Friday, August 21, 2009
The Dragon Urogwm
In the wake of the monsters Pamobe and Befghis comes the latest Georgia creation, sketched on the back of an Office Depot circular while we waited for our meal at Rice Sushi & Thai. (I had the larb with beef over rice, and it was tasty.)
Behold, the dragon Urogwm.
As always, Georgia is just writing a random string of letters after finishing the picture and then asking us what it says (though as her reading skills are improving I'm wondering if she's not stacking the deck). The latest, Urogwm, has a nicely Welsh flavor to it that I find appealing.
We've hatched plans to begin work on a much larger project, mapping out the terrain of a whole planet of monsters for these creatures to call home. (She insists that there can be dinosaurs there, too, as well as monsters, and who am I to object?)
(I've also made a new label tag for these, until our other long range plans can be put into motion, so hit the "Georgia_monster" link below to see all of the creations to date.)
Behold, the dragon Urogwm.
As always, Georgia is just writing a random string of letters after finishing the picture and then asking us what it says (though as her reading skills are improving I'm wondering if she's not stacking the deck). The latest, Urogwm, has a nicely Welsh flavor to it that I find appealing.
We've hatched plans to begin work on a much larger project, mapping out the terrain of a whole planet of monsters for these creatures to call home. (She insists that there can be dinosaurs there, too, as well as monsters, and who am I to object?)
(I've also made a new label tag for these, until our other long range plans can be put into motion, so hit the "Georgia_monster" link below to see all of the creations to date.)
Labels: Georgia_monster
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Befghis!
Following close on the heels of Georgia's last monster creation, Pamobe, last night at dinner Georgia drew yet another monster on the back of the menu, and then wrote a string of random letters at the top as its "name."
Behold, Befghis!
What's fascinating is that, while she's only just now learning to read and write, whenver Georgia generates one of these "letter salads" of random characters, they nearly always follow the standard morphology of words in the English language (that is, there's never a long string of consonants or just a jumble of vowels, or a mispronouncable juxtupostion of q's and x's or something). It's interesting to consider how much kids pick up about those kinds of rules just from seeing words over and over again, even if they don't yet know how to decode the meaning every time.
Behold, Befghis!
What's fascinating is that, while she's only just now learning to read and write, whenver Georgia generates one of these "letter salads" of random characters, they nearly always follow the standard morphology of words in the English language (that is, there's never a long string of consonants or just a jumble of vowels, or a mispronouncable juxtupostion of q's and x's or something). It's interesting to consider how much kids pick up about those kinds of rules just from seeing words over and over again, even if they don't yet know how to decode the meaning every time.
Labels: Georgia_monster
Saturday, August 08, 2009
Georgia's newest creation, Pamobe the monster
As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, Georgia has been obsessed with the Jay Stephens-penned art instruction books I got her, Robots!, Heroes!, and Monsters!
This afternoon she was drawing a monster based on one of the images in Monsters!, and when she was done decided to name it by writing a random assortment of letters above the figure. (She can sound out words with time and effort, but when she wrote the letters had no idea what they said.) Then, in a nice bit of self-referentiality, she drew a picture of herself at the monster's side, with crayon in hand (and dressed as Bubbles from the Powerpuff Girls, of course, which is her Halloween plan).
And that's how Pamobe the moster came into the world...
The yellow border is, if it wasn't immediately obvious, a golden frame around the picture, naturally.
This afternoon she was drawing a monster based on one of the images in Monsters!, and when she was done decided to name it by writing a random assortment of letters above the figure. (She can sound out words with time and effort, but when she wrote the letters had no idea what they said.) Then, in a nice bit of self-referentiality, she drew a picture of herself at the monster's side, with crayon in hand (and dressed as Bubbles from the Powerpuff Girls, of course, which is her Halloween plan).
And that's how Pamobe the moster came into the world...
The yellow border is, if it wasn't immediately obvious, a golden frame around the picture, naturally.
Labels: Georgia_monster
