What could be more essential -- and challenging -- than feeding your child food they love and that they need? It can be a struggle, but there's hope! In this episode, Sam Shapiro, Head of Marin Montessori School, speaks with Nimisha Gandhi, who runs Moon Cycle Nutrition, about her approach to inspiring a love of healthy eating in children.

In this episode, Sam Shapiro, Marin Montessori's Head of School, speaks to Varun Soni, Dean of Religious Life at the University of Southern California, about the mental health crisis on college campuses and what we might do about it.

Throughout their deeply felt conversation, they try to work backward to identify the strategies parents of young children can use to increase the likelihood that their kids will enter college healthy, confident, and whole.

Children are creative creatures -- and not just with paints and clay but also with how they approach challenges. We know it's crucial to nurture their creative spirits, but sometimes that's easier said than done.

Enter DrawBridge, a nonprofit organization that provides free expressive arts programs to children in domestic violence and homeless shelters, affordable housing facilities, and in communities across seven San Francisco Bay Area counties. In this episode, Tracy Bays-Boothe, Executive Director of DrawBridge, shares about her organization, the power of nurturing the creative spirit, and why she's so excited that DrawBridge is this year's Community Partner for The Gather for Good, which takes place on April 15 this year.

We all need help committing to the long view as we parent; it’s easy to let anxiety and social comparison hijack our highest ideals and goals for our children. Enter Jessica Lahey, author of the New York Times bestselling book, The Gift of Failure: How the Best Parents Learn to Let Go So Their Children Can Succeed.  In this podcast episode, Sam Shapiro, Head of Marin Montessori School, speaks with Jessica about her top suggestions for parents for helping their kids develop robust independence, inner motivation to learn, and self-possession.

Key topics in the podcast include:

We're living in the middle of the revolution that has reshaped our world. In this episode, Tom Preston-Werner, MMS parent and founder and former CEO of GitHub, joins for a wide-ranging conversation about the role technology plays in modern life, what we should do about exposing our kids to it, and how we should go about preparing them to be agile, creators, not passive consumers. Parents sometimes wonder whether they're disadvantaging future coders by sending them to a low-tech school.  Tom's answer might surprise you.

In this episode, we dive into a topic that most parents wrestle with because it’s essential and really, really hard. Communication or perhaps more accurately – healthy communication – is critical for a human being at any age to express feelings, preferences, needs and to receive those messages from others.

The question is how do we as parents help our kids build strong communication skills? – always a challenge but never more so than in today’s digital world.

Siri Panday, Director of Education for Toddler and Primary at Marin Montessori School, joins to share her insights and a few helpful tips for parents. 

This fall, David Brooks published an essay in The New York Times called "The Crisis of Boys and Men." Among his provocative arguments based on some pretty sobering data points: "Many men are like what Dean Acheson said about Britain after World War II. They have lost an empire but not yet found a role." 

When it comes to raising healthy boys today, parents and educators alike are called to wrestle with some troubling and uncomfortable byproducts of seismic shifts in our culture, economy, and society. The news isn't all bad, though, because parents and schools can do a lot to meet the needs of boys.  

To paint a picture of the issue and the way forward, we spoke with Dr. Warren Farrell, author of The Boy Crisis: Why our Sons are Struggling--and What We Can Do About It. It's a complex and worthy topic. As always, we'd love your feedback. Just a note that this episode addresses some adult topics, so it may be best to listen without the kids in the car. 

When your kids are young, high school may seem like a distant worry, but it comes faster than anyone would like. That's why it's good to have help, which is what Jamie Moffett provides students in Marin Montessori's Junior High School. Jamie joins the podcast to discuss the transition to high school and to share her experiences with MMS students who apply to and attend independent and public high schools. She also offers a bit of practical advice for what families can do to support their adolescents. 

For those who aren’t accustomed to Montessori classrooms, it might seem a bit curious that children cook, clean, sew, and more. There’s actually a lot behind all the cupcakes the students are baking. 

In this first episode of the Grounded and Soaring podcast, we take a few minutes to explore how practical life routines and activities help children build skills, confidence, understanding, and knowledge -- from complicated math to complex collaboration. 

What this world really needs is another podcast...

We're doing it anyway though because we're looking for ways to connect with parents and educators about the stakes and opportunities we all face as we teach and raise children today. On this episode, we introduce the thinking behind Grounded and Soaring and what we're trying to achieve. As always, we welcome feedback. Just email us here!