We are the parents of four young adults. At 16, 19, 22, and 27 they are entering their adult years. My youngest daughter is homeschooled. We’ve been an equal opportunity parenting force, when I was a public school teacher the children went to public school. When one of our sons sought a smaller school, a Christian school was chosen, another needed a specific academic program so a private school was the gig. We believe in placing children where their needs define the best fit, not the location of our home.
This week my business took us to Nashville where we were on a project for a new album for Elizabeth Montgomery. The day’s venue included being in the fabulous WestLight Studios in Franklin and working with professional stylist Joel Green and photographer Kristy Belcher. Our daughter was present for the shoot preparation and actualization. Why? Because she’s an artist who desires to work with brands and wanted to see what the real deal looked like as strategy, branding and supportive activities came together in a musician’s photo shoot.
The planning had been on for weeks, costumes from the 1940’s commissioned, hair styles studied, and the marketing plan in mind as we developed the shoot storyboard. You see, homeschooling takes on a whole new level when a sixteen year old is seeing individual requirements of every side of the project. The finances, the planning, the communications back and forth, the need for budgeting, the requirements of light, color, texture, the need for graphics, print production, photography, cinematography and then of course marketing. She’s not looking up how to run a business, math, science, grammar, and statistics, she’s employing them in research on how to make a product and marketing campaign.
She’s aware we are working on audience share and knows how we’re going about locating and engaging the appropriate listeners. You see she’s watching and engaging through every step of it. Her world has enlarged as musicians were interviewed, bands were engaged and experiences in resource experienced for the 1940’s era for the programming. You see, she’s learning because it’s joyful and watching how work can be also, and that’s what I want her to understand…learning is a joy in itself…and when tied to a purpose it just is a wealth of living lifestyle. You see, I know she’s watching, but more importantly she’s living these moments with intentional learning and becoming who she is based on the experiences of seeing that dreams can come true with hard work and focused intention. I love how she then reflects on that reality in her own focus of becoming who she is!
We learn by doing…and by seeing others do…and by engaging in finding out how by reading and watching….isn’t that what learning is all about?
