The Marshmallow Test

The Marshmallow Test

by Michelle Claus

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781631750021
Publisher: Chevron Books, Inc.
Publication date: 05/05/2014
Pages: 36
Product dimensions: 6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.40(d)
Lexile: AD540L (what's this?)

About the Author

I'm in love with writing. I'm in love with words. I'm in love with art.

In high school -- 24 years ago -- I started composing poetry. I was inspired by the poetry and prose in my senior-year English Literature tome. Sonnets, couplets, metaphor, alliteration ... I was totally hooked. I "published" my first poem in the high school chap book of student writing.

Throughout my undergraduate and graduate studies (in psychology and counseling, respectively), I continued to compose poetry -- some formal, some informal. During my one year off in-between undergraduate and graduate college, I worked as a Freelance Writer and Associate Editor for a weekly newspaper.

After graduating with a Master's degree and spending some time as a counselor in the mental-health field, I became increasingly aware that my true love rested with writing. During my free time I'd dive headlong into classic literature and poetry, allowing these great works to spark works of my own. By this time, I was dabbling in personal essays and short stories. I also was discovering how very much I enjoyed making visual art. The two endeavors, writing and art, transported me beyond Ego and ordinary cares of daily life. True freedom. This feeling was born in me ever so clearly when I internalized the melismatic music of Lisa Gerrard. The creative life, it must be.

In the ensuing years until now, I married and became the mother of two wonderful children. My dedication to family and home put full-time writing and creativity in the background, but not away. I spent one full ice-hockey season, in fact, crafting haiku after each game played by the PIttsburgh Penguins (hockeyhaiku.wordpress.com). That was a blast! Now that the kids are getting older, it has become easier to devote more and more time to writing and art.

Hence, The Marshmallow Test. I love this story. It's my first published book. The idea for this story came to me when I was simultaneously exercising and listening to an interview on National Public Radio. The interviewee talked about the Stanford Marshmallow Experiment (Walter Mischel). I took the idea of the marshmallow test and ran with it on my computer keyboard. One never knows when inspiration will strike. ...

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The Marshmallow Test 5 out of 5 based on 0 ratings. 1 reviews.
ReadersFavorite More than 1 year ago
Reviewed by Vernita Naylor for Readers' Favorite When we are young we view things differently, everything seems to go slowly, especially when it pertains to time. You often hear children say, “I can’t wait to grow up,” or “Are we there yet?” So what happens when, in The Marshmallow Test by Michelle Claus, a little girl is given a challenge of time as it pertains to delayed gratification? Her dad places one marshmallow on the table in front of her and says, “If you can wait fifteen minutes before eating this marshmallow, I will give you something even better.” As this funny children’s story begins to unfold with beautiful and inspiring illustrations by Sasha Roberson, you begin to journey into the mind of a child. Could you wait? Children do not do well with either time or delayed gratification; they want everything now. As parents, we must teach them that the world is not like that; there is a time and season for all things. In The Marshmallow Test by Michelle Claus, you begin to experience how you can best help your child in this arena. Michelle shows how children begin to go through the process when delayed gratification is presented. All types of things go through the mind of a child as they began to ask themselves when faced with this type of challenge, “Is it worth the wait?” “Will my outcome be bigger and better than what I am sacrificing for?” Michelle was inspired when she embarked upon a Stanford Marshmallow Experiment, whose purpose was the same thing, seeing how children dealt with delayed gratification and did they have what it took to receive the reward in the end. If you have a young child, reading The Marshmallow Test by Michelle Claus to them will be truly helpful in their growth.