Developing a love of culture often starts at an early age and if you expose your children to works of art and arrange a variety of cultural experiences, there is a good chance that their interest could develop into a passion.
A vacation is often the perfect opportunity to soak up some cultural highlights and give your kids an education while having some fun. Here are some pointers on how you can use travel to inspire your children to appreciate the arts and history.
A chance to inspire and educate
If you arrange a stay at somewhere like a Marriott New Jersey hotel you will often find yourself in an area that offers access to a range of free attractions like museums and art galleries.
There’s a lot to like about a museum when you are on a family trip and you don’t have to pay an entrance fee, but there are more valid reasons to go inside than the obvious attraction that you don’t have to reach for your wallet.
Museums offer a great opportunity to expose your children to some new experiences and broaden their understanding in a positive educational environment.
This exposure to learning and the chance to satisfy their curiosity will often prove to be the foundation for a greater connection to the world around them and the history that has shaped where we are today.
The power of art
Art has the ability to shape our feelings and perception of things like very little else can and many people have been inspired by a certain work of art that ended up having a profound effect on them.
Letting your child view some great works of art and allowing them to form their own opinion on what they are looking at and what it says to them can really help their creativity and critical thinking.
It’s a win-win situation as you can enjoy soaking up the culture too while knowing that your children are enjoying the experience in their own way at the same time.
Sign up for the tour
Many of the major museums and galleries and plenty of the smaller ones too offer a free guided tour of their works.
It can be a good way to enrich your learning experience and work your way around the exhibition in the most efficient way possible. Getting the inside track on the works from a knowledgeable tour guide is only going to help improve your enjoyment of the visit.
Follow the rules
You want to encourage your children to explore and appreciate the displays but it is also a good idea to set some ground rules if they are young and haven’t been exposed to this sort of environment before.
Fill them in on the usual protocol for visiting a museum or gallery, which includes no running and no touching, unless it’s interactive for the kids, which will be highlighted anyway if that’s the case.
It would also be a good idea to ensure that they have comfortable clothes and shoes for the trip so that your kids don’t start to flag after a couple of hours of walking around.
Take advantage of the chance to expose your children to some culture when you are on vacation or whenever you get the chance and enjoy seeing how it broadens their horizons.
