A Little Project on the Side

I haven't had a chance to put together my pictures from New Orleans because my early morning "me" time has been consumed with getting this little project I launched at the AMS Montessori conference off the ground. I wrote a little song about peace that I am giving to Montessori schools all over the world (it turns out they are practically in every country) so they can sing it as a school on September 21st, 2009 when the world celebrates the United Nation's International Peace Day (and our family celebrates daddy's birthday of course.) The song will begin being sung by Montessori children in New Zealand and finish 24hours later being sung by children in the Hawaiian Islands. So essentially the song will go all the way around the world. The UN was thrilled to receive our project and as of two days ago, we are on their 2009 event calendar. So far we have 300 schools unofficially signed up at the conference which works out to be about 17, 000 kids. I started a blog when I got home from New Orleans so that teachers around the world could get on board and start getting excited.

http://singpeacearoundtheworld.blogspot.com

I also wrote a little commercial with some music using the instruments I purchased in New Orleans (kalimba, sheepskin drum).

If you know of any teachers (Montessori or not) who you think might want to include their class in this celebration let me know!

A Little Lesson:
Children collect pennies for peace, sign petitions for peace, skip rope for peace, dance for peace, sew for peace and yes, sing for peace. Although I understand singing for peace on an ordinary Monday in September wont change the lives of the millions of people who live in war torn countries. I do believe that we must continue to teach our children to have hope. And maybe, just maybe there will be a child who will sing in some country somewhere on this ordinary day and grow up to make an extraordinary difference in the world. The same way a little girl named Rosa Parks or a little boy named Martin King who must have believed that there was a better way for the black people to be treated. And so we continue to sew, skip, dance, sing, drum, write, collect and run with our children for peace so that perhaps the next generation will figure it out and get it right.