Q. We had a wonderful summer as a family, but both my kids are feeling pretty apprehensive about returning to the school routine. What can I do to help them adjust?

Children love to learn. Learning is as natural as breathing to them–they absorb every single thing that happens! They learn through play, they learn from the behavior of the children and adults around them, they learn from their own experiments. By all rights, going to school, where there will be new experiences, many children, and a chance to master powerful skills like reading and math, should be exciting and fun for them!

In order to learn well, our children need to feel safe and wanted
Their minds don’t function well unless this bottom line condition of being welcome and appreciated is met. At school, they need to know that their teachers like them and think they’re special. They need to know that they won’t be bullied or made fun of on the playground or in the hallways. They need encouragement, high expectations, and a good deal of fun.Â

Play, which is the language and work of young children, is still deeply important to children of school age. The more they are allowed to play in their learning activities, the faster they absorb information and new skills. At home, children need kindness, affection, and some measure of one-on-one time with their parents, even if it’s has to be as little as a five-minute snuggle before going to sleep every night or the ride in the car to the Boy Scout meeting once a week.

There are several basic ideas about helping children learn that aren’t well understood in our culture. In fact, they’re not well understood in most cultures of the world. For schools to foster learning, and for parents to support their children, we grown-ups need to see that these learning needs of children are met both at home and in the schools. Here are a few of the key concepts that aren’t yet well-understood:

• Children need to feel loved, or at least understood and respected, in order for their minds to be clear enough to learn.Â
• Children need large amounts of physical affection and closeness. Closeness fuels their confidence and frees their minds of worries about whether or not they’re OK. If they’re unsure about whether they’re OK, they can’t concentrate on learning.
• Children learn best through play and hands-on activities. The best teacher is experience, experience, experience! We need classrooms in which children are doing things together, experimenting, and teaching each other what they’ve learned. In particular, free play without competition or pre-set rules is a great builder of children’s intellect, imagination, and confidence. Jumping on the beds at home, chasing around the house, and wrestling and pillow fights (the children win, of course!) are the kinds of personal, physical play that lift children’s spirits and create enough fun that they can manage to stay hopeful even when days at school aren’t inspiring. If life feels like drudgery, learning won’t take place. So free play is vital. It keeps your child’s spark of hope and interest alive!
• Children need the freedom to make mistakes and ask questions without fear of shame or belittlement. Mistakes and “failures” teach as effectively as successes, as long as a child continues to be respected.
• Children’s keen sense of justice demands that they and others be treated thoughtfully and fairly. Fairness, to children, means limits but not anger, boundaries but not belittlement, facing problems but not attacking people for having problems.
• When a child isn’t able to concentrate or to learn, there’s usually an emotional issue that blocks his progress. It feels bad on the inside when you can’t think! It feels scary on the inside when you can’t do what’s expected of you, and you don’t know why or what to do about it! This is the position children are in when they can’t write a story, can’t memorize their times tables, or can’t sit down to their homework. They feel upset, and often scared. They also feel alone.

When we parents see our child caught in upset around learning, it’s usually infuriating. Our child’s problems make us feel tired and worn. Our thoughts are something like, “By now, he should be able to do school work on his own! Why do I have to get into it?!” We badly want our child’s problems to go away so we can get a little peace!

What helps immensely is something we’ve always been taught to avoid at all costs. If you can sit close by while your child has a good cry about school, or a tantrum about not wanting to do homework, your child will do the work of draining some of the bad feelings that have paralyzed him.Â

Emotional release helps children focus their attention and regain their ability to be hopeful about learning. Your child won’t sound reasonable while he cries or rages. He’ll believe very strongly in the terrible feelings he’s having. But surprisingly, the crying and the chance to make sure you know how bad it feels inside has a deeply healing effect. So try to keep from arguing and reasoning with him, and stay close while he “cleans the skeletons out of the closet” with his tears and his bleak or angry thoughts. He’ll finish. The longer he has been able to cry, the more improvement you will see in his ability to concentrate and to believe in himself.

Schools are not set up to help children with the tensions that keep them from learning and getting along. This is a job we parents need to do. It’s a very hard job, one that was never done for us. It feels all wrong to allow a child to cry on and on without fixing anything, without sending him to his room or insisting that he pull himself together. But listen.Â

Listening heals. Listen your way through a big cry or tantrum once, without trying to “fix” his feelings or solve the problem, and you’ll see how well it works to clear your child’s mind and restore his sense of closeness to you.

