Students in the Thriving Minds after-school program at Ireland Elementary chose to prepare and plant part of a Community Garden in their neighborhood for their SLANT 45. Big Thought Development staffer Katy (among others) went out to help them weed, hoe and plant - and she took some pictures of those hard-working kiddos while they were at it!
Congratulations to all who participated - and thank you for helping to make the Metroplex a greener, more awesome place to live!
Friday, May 28, 2010
Friday, May 21, 2010
Photo Friday
Big Congrats to the Stockard Middle School cheerleaders, who won 2nd place in the Six Flags Cheerleading Competition on May 1, 2010! These gals have been working hard in their cheerleading club under the leadership and direction of Erin Adams and Jessica Weems, Thriving Minds after-school staff.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Coming to Theaters in January 2011...
All these projects and more will be on display on the BIG screen next January. As Birnbaum puts it, "The opportunity to make a documentary about this ambitious project is the sort of thing a filmmaker dreams about...we look forward to revealing the individual stories of kids and communities that SLANT 45 represents." And we look forward to seeing it - don't you?
Stay tuned to the Think Big blog for more information on where and when the movie will be playing - and make sure you register your team TODAY, and perhaps we'll be seeing YOU on the big screen!
Friday, May 14, 2010
Photo Friday!
As promised, here are the pics from the mural unveiling by students in the Thriving Minds after-school program at Comstock Middle School. They began the mural in February as their SLANT 45 project, and had a special event to show it off to everyone for the first time on May 5, 2010. Congrats, Comstock, on your beautiful and poignant new addition to your cafeteria!
Celebrating the Arts in Dallas
Staff, board and volunteers rallied together last weekend in support of Big Thought, Thriving Minds and SLANT 45 at the City Arts Festival. While students from Thriving Minds after-school at Titche Elementary performed a Jackson Five/Rockin' Robin tribute onstage in Centennial Hall, children and families gathered around the Big thought table to make pet rocks for the kiddos at Texas Scottish Rite Hospital.
In addition, representatives from the Super Bowl community service project, SLANT 45, were on hand to recruit and inform children and families about getting signed up and started on a service-learning project (you can sign up, too - right here!). And finally, we had a fantiastic children's art exhibit, sponsored by Prudential, that featured a mural, oil paintings, ceramics and reverse plexiglass portraits, among other things!
In addition, representatives from the Super Bowl community service project, SLANT 45, were on hand to recruit and inform children and families about getting signed up and started on a service-learning project (you can sign up, too - right here!). And finally, we had a fantiastic children's art exhibit, sponsored by Prudential, that featured a mural, oil paintings, ceramics and reverse plexiglass portraits, among other things!
It was three VERY busy days, but they were also very rewarding. One volunteer shared a heartwarming story about a shy 4-year-old who stopped by the table to make a pet rock. After some coaxing, he collaborated with this volunteer to make a fantastic concoction of googly eyes, pom-pom balls and feathers - in JUST the right places. His father and grandparents were very pleased to see him interacting, and told our volunteer so. Cool, huh?
If you missed the City Arts Festival, stay tuned to our events calendar for other opportunities to come out and see what's going on in your neighborhood through Thriving Minds, SLANT 45 and other programs. Stories like the ones above are what inspire us to continue exploring new ways to make imagination a part of everyday learning for everyone.Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Social Media Fire & Brimstone vs. Creative Social Media
Guest-blog by Big Thought President/CEO, Gigi Antoni
I’m somewhat of a newbie at the social media thing, but it seems that when most experts talk about it, they take on the characteristics of a southern preacher. At conferences and in newsletters, techies and marketing gurus scrunch their faces and point their fingers to demand, “You have to be using social media at your organization. You just have to. You’ll be lost in the crowd without it.”
The gist of the social media message has thus far been fire and brimstone. If you don’t have X followers on Twitter and don’t have a large enough Facebook presence (presence sounds so extraterrestrial, doesn’t it?) your organization is doomed to social media limbo, always missing out on would-be donors or volunteer hopefuls.
In this way, social media has become exactly what it never was intended to be; a tool that makes your life harder. For personal use, the purpose of social media was to connect people, provide venues for them to express ideas, thoughts and to share them with the world. With social media came extraordinary videos, fascinating exchange and millions of blogs powered by everyday Joes who wanted to write about life, network TV or any other topic under the sun.
But more importantly, for those of us in the creative world, the arts became something, well … cool, thanks to social media tools like YouTube. Instead of audiences of hundreds who watched a symphony, an unbelievable multitude of millions were wowed by the creativity of bands, dancers, and even string players who became memes of extraordinary popularity by merging innovation with creativity.
