Our Great City

Article from Mayor's Update, November 14, 2008

The public is encouraged to attend and participate in a second workshop meeting on the Keller Town Center Visioning Project at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 19, at Keller Town Hall. The focus is to help develop an updated plan to guide the development of the remaining parcels in Town Center. The meeting will be conducted by Dan Sefko of Freese and Nichols, the firm that is coordinating the update of the Town Center plan.

For more information on the plan, click here. For additional questions, please call Community Development at 817-743-4130 or email towncentervision@cityofkeller.com.

Submitted By Lois Frazier, Monart School of Art – Keller

Positive parenting can sometimes be overloaded by praising your children too much. Many psychologists believe that too much priase lowers children’s motivation and may turn them into “praise junkies” by looking for that confirmation from family. Do you use the phrase “good job” like a nervous tic? Does everyone on the soccer team get a trophy?

The more we reward, the more likely the child is going to loose intrinsic interest in whatever they were doing to get the reward. This is backed up by research from Joan Grusec at the University of Toronto. Young children who were regularly priased for their generosity in giving to charity became slightly less generous. But the generosity of their peers who were not being praised did not decline.

Teaching in the classroom by Mary Bud Rowe, at the University of Florida, found that students who were praised lavishly were more hesitant in their responses, less likely to persist with difficult tasks and did not share ideas with fellow students. Creativity may also be affected as they take fewer risks in their work.

Could their apparent loss of confidence and motivation be tied to their over-praised pressure to keep it up. “Good job! Is conditional. It means that we’re offering attention and acknowledgement and approval for jumping through the hoop.”

Friday, November 28th, Monart School of Art will offer two mini art camps for students and guests, ages 4 and up, the day after Thanksgiving. This is a great opportunity for moms and dads who want to soak in that extra football game or take the day to go shopping.

Monart will host a morning mini camp from 10:00am-12:00pm exclusively for children ages 4 to 6. Attendees will learn to draw a cornucopia still life, paint an autumn watercolor picture and create Holiday postcards.

An afternoon mini camp for children ages 7 and up will take place from 12:30pm-3:30pm. Students will participate in learning to draw portraits and facial features. As a special treat for this class, Monart has invited two live American Indians to come in full authentic dress to model for the session.

Cost is $30 per student/per class paid in full to reserve spot.

CONTACT: Lois Frazier at 817-993-1374 or lois@kellermonart.com

About Monart:
Classes at Monart School of Art are based on the best-selling books “Drawing with Children” and “Drawing for Older Children and Teens” by Mona Brooks. Monart is a directed, step-by-step method that teaches people how to draw. Increased focus, problem solving and self-confidence are just a few of the benefits of the Monart method.