NPR: Back to School Blues

Back to School Blues

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The creators of The Blue Man Group embarked on a new venture recently, which is very much in the vein of their past work. Music, movement and interactivity are still the cornerstones of this latest project, but there is one major difference: the only place you'll find blue paint is on the fingertips of toddlers. The latest passion of Chris Wink and Matt Goldman, co-founders of the Blue Man Group, and their wives Jen Wink and Renee Rolleri has been the creation of a school for children. Although the Blue Man Creativity Center is not a full-blown school yet (Chris and Matt expect to get accreditation very soon), it already has over 40 students under the age of five. The founders describe the philosphy of the school to be in the tradition of Reggio Emilia, which enables the children to have an influence on their own curriculum...with a Blue Man twist.

Recently, they welcomed us into their classrooms and told us about what goes into the making a truly 21st-century pre-school.

Win Rosenfeld

9:50 PM ET | 10- 7-2007 | permalink

Comments (Send a comment)

As schools become more and learning factories that treat their students as products whose labels need to read "high test scores", opportunities for true growth are lost. The ideas expressed by this group are welcome in an atmosphere that becomes more polluted by the day. I look forward to hearing your piece with them tomorrow.

Sent by Dean | 8:58 AM ET | 10-08-2007

It seems like a genuinely interesting and welcome alternative to the more structured and un-delineated rigor of regular schools. My comment, less a question, is that it is saddening that the likelihood of this opportunity being available for children of diverse economic backgrounds seems nil. Though it affords a wider breadth of schooling for certain children, doesn't it still not create a different genre of over privileged hegemony-to-be?

Sent by Anthony Irons | 11:33 AM ET | 10-08-2007

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