To feel a bit sorry for children whose parents don't do anything creative with them?

[flamingobingo]

I expect a lot of people will think I am, but I don't care.

I don't love doing crafts (in fact it drives me mad most of the time), but isn't it part of parenting?

You kind of signed up for it, didn't you, the day you got pregnant?

Laweasel I may print and frame that - "a craftbox the kids can go into whenever (within reason) is way better than sitting down to do a kit" - that's what we have had for ages!

(possibly entirely because I never have time to sit and do kits, but still....)

laweasel, I am reassured by your description of creative play.

Oh boy do my children take the lead with whatever materials they can find. Paper, felt tips, string, glue, boxes, toilet roll holders, bits of cloth, leaves, sticks with my only input to supply endless stubs of cellotape or to put the string around a face mask. I usually try to hide when dd is in one of her projects. The result is utterly crap and bears scant resemblance to anything.

I cannot wait to chuck it in the bin.

Our craft consists of sitting at kitchen table with ''my first felt tips'' , and paper. I say , '' draw daddy'' , and then wander off, and make myself a cup of tea. I then praise her unidentifiable scribbles. I pop it into the recycling , when she's not looking.

This little scenario happens about twice a day.

Just wanted to make a point re the link to fine motor control. dd is a classically creative child, she likes drama and music and art. She has excellent fine motor skills, concentrates easily and is (relatively) neat. Her handwriting is about what you would expect from an eight year old.

ds has a totally different sort of creativity, verging on the chaotic. He has no interest in organized creativity of any sort (gets totally bored with school performances etc) and really dislikes crafty stuff. He has poor fine motor skills, and his handwriting is a real problem. He says he hates craft stuff because he is bad at it, which is almost certainly because of his poor fine motor skills.

They both went to the same nursery, school etc, and did lots of craft stuff at school (isn't that what nursery/KS1 is about?). Maybe lots of exercises would have helped ds, but as neither his physio nor his OT assessments (both borderline normal) suggested "do arts and crafts" I'm not at all sure that there is the link suggested.

On the handwriting and pens side, my grandmother was a caligraphy expert (wrote books, advised schools that sort of thing) and she actually thought schools should move entirety from fountain pens to Berol roller balls. She wasn't at all keen on biros though.

nooka - at my DD's school, the parents of children like your DS are advised by the school to start graphothérapie (writing therapy) from moyenne section onwards. This in a school system heavily geared during the three years of maternelle towards preparing children for good pen control. Rightly or wrongly, it is believed that very specific extra fine motor skill therapy (not just drilling, but things like placing tiny balls on lines with glue ie typical craft) help eye-hand and pincer control.

Spot on Anna. No room for creativity whatsoever - in fact ask a French school child to draw you a person and they'll all draw pretty much the same thing (having been drilled even in this!). The only creativity at our school is provided by an Australian mum who runs the bricolage club after school on Wednesday and is truly inspirational. The children adore it and I can't help thinking it's a shame they don't get more opportunity for that sort of thing. They do have beautiful handwriting though ...

There's that old joke about the journo interviewing the French education minister and asking "What's happening in French schools at the moment?" And the minister looks at his watch and says "Mathematics."

That used to be funny. Until it happened here...

I quite liked doing craft stuff with dd, when I grew up my gran bought me loads of pens and pencils and craft stuff, but I was never allowed to use it. I had a beautiful box of Caran D'Ache watercolour pencils, however I was never allowed to use them as I would ruin them. I remember sneakily using them once, and got into terrible trouble.

So with dd I bought her loads of stuff and lived vicariously through her. I particularly loved her crayola crayon suitcase (it had 72 different colours!) and I was happy to see her using them until they got trashed.

She still likes craft stuff, and over the years has accumultated a load of card making kit. It's great, if I need to give a card to someone I get dd to make it.

However people who can't stand craft crap activities should definitely not be made to feel guilty. Bloody hell isn't there enough pressure on ourselves!

I HATE crafts/arty stuff. When we do it at home no-one has fun. I try really hard, but I just don't enjoy it and the kids can see that .

This morning the 2 of them painting (mainly themselves and my table) pretty much reduced me to tears and made me snappy grumpy mummy as I tried and failed repeatedly to do the first of 5 loads of washing that needed doing today, whilst being interrupted by requests for more paint, washed hands etc. Then I had to not only clean the paint off most of the kitchen, but also the bathroom, actually increasing the already huge amount of housework hanging over me. I'd rather pull my own toenails out than do this again tomorrow.

There are loads of activities we enjoy doing together, but arty stuff isn't on the list for me. Daddy's better at that, ds does it at nursery, then there are grandparents and friends etc. Sometimes I even take them to a local messy play session. It doesn't have to be me that -endures- does this activity with them.

LilianGish - it's not quite like that at DD's school - they attach quite a lot of importance to art work and the school entrance hall is always decorated with really quite impressive work that the children have done - the display is renewed regularly. There is extra curricular art, modelling etc if you want it.

ooh I had a set of Caran D'Ache watercolour pencils when I was younger (also a Granny present). I just liked to organise them in various colour schemes! Perhaps that's when quality control first got a hold of me

unquietdad.

crafts = mess

I do lots of creative things with my children, for example, sun reflections on the walls are sun fairies that bring the sunshine. Toast comes from the toast monster that runs around the hills, has three eyes, is hairy and stinky. The stuffing out of a toy that got spread about our garden was clouds fallen out of the sky...

there is a lot more to creativity than just craft.

We did so much craft at primary school that we didn't need to do extra when at home.
That said, my grandad always made stuff with us such as cardboard fairy wings and puppet theatres. That really left me with some lovely memories and I had a very close bond with him.
I think as long as you spend time with your kids, it really dosn't matter what activitiesyou pursue.
My mum left me to it with my best friend and we used our imaginations to build dens, make ''potions'' from household toiletries etc and it was carnage great fun!

Oh I had Caran D'ache pencils as well. I yearned for a box because all the posh kids at my school had them, in the end I got them and never, ever used them. They were too beautiful. Think I still have them somewhere.