The huge need children have for one-on-one attention while they learn is natural. It’s the school environment, where so many children need to compete for the attention of just one adult, that’s not natural. Children’s needs feel bothersome to parents and to teachers, not because the children are out of line, but because our society is out of line. Policymakers and citizens haven’t yet decided to give young children enough adult attention in school, and parents enough support at home, to meet natural human needs for support and attention. When schools are genuinely supportive to children, we’ll look back at present class sizes, at the lack of support for teachers, and at the lack of services for children experiencing difficulties in learning, and think of conditions in the year 2000 as primitive indeed!

Assisting Our Children, Supporting Their Schools

Almost every child will experience some difficult times in school. And almost every parent feels upset, helpless, and/or angry when these troubles surface. Our strong love for our children and our frustration with a society that doesn’t offer much support to its young people makes it hard to think clearly when our children are having a hard time. There are a few guiding principles that many people find helpful when they hit a hard patch

• It doesn’t help to blame your child, yourself, or the teacher for the difficulty. Blame wastes energy and makes others feel worse than they already do. Because blame spreads bad feelings, it gets in the way of the fresh thinking and cooperation you’ll need in order to build solutions. You aren’t to blame. You’re working as hard as you know how that this difficult job of parenting. Your child isn’t to blame. He’s doing the best he can, and is carrying burdens he hasn’t told you about yet, or doesn’t know how to shed yet. The teacher is not to blame. No matter who has made mistakes, the heart of the matter is the lack of support and assistance for everyone involved.
• We live in a society that doesn’t value its children or the people who work with them. There is talk of the importance of education, and many skilled and good-hearted people working in that field, but too little funding and respect are funneled toward schools. In most schools, human caring and teaching expertise is spread far too thin. You, your child, and your child’s teacher are all stressed because learning conditions aren’t optimal. Constructive action means to look for people’s strengths, call on their good intentions, and perhaps to look for additional help.Â
• First, listen to your child about the difficulty. He’s feeling hurt and upset, and he can’t solve the problem in that state. See if you can be warm and positive enough to help him have a big cry or a tantrum. Children can often work through their feelings of victimization and come up with their own solutions to troubles at school, if they have the chance to offload the feelings in big, hard cries at home.
• Let your child be in charge of the solutions. After your child has shed big feelings of upset, and after you’ve spent some time just being close to him without trying to solve the problem, ask him what he wants to do. Listen carefully. There may be a role you can play in advocating for him with the teacher or helping him talk with his friends. But don’t assume that because he brought his feelings to you, that he wants you to take charge of the situation. Many times, children can think of how they want to take charge after one or several good cries.Â
• If he wants you to approach a teacher or other students, listen well before you attempt to find solutions. A teacher, principal, or student needs to have their side of the story heard before they will be able to change a viewpoint or cooperate toward a fresh solution. If things aren’t working well, they feel badly about it (even if they’re acting like they don’t). Fresh, workable behavior comes only from a mind that’s been freed a bit from its troubles by a good listener, a listener who cares about all the parties involved. Your thoughts are important, and working toward a solution is important. But listening well to the others involved is as vital as tilling hard-packed soil before you attempt to plant a new seed.
• Problem-solving goes better if we find a listener, too! When our children struggle, we feel as frustrated and disappointed as they do! When they meet with unfairness, we want to storm and rage until the threat to them is gone. When they seem to be unable to help themselves at home, we aim our frustrations at them, driving them further into their shells of hopelessness. In short, when our children meet trouble, we feel troubled too. To be good allies and problem-solvers, we need someone to listen to us, perhaps again and again, to how we feel and to the things we’ve tried. Someone listening to how angry or disappointed or exhausted we feel freshens our communication with our children, their friends, and their teachers. Our problem-solving effectiveness is 100% improved if we decide to find a listener and let them hear our fears and our frustrations before we try to help!

How Listening Works
Here is one parent’s experience: “My daughter was given a month to learn all the states and their capitals. I offered to help her learn groups of about six states at a time. After she memorized the first six she felt she couldn’t possibly learn all the states, and she had a huge cry. Then she proceeded to learn the second set of six states and capitals, but again she felt that this was too much for her. She had another long cry. She kept saying, ‘I’ll never learn this. I just can’t do it!’ She also got mad at me for trying to help, and cried about my ‘interference.’ I was somewhat confused by this, and wondered if indeed I had gotten too involved in this assignment. In a few days, she again felt hopeless about learning them all, and had a third big cry. Each cry she had went on for half an hour or more. She felt she could never do the assignment, and expressed frustration and anger at me, at the assignment, and at the world. I kept listening and wondering how this was all going to turn out. ”