As artistic and creative nonprofits, we tout the importance of innovation all the time in connection with the arts. We convince non-arts lovers of its importance in the lives of our young ones because it means that they will be able to thrive in a new world with new challenges. Unfortunately, we can say it until we’re blue in the face but until people see it, hear it, read it or live it, the prospect of creativity falls decidedly short in the minds of our constituency.
This is where social media comes in. Far from being an obligatory process of routine tweets, relationship-less exchanges or a begrudging step into the 21st century, its very existence provides us the opportunity to show the world what creativity can mean. And this doesn’t always mean posting videos of a program or writing newsletters about our work. It could simply be a young virtuoso on the piano. It could be a TED video which would spark conversation. Or it could be tweets from our staff about what instrument they played or creative activity they take part in with their friends or family.
Social media doesn’t have to make our lives harder. It can make our lives incredibly easy. We only have to leverage what people have already shown that they love … creativity and innovation. These are the open doors that will draw people into our work in arts and education. All along, we’ve been focusing on the work itself, and ignoring the work’s inherent ability to amaze people and make them say “That’s so cool!” And voila, the would-be volunteers or arts and creative learning supporters are right in the palm of our hands.
Follow us on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter so that you can share the cool and creative videos, songs, organizations, social media ideas and anything else that you are buzzing about. Together we can show the world what creativity looks like in everyday life!
Gigi Antoni
President/CEO, Big Thought
I’m somewhat of a newbie at the social media thing, but it seems that when most experts talk about it, they take on the characteristics of a southern preacher. At conferences and in newsletters, techies and marketing gurus scrunch their faces and point their fingers to demand, “You have to be using social media at your organization. You just have to. You’ll be lost in the crowd without it.”
The gist of the social media message has thus far been fire and brimstone. If you don’t have X followers on Twitter and don’t have a large enough Facebook presence (presence sounds so extraterrestrial, doesn’t it?) your organization is doomed to social media limbo, always missing out on would-be donors or volunteer hopefuls.
In this way, social media has become exactly what it never was intended to be; a tool that makes your life harder. For personal use, the purpose of social media was to connect people, provide venues for them to express ideas, thoughts and to share them with the world. With social media came extraordinary videos, fascinating exchange and millions of blogs powered by everyday Joes who wanted to write about life, network TV or any other topic under the sun.
But more importantly, for those of us in the creative world, the arts became something, well … cool, thanks to social media tools like YouTube. Instead of audiences of hundreds who watched a symphony, an unbelievable multitude of millions were wowed by the creativity of bands, dancers, and even string players who became memes of extraordinary popularity by merging innovation with creativity.
As artistic and creative nonprofits, we tout the importance of innovation all the time in connection with the arts. We convince non-arts lovers of its importance in the lives of our young ones because it means that they will be able to thrive in a new world with new challenges. Unfortunately, we can say it until we’re blue in the face but until people see it, hear it, read it or live it, the prospect of creativity falls decidedly short in the minds of our constituency.
This is where social media comes in. Far from being an obligatory process of routine tweets, relationship-less exchanges or a begrudging step into the 21st century, its very existence provides us the opportunity to show the world what creativity can mean. And this doesn’t always mean posting videos of a program or writing newsletters about our work. It could simply be a young virtuoso on the piano. It could be a TED video which would spark conversation. Or it could be tweets from our staff about what instrument they played or creative activity they take part in with their friends or family.
Social media doesn’t have to make our lives harder. It can make our lives incredibly easy. We only have to leverage what people have already shown that they love … creativity and innovation. These are the open doors that will draw people into our work in arts and education. All along, we’ve been focusing on the work itself, and ignoring the work’s inherent ability to amaze people and make them say “That’s so cool!” And voila, the would-be volunteers or arts and creative learning supporters are right in the palm of our hands.
Follow us on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter so that you can share the cool and creative videos, songs, organizations, social media ideas and anything else that you are buzzing about. Together we can show the world what creativity looks like in everyday life!
Gigi Antoni
President/CEO, Big Thought
Friday, May 7, 2010
Photo Friday
The good news keeps on a-rollin' in from teams of kids carrying out their SLANT 45 projects all over the Metroplex! This week's Photo Friday is of a few pics of the Collin County Patriots youth football team. Their SLANT 45 was to participate in Lewisville's "Walking in Love" Walk Against Child Abuse; they feel very strongly about the topic, and wanted to educate their community and encourage their support in helping to end child abuse. Is there anything more inspiring than kids rallying in support for other kids? We don't think so.
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