The 92nd Street Y Camps season starts today and counselors are certain to have their hands full. Our committed and caring counselors, who nurture each camper’s individual needs and talents, reflect the quality of excellence of 92nd Street Y camps. Tom Allon, president and CEO of Manhattan Media—which owns local newspapers Our Town, New York Press, City Hall, The West Side Spirit, Chelsea Clinton News and The Westsider, as well as Avenue and New York Family magazines—was a counselor at Camp Yomi in the summer of 1982 and his two daughters and son attended Yomi for several years.

Just in time for summer, Tom offers a delicious cold soup for you and your hungry campers.

Tom Allon’s Mom’s Sour Cherry Soup

“This is my mother’s world-famous Hungarian recipe.”
—Tom Allon

Video: “Comet the goldfish may be the world’s most intelligent fish after its owner, Dean Pomerleau, trained it to perform a range of aquatic activities. Comet can play football, basketball and even limbo dance under a bar. The genius of the water world can also play fetch with a hoop, slalom around a series of poles and push a rugby ball over a set of posts.” Read more at Telegraph (UK).

This weekend, the Y’s Sunday Science Spectaculars continue with One Fish, Two Fish: Ichthyology—an opportunity for you and your child to learn together, dissect a fish and make a soda-bottle home for a pet fish or turtle.

You’re on your own with the fancy underwater tricks.

Two weeks ago, we posted news about one of last summer’s 92nd Street Y Film Campers being featured at the Tribeca Film Festival’s Downtown Youth Behind the Camera event on Sunday, April 27. And the winner is… Liza Paterson, pictured above, poses on the “red carpet” at the City Cinemas Village East Theater on Second Avenue, for her film American Idol: Stranded Version that was selected to be screened at the annual children’s film festival. Here’s a photo of her fellow budding filmmakers.

The 92nd Street Y Film Camp offers two weeks of professional instruction and serious fun for children ages 9 to 12. Register now!

This commercial for the soccer video game FIFA Street 3 features some amazing (and no, not 100% real) “extreme soccer” footage from Mexico City. It’s become a viral hit with over 3 million views on YouTube and coverage on outlets like Very Short List. You may even know a young soccer fan who’s seen it—if so, we encourage you to nix the video game gift idea and do the right thing: consider our week-long Super Soccer Stars Soccer Camp this summer instead. Soccer players 7-10 years of age will enjoy small-group, skill-based instruction and coaching by soccer experts from New York’s premiere children’s soccer program (and we won’t let them jump off rooftops). It’s one of our five specialty camps, which includes a top-notch film camp for budding viral video directors.

[Super Soccer Stars Soccer Camp for Children Ages 7-10]

The Tribeca Film Festival is one of the most anticipated events on the New York moviegoer’s annual calendar and it’s a highlight for the international film community as well. For the fifth year, the Festival is giving kids a chance to walk the red carpet with a special Downtown Youth Behind the Camera screening. Student films are selected from New York City schools and we’re proud to announce that one of last summer’s 92nd Street Y Film Camp attendees is having their film shown at the Festival on April 28. It’s exciting news for would-be Scorseses or Altmans. Read a story by the Scholastic Kids Press Corps from the 2006 screening.

In addition to film making, the Y also offers specialty camps for future sports and fashion stars:

It was announced today that First Lady Laura Bush will be “guest host” for an hour of NBC’s Today show on April 22, the very same day she’s appearing at the 92nd Street Y with her daughter Jenna to launch their new children’s book, Read All About It!, which also hits bookstores that day. TVSquad.com notes:

Mrs. Bush will guest host the 9 am hour of Today next Tuesday, April 22nd (that also happens to be the day of the Pennsylvania primary). That later part of the show is usually quite a bit softer, with less political talk and more topics aimed at women. Laura Bush will also appear earlier in the broadcast with daughter Jenna to talk about their children’s book, Read All About It!. And she will give Ann Curry a tour of the family’s Crawford, TX ranch.

Previously, we posted an excerpt from a New York Times piece on writer Meg Wolitzer who recently published her eighth novel, The Ten-Year Nap, an account of female ambition, money, class and motherhood. Rebecca Traister interviewed her for Salon:

You claim not to be taking sides in the mommy wars...

Oh no, I would never.

But I can’t help but feel that a book that begins with the sentence, “All around the country, women were waking up,” is a pretty broad blow against those who have opted out.

Oh, you found me out! When I started writing “The Ten-Year Nap,” I was judgmental of women I had known and liked, who had given up careers when their kids were born, and somehow 10 years had gone by and they weren’t sure what they were doing. I thought to myself, “Why aren’t they driven? Why aren’t they guided by some singular purpose?”

But as I wrote and the characters became more complex, I thought, “Who am I to say?” I’m not writing a polemic. I really want to show what it’s like for women who stop working. And that hasn’t been done, as far as I could see, in fiction.