“After the third cry, everything changed. She learned the next sets of states quickly and easily. She took on a set of 18 states and capitals, and did them all at once. Three days before the test, she asked me to quiz her on them, and she knew them all! She was ecstatic, and I think she was amazed that she had done something she was sure she never could do. She was so proud of herself. The day before the test, she was completely confident that she would get 100%, and she was actually looking forward to the test! She usually showed a lot of anxiety around tests, so I’d never seen her like this before. After the test was over, she said she was sad that it was over, and she told me that she wished she could do it again! She has referred to it again and again as one of the major learning feats of her life, and she has thanked me profusely for my help with the project, saying that she never could have done it without me. It was great to see this whole process work!”
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More information about Listening Partnerships for Parents and Hand in Hand are available on our website at www.handinhandparenting.org

Keeping kids active and learning through the summer months can be a challenge for parents and caregivers. Usborne’s Ten Terrific Weeks Reading Adventure Program could make a difference in your child’s summer by keeping them connected with learning so they don’t suffer the summer “brain drain”. Each exciting program comes complete with books, curriculum and detailed supply lists. Short daily activities encourage creativity, learning and fun. The individual programs are geared toward preschoolers up through middle school and beyond, and offer parents a great alternative.

There are various subjects available and include, but are not limited to the ocean, space, fairies and the human body. The daily activities usually take an hour less to complete and typically involve reading a chapter from one of the curriculum books and completing an activity that helps your child retain the concept. For example, in week three of the human body curriculum, one day your child will read a chapter on blood and check for someone’s heart beat. The next day, your child will read about the heart. The third day, your child will pretend that he is a blood cell. He will create an obstacle course of his body to travel through, making sure to include a place to enter the heart and exit to the lungs. On another day, the child will access websites (which are provided by Usborne’s own safe search engine) where additional activities are offered. And on the final day of that week, your child will read about pumping blood and will check someone’s heart rate. Then, he will determine what causes the heart to beat faster and why.

This seems to be a great way to keep your child’s brain in gear while taking a break from the rigid schedule of the school year. It offers education and fun without much planning on the part of the caregiver – it’s all done for you! And for those of you with children in year round school, this program can still work for you. Just space it out over your child’s breaks. Once your child has completed the program – he receives his own certificate of completion. So have fun this summer and keep learning!

For more information on this program and many other Usborne educational materials, please visit www.ubah.com/k2841.

Is your preschooler showing an interest in the letters of the alphabet? Clever Parents loves 3D Think & Blink Alphabet Flash Cards. Packaged in a reusable cardboard container that fastens with velcro, the pack includes 26 sturdy, brightly colored holographic cards, each one featuring a letter.

On the hologram side of the card, a window alternately displays a letter and an object (i.e. “H” and a picture of a house, “L” and a picture of a lion). By holding the card at a slightly different angle, the letter and the object appear in the foreground or background, respectively. The word describing the object is printed below the hologram.

The reverse side of the flashcard features a picture of a different object, the word as well as the letter displayed in both upper and lowercase format. During playtime, turn these flashcards into a fun game and alternately quiz each other about the letters, the objects or come up with different objects that begin with the same letter. The options are endless.

School Zone’s recommended age is 3-6, but the cards are so sturdy you can use them with younger children, too. What’s more, the low price makes this purchase a no-brainer.

Learn more on the School Zone website.

Since Thanksgiving, most of you have been pulling the decorations out of the attic and setting them up in preparation for the big holiday. While unpacking those boxes of decorations, I’m sure you ran across some of the old Christmas story favorites – Frosty the Snowman, Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer, The First Christmas, the Nutcracker – the list goes on. Well, we are all very familiar with these stories, so I think many of us allow the season to go by without even dusting them off.

Here’s an idea to get those books read and have an enjoyable slow down moment with your family. Wrap up each book in Christmas paper. Place the wrapped books in a basket and set them under the tree. Each night, allow your kids to choose the wrapped book that they would like to read. Turn off the TV, make some hot chocolate and sit with your kids and read the story with them. I promise, that you will enjoy that “break” with your kids. What better way to end a busy day of work, school or shopping than to curl up on the couch with your kids and read a book.

Add an additional element of surprise for your kids. Add some new books to your collection. Christmas Around the World, by L. Sims is nice book because describes the holiday traditions of those in other countries. The Usborne Book Of Christmas Poems by S. Taplin would be a delightful addition to your collection. Maybe one night you would like to bake some cookies to enjoy while you read those lovely books – try Christmas Cooking (R. Glilpin and C. Atkinson) or Christmas Fairy Cooking (L. Pratt and C. Atkinson) for the little darlings in your life. These books and many more can be found at www.ubah.com/k2841 Enjoy those holiday books and Merry Christmas!

