laura carlin

Ohh, I like this gal.  Have you heard of her?  See more here.  (and be sure to check out the other illustrators represented by Heart, there's some good stuff!)

play!

Jonah Lehrer on the virtues of "unstructured play" here.

"A 2007 study published in Science, for instance, compared the cognitive development of 4- and 5-year-olds enrolled in a preschool that emphasized unstructured play – they were using Vygotsky’s “Tools of the Mind” approach – with those in a more typical preschool. After two years, the students in the play-based school scored better on cognitive flexibility, self-control, and working memory, all of which have been consistently linked to academic and real-world achievement. According to the researchers, the advantage of play is that it’s often deeply serious – the best way to get kids to focus, to exercise those attentional circuits, is to let them have fun."