But there have been novels about working women, and about mothers.

Anytime you have intelligent women in a novel, they have jobs like “urban planner” or “architect.” It’s meant to show that they are smart. You never show them at that job, because that’s too boring, but you have to give them a job to assure the reader that they’re the kind of people the smart reader would like.

In fiction, stay-at-home moms have often been [subject to] mockery, and I think it’s very sexist: the stay-at-home mother whose children are oversubscribed, who has reduced her entire brain to trivial things. I mention a character in the book whose husband is so bored when his wife talks about her day that he has to take Ritalin in order to listen. And look, I have a bit of playfulness in this book because I don’t want it to be a somber meditation on motherhood versus work. I really want the novel to be about motherhood and work, and also about female ambition and what happens to it over time.

Wolitzer will be joined by Andrew Sean Greer for a reading at the Y on April 24.

Related: Parenting & Family at the Y

This summer marks the inaugural trip of the 92nd Street Y Havaya International: Summer Camp in Israel for Teens, a 4-week-long life-changing opportunity to travel like a local in both Israel and across the United States, while making a positive difference in our global village. Made up of fifteen American teens and fifteen Israeli teens, going into 10th-12th grade, Havayaniks will spend two weeks traveling throughout Israel with local Israelis from the 92nd Street Y’s sister city in Ramat Hasharon and two weeks in the U.S. getting the opportunity to share their lives with their Israeli counterparts.

Sightseeing, expanding your cultural knowledge, performing community service, having fun and making friends are the major themes of this journey. If you have or know a teenager who would be interested, read more. Applications are still being accepted.

The above video is a quick hello from Tamar Gersh, the Havaya director in Israel.

If you’ve been keeping an eye on the science pages, you’d know it’s actually been a big week for dinosaur news.

Erika Jurney of Momsational has high praise for Practical Wisdom for Parents: Demystifying the Preschool Years by Nancy Schulman and Ellen Birnbaum of the 92nd Street Y Nursery School:

Can I say again how I wish I had this book 5 years ago? For example, in the How to Choose a School section, there are notes about elements you may want to watch for when visiting the schools in person.

There’s a chapter called “What is Preschool?” and it isn’t a fluff piece—it actually tells you in depth what to expect from a typical day at a typical daycare. And they don’t stop at age 3, the advice and tips will take you through preparing for Kindergarten and beyond.

Written by the Directors of the 92nd Street Y Nursery School in New York City, Nancy Schulman and Ellen Birnbaum, these two women clearly have not only a wealth of knowledge at their fingertips, but the organizational skills to present it clearly and without condescension.

Tracy Pollan and Michael J. Fox are fans as well.

Meanwhile, Wonderplay, Too: Games, Crafts, & Creative Activities for 3- to 6-Year-Olds, by the Y’s own Fretta Reitzes and Beth Teitelman, has been busy garnering 5-star Amazon customer reviews (not to mention celebrity endorsements). Steven A. Shaw writes:

The Parenting Center at the 92nd Street Y in New York City has long been at the forefront of child development. Our son has attended several of the classes offered by the Parenting Center, and they have been outstanding. This book brings the accumulated wisdom of that organization to bear on the question of what kinds of fun activities to pursue with kids. “Wonderplay, Too” picks up where “Wonderplay” leaves off, with hundreds of great ideas for games to play with 3- to 6-year-olds. It’s full of so many great ideas, any one of which can save your sanity on a rainy day. Highly recommended.

You can purchase Wonderplay, Too direct from the 92nd Street Y for only $9.50 (27% off the cover price!). Both books make great gifts.

In the middle of a bustling holiday season when kids are usually pining for the latest techno-gadget or game to hit the shelves, the Y offers a lit-breather with the launch of a Children’s Reading series and local media has taken note.

New York magazine:

All too often these days, children—if they’re reading at all—have their noses in books pegged to television shows. It makes one long for the classics, and the 92nd Street Y is launching a reading series aimed at bringing old-school favorites into the “hearts and minds of today’s kids,” says Hanna Arie Gaifman, director of the Y’s Tisch Center for the Arts. The series kicks off December 15 with Charlotte Jones Voiklis, Madeleine L’Engle’s granddaughter, reading from L’Engle’s best-known book, A Wrinkle in Time. She’ll also discuss her grandmother’s life and answer questions. L’Engle passed away in September, and “in a way it does feel like a memorial,” says Voiklis, a native New Yorker. She claims having a famous writer as a grandmother was “absolutely normal,” until L’Engle visited her school, when “there was a great stir.”

The Newbery Medal-winning “Wrinkle in Time” spins a complex tale of three children on an interplanetary quest that pits them against an all-controlling evil. Ms. Voiklis said she and her sister would probably read much of the novel’s climax.