Looking for a clever and environmentally sound way to make learning the letters of the alphabet fun for your kids? Pick up an alphabet tee or two from bioME 5, an eco-friendly apparel company focused on using fashion as a tool for learning. bioME 5, which takes its inspiration from the earth’s biomes, produces a line of 100% organic alphabet tees each emblazoned with a single letter, superimposed with a wild animal representing the letter (’B’ for bear, ‘J’ for jaguar, ‘O’ for octopus…). The animal name is cleverly printed upside-down below the larger letter on the shirt, giving the child wearing the shirt the best vantage point for reading.

The shirts are tagless and pre-shrunk; online orders are packaged and shipped in ‘green film’ biodegradable plastic bags that take only nine months to biodegrade.

The website alone is worth a visit. Simply click on one of the letters of the alphabet and listen to the museum-quality animal sound representing each of the 26 featured animals. Check out the Links area for a list of environment-friendly websites.

Use coupon code 07CP02 for $5 off any Alphabet Animal tee and free shipping from now until September 9, 2007. Learn more at www.bioME5.com

See vidcast #31 featuring bioME 5 animal alphabet tees on Clever Parents TV.

The time comes in every parent’s life, whether you’re employed, self-employed, or unemployed, when you must release your firm grasp on the little one and watch him/her begin to exercise their autonomy and enhance their social skills. This era is called starting school (be it preschool, nursery school, or elementary school). If you’re anything like me, this time period could prove to be a difficult transition for you, the child, or even both of you. In my case the transition was one we both had to adapt to.

As a fulltime case manager and a self-employed business owner, I decided it was time for my 20 month old to go to nursery school, a place where I can drop him off early in the morning, have a family member pick him up on the evenings when I must work later, and feel confident that my son is learning the social skills appropriate for his age group. On the first day of school, I prepped my son, letting him know what a big boy he was for starting school. I left him in the hands of the a.m. teacher and quickly walked away before he could follow me. As I exited the school my chest tightened, my breathing became uneven, my eyes got teary, and my hands began to tremble. I was panicking over leaving my only child in an unfamiliar place. Needless to say, that was one of the longest days I’ve ever had to endure! In retrospect, I realize that there are several things parents like myself can do to alleviate the stress that starting / going to school can bring. For this reason I have come up with: Five Simple Wayz to Easy School Dayz:

1. Transition Into the Transition: Before leaving the little one at preschool / nursery school, try dropping in with him so that he can become acclimated with the environment, the staff, and the other children. Of course you will want to check with the facility’s director to see if this is permissible. Also, you will want to stay with your child during these initial visits. Like trying on new clothes or shoes, you want to make sure that the school is a good fit for you and your child’s needs. Once this has been achieved and you feel that your child is comfortable, let him fly solo, but gradually lengthen the amount of time he’s there until he’s able to stay a full day with no problem.

How does this help? The child is more at ease with the transition and you should now feel more comfortable with the school given the time you’ve both spent getting familiar. If you are more at ease, the child is more at ease for children tend to feed off of their parents’ vibes and emotions.

2. Communicate, Communicate, Communicate!!! – Express your feelings and concerns with the teacher and/or director. For me it is very important that my son gets the same (or close to it) encouragement and training he would receive at home. For example, my husband and I have been teaching my son to use his ‘big boy’ cup. When his teacher sent home a note requesting a sippy cup instead, I promptly responded in writing advising that I refuse to revert back to a training cup. I insisted that she continue to work with him regarding the ‘big boy’ cup as this is what he’s becoming accustomed to at home. Another issue we’ve faced is potty-training. We have been working on potty-training since 18 ½ months. So, when I realized that he was not being placed on the potty at school, I voiced my concern. Nursery school / preschool should reinforce developmental lessons that parents are teaching their children and vice versa. I believe in the old saying that it takes a village to raise a child. For this reason, it is important that what the child learns at school should mirror the lessons taught at home. But, if the parent fails to communicate their concern, the school will never be aware of what needs to be done.

How does this help? This strength in communication alleviates any confusion the child may have with regards to their developmental milestones. Additionally, you may find that you will feel better having assured that you and the school are on one accord, in a united effort to educate your child.

3. Volunteer! – If you have the time, volunteer it. If you don’t have the time to spend at your child’s school, you can help in other ways. For example, I own and operate a small event planning agency which houses a caterering division. I have recently volunteered to bring in treats for my son’s class, courtesy of my company, and/or do a simple cooking activity with his class one afternoon.

