Colourful Creativity

Phoebe has improved in her colouring throughout the months. I am very proud of her development. Sometimes I will give her little workbook tasks to complete. With an adult's guidance, she is able to complete her task fairly well. In this particular exercise, she was required to colour an elephant. She did it with much care and enthusiasm. I watched her and tried to give her praises and encouragement to cheer her on to completion. My hubby saw Phoebe picking up a blue colour pencil and told her that the elephant should be grey. Phoebe was nonchalant towards her papa's comment. I asked him why should an elephant be grey. I feel that in the eyes of a child, an elephant can be in any colour that he/she likes. We should not impose our ideas on the children and expect them to conform to the norm. If we do that, we are stifling their creativity. I do not want my child to grow up trying to blend into the norm of the society. I want her to be a risk taker and a non-conformist in her ideas, as long as it is lawful. And my duty as a parent is to make a difference in her life so that she can be that difference.