“My grandmother and my grandfather did dramatic readings together, and we’ve used that as somewhat of a starting point,” Ms. Voiklis said. They plan to read from several other books by L’Engle, who died in September at 88. They include “The Arm of the Starfish,” a scientific mystery, and “A Circle of Quiet,” a memoir in which L’Engle, above, reacts to being called a children’s writer. (She hated it.)

“She always insisted that if something was not good enough for grown-ups, it was not good enough for children,” Ms. Voiklis said.

Wonderplay, Too, the follow-up to the popular parent’s guide to active child’s play, Wonderplay, by Fretta Reitzes, director of the 92nd Street Y’s Lillian & Sol Goldman Family Center for Youth & Family, and Beth Teitelman, former director of the Parenting Center, has received enthusiastic reviews from an impressive lineup of experts.

Tiki Barber, former NFL star player for the New York Giants, is an NBC news and sports broadcaster and author
This book is a big winner for parents with young kids. Both parents and kids can find creative ways to have fun together. It’s a terrific way to bring the great children’s activities from the 92nd Street Y into your own home, while being practical, easy to use and educational at the same time.

Michael Thompson, PhD, psychologist, lecturer, author of New York Times best-seller Raising Cain
No one understands the nature of children’s play better than Fretta Reitzes and Beth Teitelman. So, turn off the television, throw out the videos, buy a copy of Wonderplay, Too and start having some genuine, old-fashioned fun with your kids. Every page of Wonderplay, Too is a treasure trove of creative ideas for terrific activities that any parent can enjoy with her or his children. As I read through the book, I was practically shouting, “Yes, yes of course, every child would love this!” My fingers itched to get out the cardboard and crepe paper to make a sun, or to fill the sink with water and get out the measuring cups and the funnel for water play. 

Gail Saltz, MD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry, The New York Presbyterian Hospital and NBC TODAY show contributor
With wisdom, common sense and a big dollop of “joie de vive” Fretta Reitzes and Beth Teitelman have created a manual for parents and young children to have wonderful fun together. Many years of experience through the 92nd street Y means they have their pulse on how children’s minds and bodies develop, what is really fascinating, challenging and engaging to them. If you are looking to encourage your child’s curiosity, independent thought, self expression and have alot of fun together… then you have come to the right “place.”

Barbara Seuling, children’s book author
Parents will jump for joy to have this incredible resource, especially when children are housebound. The activities are imaginative, fun, and easy to share with active young ones. I will now enjoy going through it page by page, wishing there were a four year old close by so I could investigate some of these wonderful-sounding activities. I’ve always loved this kind of book—such an assortment of riches to try!

Purchasing info and sample pages are available here. If you’re in the New York area, you can also learn more about the Y’s Wonderplay: Early Childhood Learning program in person.

The cute, albeit irreverent, instructional video above on lighting the Hanukkah menorah was created by William Levin of JewishRobot.com for MyJewishLearning.com. (Daniel Septimus, the editor of My Jewish Learning, will be hosting a talk with Shalom Auslander at the Y in January.) We hope it gets you in the holiday mood and that you’ll come by the Y on Sunday for our big Hanukkah Festival. The schedule is packed with music performances, storytelling, dancing, including the Human Dreidel, crafts for the kids and plenty of food. You can even get your picture taken with Judah Maccabee! It will be like the Disney World of Hanukkah.

[Hanukkah Festival: Sun, Dec 2, 10:30am-2:30pm]

Today, some of the brightest minds in the world on early childhood education are attending the New York Reggio Conference presented in collaboration between Reggio Emilia and the 92nd Street Y, in partnership with the Italian Cultural Institute of New York, at the 92nd Street Y. The New York Sun has the story:

At least 10 Upper East Side nursery schools are closing their doors today to make time for a conference on an Italian teaching philosophy that is challenging American methods.

Nearly 900 people will crowd the 92nd Street Y to learn about Reggio Emilia — named after the small Italian town, population 140,000, where the approach was developed and that is known for its fine wines and parmigianas — and hundreds more are scheduled to tune in to the 92nd Street Y’s first major Internet broadcast of a conference.

Unlike many foreign countries, Italy does not outscore America on standardized tests (its children score about the same), but its approach to teaching 4- and 5-year-olds has captivated educators across this country. They say the philosophy elicits more from the young children than ever seemed possible.

Reggio eschews traditional lesson plans and instead encourages 4- and 5-year-olds to develop their own projects.

About 500 Americans visit Reggio schools in Italy every year to marvel at these projects, and a traveling exhibit of the projects has been making its way across the country. The U.S. liaison to the nonprofit Reggio Children group that organizes the exhibit, Lella Gandini, said interest appears to have grown “immensely” in the past several years, especially in New York.

Read more about the Y’s Wonderplay program for early childhood learning and Reggio Emilia in Italy.