How does this help? This allows you to have an idea of what’s going on with your child at school. It also gives you a chance to be there first hand which is good for the child in that he/she may feel more comfortable in your presence. Also, it lets the school know that you have a real interest in your child’s education and the curriculum. This may encourage them to seek out your advice or assistance repeatedly in the future, especially if it is a small school like my son’s learning academy.

4. Surprise, Surprise – So, you want to know what’s really going on in your absence at your child’s school. Try doing a surprise visit. Several schools that we visited during our selection process have class rooms with hidden windows that allow parents to observe their children at play. Drop in at a time when the instructor is not expecting you. Try to choose a time that would not interrupt the child’s day should you feel the need to alert him of your presence. If your facility does not allow you to do surprise visits, you may want to reconsider schools. Sure, their rationale may be that your dropping in may prove disruptive to the flow of the child’s day, however my thought is that any place my son is, I should be able to check up on him…after all, this is your child, not the director’s! I stress using your judgment with regards to when you drop in. Also, just because you do a surprise visit doesn’t mean that you have to ‘visit’ with the child. Stop in, take a look, and return to work once you’re satisfied.

How does this help? You get a real, first hand look at what your child’s day is like, what his interaction with his teacher and classmates is like, and hopefully you get a sense of relief knowing that your precious one is progressing and doing well in his new environment. Surprise visits give you a real glimpse of what’s going on, as the school does not expect your arrival and thus will not be prone to put on a show to impress you. Plus, if something wrong is going on, you just may catch whoever is involved in the act!

5. Trust Your Instincts - If your child returns home with an unusual demeanor don’t ignore it. Read your child and trust your instincts. If you question his behavior and feel as it is related to his new environment check it out. Utilize tips two and four. Communicate your concern about your child’s behavior with his teacher and if you feel as if something is still wrong, do a surprise visit to see what’s really going on. As parents, especially mothers, we have a unique connection with our children. Thus we can often sense when something is wrong with our babies. Never ever ignore or question your instincts. Follow up on anything that causes you concern.

How does this help? This helps you stay abreast of any social or developmental problems your child may be experiencing and it also gives you peace of mind. Not knowing for sure what’s wrong with your child could be detrimental in the end. Of course, perhaps nothing at all could be wrong with your child, but wouldn’t you feel better if you knew this for sure?

Going to school will be a good thing for you and your child. Like any other milestone, it only takes a bit of adjusting to get through it. But, breathe (as someone should have instructed me) you will get through that first day, week, and year. In the end, practicing the Five Wayz to Easy School Dayz coupled with exercising patience will ease you through this transitional period in your lives. Trust me, if we can do it so can you….And that’s all I have to say.

Summer is here and the long days of relaxing at the pool or the beach have arrived. After two weeks or so with your children being home all day, you may be ready for some new adventures…. Even some educational ones!

As an educator of early language instruction, I am always looking for new opportunities and ways to expose my children to languages. Whether your child is learning a second language for the first time, or perhaps learning a third language, there are many ways to incorporate some bilingual fun into your summer.

Choose a fun summer destination that you will be ordinarily visiting (i.e. the park, the zoo, the beach, grandparent’s house). About a week before you make the trip, sit down with your children and draw a picture of what they think they will see there. Encourage them to include as many details as possible. Choose about 8-10 words from the picture, and look them up in the target language (www.wordreference.com has many different languages and is a great online bilingual dictionary). Together, you and your children will label the items in the target language on their drawing. You have just created the first page of your picture dictionary! If you will be teaching Spanish, and you drew a picture of the zoo, you may want to label the following: el tigre- tiger, la jirafa- giraffe, el elefante- elephant, la foca- seal, el oso- bear, el leopardo- leopard, el pinguino- penguin, la culebra- snake, el cocodrilo- crocodile, etc.

Be sure to post your labeled drawing on your refrigerator for the week leading up to the visit. Use every opportunity you have to discuss the picture and say the words together. Try www.spanicity.com and look up the appropriate vocabulary to listen to audio recordings to help with your pronunciation of Spanish. Allocate a special folder to your ‘language drawings’, so you that you may add pages to your picture dictionary as you visit new places this summer.
When the big day arrives when you will be taking the adventure, be sure to grab the folder with the drawing. Practice in the car on the way and try to say as many of the words as you remember. As your adventure begins, encourage your children to look for the items that they predicted in their drawing. When you see the item, reinforce the language by saying the words together. The children will be excited to see the actual words that they have been practicing come to life. Take this opportunity to teach others that may have joined you on the adventure.

For each adventure you take this summer, try to complete a language picture, so that your children can make their language learning relevant to their lives. Research continually shows the benefits of early language instruction and the facility that young children have with absorbing languages. Have fun this summer and be sure to include some bilingual fun into your adventures!

