbatical at the end of the school year in May, I left behind children who had been in my classroom for one or two years. I was able to catch up with many of those students today when I visited the classroom. I observed that two of "my" third-year students, I'll call them S and K, were part of what Montessorian John Chattin-McNichols calls a "roving pack of 5-year-olds." They were wandering around with some other boys and mixing it up a little. I knew these two boys when they were just barely three years old. I knew them before they could consciously control their bodies at group time and even before they could dress themselves successfully. Now, here they were - big, bold 5-year-olds and I was curious to see who they had become eight months after we last worked together.
Angie, my dear friend and the lead teacher of my former class, shared with me that S and K had been working on the squaring and cubing chains in the math area, so I asked them about those activities. They were eager to show me what they had already done and tell me what came next. Within a few minutes, they broke off from the pack and were ready to master the 10 cubing chain.
The 10 cubing chain - or 1000 chain - is a concrete representation of 10 cubed. It's made up of one thousand pea-sized beads organized into bars of ten. The bars of ten are attached at the ends to make a chain. Children are ready for this work after they have mastered the 1 - 10 squaring chains and the 1 - 9 cubing chains. This video from the DuPage Montessori School in Naperville, Illinois provides a good overview of how the squaring and cubing chains are presented in the Montessori classroom.
The 10 cubing chain is nearly 30 feet long so it must be laid out in the hallway outside the classroom. So, off to the hallway we went.
S and K divided up the tasks between themselves. One carried the rolled-up mat and the other carried the chain. We established the space we would use in the hallway and K unrolled the mat while S went back into the classroom for the number tabs. We discussed how they would sort the tabs on the tray and move it down the mat as they worked.
S found the 1000 tab. He knew it went at the very end of the chain but he left it on the tray. There was a pause before they started and I asked what number they would start with. S said, "We have to count them all."
That is certainly one way to do it. But when a child is ready for the 1000 chain, he is generally ready to complete it without counting every number because he can now count by tens and hundreds. Once you trust that 10 is ten, you don't have to count it again.
I asked if they thought they could first put tabs on the hundreds. Yes! They were sure they could. Together, we counted the bars as 10, 20, 30 and so on until we got to 100. S got the 100 tab and marked that spot. K quickly grasped the system and immediately went to work sorting out all of the hundreds tabs in a separate group so that S could place them. This was my cue to find something else to do. I went back inside the classroom to assist Miss Angie while the boys marked off every 100th bead on the chain with the appropriate tab.
They repeated the process, stopping after each bar of ten. K was the sorter, S was the placer. "150! I need 150," S said. K had it ready. There was never any disagreement, that I heard, over who would do which task. They just got started and they each found their niche as they went. And they were really digging their work.
They started the cubing chain work at 9:45 and I checked in with them every few minutes. They finished at 11:00. One of them stopped to use the bathroom then went straight back to his work. Other children would step into the hall to see what was happening and then go back inside to their work.
Sometimes I checked on S and K without speaking and other times I acknowledged their progress. Once, I said I would be back to check on them in a bit unless they needed some help. "We need some help," S said. They could not find the tab for 590. I suggested they leave a space for that number and they could put it there when they found it. They never found it, but they were able to move on without hesitation.
As they got to the very end, S picked up the 1000 tab and started to place it under the 1000th bead. K said, "Hey! We decided we would put that one on together!" And so they did. That's when this photo was snapped.
If you had asked me three years ago if these children were developing normally and if they were going to learn to read and write and grow up to be compassionate humans I would have responded, "Of course they will!" But in the back of my head there would have been a tiny voice saying, "What if they aren't? What if they are never able to sit in a chair for more than 8 seconds? What if they never learn to put their shoes on by themselves? What if they show no interest in reading? What if they always write six as 9?"
That doubtful voice is a familiar one to parents because most of us only get to experience the development of one or two children. We fear we will do something wrong and our children will not achieve their potential. Preschool teachers should know better because we get to observe hundreds of children over the course of our careers, right? But sometimes, even with years of experience, we forget that our job is simply to prepare a nourishing environment. It is the child who must do the work of building the man.
In 1949, Maria Montessori offered us some guidance in our quest to relax and trust that each child will reveal himself as a competent and confident being in his own time. In The Absorbent Mind she wrote, "...for while, in the traditional schools, the teacher sees the immediate behavior of her pupils, knowing that she must look after them and what she has to teach, the Montessori teacher is constantly looking for a child who is not yet there."
Dr. Montessori also implemented the three-year cycle in our classrooms to give us enough time to look for that child and see him before he moves on to primary school.
I am not at all surprised that S and K can count to 1000 by tens and hundreds. I am not surprised that they can recognize 3-digit numerals or that they can prepare, complete, and put away their work. I am not even surprised that two 5-year-old boys willingly work together on a math material for 1 hour and and 15 minutes with only a bathroom break and very limited guidance. I've seen it before.
I am surprised at the sense of joyous relief I feel each time children reveal themselves in this way. It's an experience that never gets old. I suppose that's the ultimate reward of being a teacher.
Today's Wayback Wednesday comes from March, 2000. The children in Room B were treated to a science presentation by a group of MSGL parents.
These parents must have been SO COOL! We are thankful for all of the Montessori parents and grandparents who have shared their interests and their time with our children over the past 41 years. Have a Happy Thanksgiving!


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On this day: January 23
Published On: Jan 22 2013 04:26:32 PM CST Updated On: Jan 23 2014 01:00:00 AM CST
The deadliest earthquake in recorded history hits China, Duke Ellington plays Carnegie Hall, North Korea captures a U.S. Navy ship, and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducts its first class, all on this day.
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