What do you think? Enter your comments below and feel free to visit www.bilingualfun.com

Like their bodies, kids’ brains need exercise to stay in tip-top shape. It’s no surprise that during the long, lazy days of summer, many students lose the equivalent of one to two months of reading and math skills.

Because the best learning often occurs when children don’t realize they are learning, fun and creative activities like painting, visiting the zoo or creating a beach towel “journal” are ideal for keeping summer brains in peak condition.

Following are ten, kid-friendly activities designed to give students the ultimate summer brain workout:

Grades K-3
Take a walk on the natural side. Plan a nature walk to a nearby neighborhood, park or zoo. As you and your child walk, stop to record observations with a drawing or a brief description. Gather any items you may want to save or examine more closely when you get home. Later, take the time to search the Internet or read wildlife books to learn more about the plants, rocks and animals you discovered on your walk.

Have fun with sidewalk chalk. Draw a hopscotch pattern, sketch pictures of your favorite characters from books, practice spelling your family members’ names or create math problems for you and your friends. Visit tutoring.sylvanlearning.com/learning-activities/summer-fun.cfm to learn how to make your own sidewalk chalk.

Write on. Keep track of your child’s adventures this summer by creating a beach towel or t-shirt “journal.” All you need is a white beach towel or t-shirt and fabric markers. Have your child include his or her favorite events of the summer on the towel or t-shirt, such as family parties or the scores of baseball games. In September, your child can bring the unusual “journal” to show-and-tell so teachers and friends can reminisce about summer fun.

Grades 4-6
Plant a mystery garden. Visit a garden supply store and purchase a variety of flower and vegetable seeds. Remove the seeds from their containers and place them in unlabeled bags. It’s up to the student to grow the plants and determine their correct seeds! Have your child keep a garden journal, including things like how often and how much water each plant received, and drawings or pictures of the plants as they develop. At the end of the summer, press the flowers in clear contact paper and enjoy the vegetables with the family.

Become a pen pal. Have your child write letters to a friend who has recently moved or a relative who lives out of town. The student could write about his or her summer experiences, stories about friends or pets or the latest family adventure. Consider visiting an art supply store and buying multicolor paper, stickers, stamps or glitter and design your own stationary.

Create a cookbook. Look through cookbooks and ask family members and friends to send their favorite recipes. File recipe cards by category and number each one so they can easily be kept in order. Try a new recipe each week and work together to read the directions and measure the ingredients. Take a picture of your child enjoying the finished product. At the end of the summer, have your child design a cover for the cookbook. Gather all of the recipes into a binder and make printed copies for family and friends.

Grade 7-9
Plan a vacation. Ask your child to use the Internet to learn more about your vacation destination. If you will be traveling out-of-state, research the state flower or bird and interesting tourist attractions. Gather bus and subway route maps and schedules to places you would like to visit, such as a museum or the zoo. As you travel, your child can keep a journal filled with notes about his or her favorite places.

Become a reporter. Keep track of local and national news by creating a family newspaper. Develop a list of article types, such as sports, comics, movie guide, etc. If the student is writing about a sporting event, use the Internet to learn more about a favorite player or team. Set up a question box in your home and ask friends or family to write questions your child can answer in an advice column. At the end of the summer, organize all of the articles in a binder. It will be fun to look back on in years to come.

Track the weather. Make a large calendar or graph to chart the high and low temperatures each day for a month. At the end of the month, the student can calculate the average temperature and record the highest and lowest temperatures. Consult an almanac at the library to find out whether the temperatures measured were above or below the average in your area, or if you broke any weather records.

All Ages
Read, read, read. Have younger children challenge their friends to a summer read-a-thon. Keep track of hours spent reading and the number of books read. Then, hold a summer-end pizza party to celebrate the winner. Older students can create a local book club by planning weekly meetings to discuss books and serving snacks that relate to the story. To encourage students of all ages to pick up a book, Sylvan has compiled a grade-by-grade list of great “summer reads.” For additional fun books, visit Sylvan’s www.bookadventure.com.

For free learning guides and a variety of complimentary activity booklets and writing journals, visit tutoring.sylvanlearning.com/learning-activities or call 1-800-31-SUCCESS.

Sylvan Learning Center Summer Reading List:

Elementary School
Kindergarten:
Whose Mouse Are You? by Robert Krause
Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown

Grade 1:
Anansi the Spider by Gerald McDermott
Cork and Fuzz by Dori Chaconas

Grade 2:
The Principal’s New Clothes by Stephanie Calmenson
Henry and Mudge by Sucie Stevenson and Cynthia Rylant

Grade 3:
10-Step Guide to Living With Your Monster by Laura Numeroff
Aladdin: The Magical Tale of a Boy and his Wonderful Lamp by Rosalind
Kerven

Grade 4:
Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White
If You Lived 100 Years Ago by Ann McGovern

Grade 5:
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Ronald Dahl
Harriet the Spy by Louise Fitzhugh

Middle School
Grade 6:
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
The Black Stallion by Walter Farley and Keith Ward

Grade 7:
The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

Grade 8:
Briar Rose by Jane Yolen
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

High School
Grade 9:
The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, or, on the Segregation of the Queen by Laurie R. King
My Antonia by Willa Cather

Grade 10:
Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne
Series of Unfortunate Events series by Lemony Snicket

Grade 11:
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Les MisĂŠrables by Victor Hugo

Grade 12:
Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift and Pat Rogers
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

Earth Day is celebrated on April 22nd. As we strive to make the earth a better place to live, there are many things you can do in your own home to make a difference and to teach your children about taking care of the world in which we live. Read on for fun activities, crafts, a yummy snack idea, a great EarthBall toy, a song and more!

Earth Day Activities (and beyond):
1. Plant a tree. Visit a local nursery and pick up seedlings (they’re often free) or a small sapling. You and your children can enjoy watching your tree grow from year to year. Measure it every year on Earth Day and talk about the difference you’re making in your world – one step at a time.
2. Teach your child about recycling. Involve your children in recycling your trash. Have them help separate the trash and talk about what types of items can be recycled and why it’s important. (Use recyclable bags at the grocery store, too!)
3. Pick up trash. Make a game of picking up trash on the playground, in the park or in a place that you frequent with your family. How much can you find?
4. Conserve water. Limit time in the shower, wash hands for a designated period of time (like the time it takes to sing Happy Birthday), wash your car less frequently, turn the faucets all the way off (don’t be a drip!), run dishwasher and washing machine only when they are full.
5. Save energy. Switch your inefficient incandescent light bulbs to compact fluorescent bulbs. You’ll save money on electricity bills, use less energy, reduce your carbon footprint and help stop global warming!

Earth Day Crafts & Fun Snack Idea:
1. Make leaf prints. Go on a scavenger hunt for a variety of leaves. Paint the leaves and then press them on paper. Talk about what you see.
2. Make a bird feeder. Cover an empty toilet paper (recyclable) with peanut butter and roll in birdseed. Hang with yarn.
3. Make Dirt! Have fun with your child making dirt and talking about the earth. Put some chocolate pudding in a cup, add crushed Oreos for gravel and rocks, and top with a gummy worm. (Watch for Vidcast #22 where two “experts” experiment with making dirt, then sing a song about the Earth.)

EarthBall:
Your kids will have the whole world in their hands with 16″ inflatable EarthBalls. EarthBalls are not only fun to toss around, they display NiteCities, allowing you to observe the world’s cities glowing brightly at night. Every EarthBall also comes with the 20-page Global Handbook that includes games, activities & resources for Earth adventurers of all ages. Visit ODTMaps for more.

Earth Day Song (borrowed from Henry’s preschool teacher – thank you Ms. Dorothy):
To the tune of ‘If you’re happy and you know it’
If you see a piece of litter pick it up
If you see a piece of litter pick it up
If we all pick up the litter
We will make the world much better
If you see a piece of litter pick it up.

Printables:
Visit Planet Pals for recycle kits kids can print, cut out and hang, plus a number of additional resources to help teach your children about the planet on which we live. www.planetpals.com

What’s the greatest gift Clever Parents can give a child besides their own time? The gift of reading, of course! Created by two teachers turned moms, The Gifted Grasshopper provides books that have been personally selected after scouring the bookstores for what kids love and what parents love to read.

Book selections are grouped by age and topic. In the Preschool area, for instance, you can choose from book sets about the alphabet, numbers, animals, fairy tales and more. The 2nd and 3rd grade area has selections on sports, poetry, math and chapter books to name a few.

“Jen and I pride ourselves on being able to find beautiful books for children: books with engaging text and beautiful illustrations; books that will foster language development and instill a love of reading in children,” says co-founder Laura Greenstein. “Books that are displayed at large bookstores are typically there because the publisher paid for the special placement, not because they are a quality selection. There are hundreds of books hidden on bookshelves in these stores or not even in stock at all that should be a part of every child’s reading experience. These are the books that are placed in Gifted Grasshopper gift bags. We are quite certain that when we send a baby bag to a baby shower, no one else has purchased the same books for the new mother to be. We feel confident that we can find original books for a bag for a child with hundreds of books in his collection already. Jen and I spend hours looking for great books to add to our collections.”

Bags are packaged by theme, however, if a customer has a need that is not covered by one of these categories, you can order a gift bag by Custom Request.

Gift bags come packaged in a Gifted Grasshopper tote and include a bookmark containing helpful hints that can be used while reading with your child, glasses to help your child spot new letters or words and Griffen the Grasshopper, a plush grasshopper puppet.

Learn more and shop away at www.giftedgrasshopper.com – happy reading!

Clever Parents wanna raise clever kids, right? Well, these Flash of Brilliance cards are perfect for your little genius! Who wouldn’t love the Space or Bug cards? And the Alphabet cards have sign language on the reverse side. These make great gifts, too!

The details:

• Full-color photographs of real animals, not cartoons or stuffed toys
• Thick and durable cards that children love to touch
• Animal names in English, French and Spanish to maximize language skills
• Fun and educational facts that round-out your child’s knowledge
• Complete guidelines for getting the most from each play session

Buy at www.blackwagon.com

Developing solid math skills is a necessity for all children. Students who take math early in their educational careers set a stronger foundation for success in school and throughout life.

Skills taught in math courses cross over into other subject areas, such as English and writing. For instance, math students learn good problem-solving skills, which improve their ability to create a coherent essay – a task that requires students to shift between abstract concepts and supporting facts.

By taking a fun, creative approach to math outside of the classroom, parents can help their young children develop strong skills and a positive, confident attitude toward an often-maligned subject.

The following are ideas to foster a love of math in your children:

• Play popular board games that require basic math skills. Chutes and LaddersÂŽ and RackOÂŽ develop number sense. “24″ and YahtzeeÂŽ help computational speed and accuracy, and problem solving skills are developed through games like TriOminosÂŽ and Connect FourÂŽ.
• Assemble puzzles with your child. Puzzles help children learn spatial and visual organization. These are the basic lessons of geometry.
• A deck of cards can be a valuable math tool. Card games begin to teach the lesson of probability and can reinforce addition and subtraction memorization for children learning basic math facts.
• Dice are helpful for younger children to practice number facts to six. If they are stumped, they can count the dots to find the sum.
• Relate math to your children’s favorite sport. Keeping score is a math exercise! Ask them to calculate the number of points needed for their favorite team to win. Encourage them to create multiple point combinations to reach that score.
• Use driving time as math game time. Invite children to figure out how long it will take to get to the destination or estimate how much it will cost to fill up the gas tank. Play other car games like “Guess My Number.” This will reinforce logic skills with children of all ages.
  If your child receives an allowance, use it to formulate mathematics problems and teach them about saving. For older children, relate percentage problems to their allowance.
• Dominoes are a great game for children of all ages. Smaller children can use them to recognize similar quantities while older children can explore the concepts of probability.

For more helpful tips, and for information about math tutoring at Sylvan Learning Center, call 800-31-SUCCESS or visit tutoring.sylvanlearning.com.

Want to jump-start your child learning a second language? Boca Beth is for you! Using music, language, movement and a series of tools including DVDs, CDs, music makers, activity books and Boca the puppet, the Boca Beth program gets your child excited about learning a new language.

Boca Beth creator, Beth Butler, is a mother of three who has been speaking Spanish as a second language for 25 years. Beth started the bilingual program due to a lack of programs available designed to teach second languages to babies and young children that were both affordable and fun to teach. Beth’s program is not only fun, easy to use and affordable, but kids LOVE it!

Pop in a DVD and join your child with Boca and shaker in hand and you’ll be amazed how soon your toddler is singing ‘Hola! Hola! I say hi.’ Our favorite product is the Boca Beth Bilingual Bag which comes with Boca the puppet, Boca Beth’s three bilingual fun music CDs and two DVDs presented in Spanish and English, a 44-page coloring/activity book and an egg shaker and a mini-maraca.

One lucky Clever Parents viewer will receive a Boca Beth Beginner Set. Simply email info (at) cleverparents (dot) com and tell us why you’d like to win. The Beginner Set includes Boca Beth’s first DVD “Mi Casa/My House”, her first music CD “My First Songs in Spanish”, BOCA the lovable puppet and a How To Guide for second language instruction.

Learn more about the Boca Beth program at www.bocabeth.com

“Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence.” Abigail Adams

I’ve shared that quote with dozens of young Chronically Disorganized (CD) clients. I often ask them to substitute the word organizing for the word learning and read the quote out loud. Children can then see that while organization – like education – may be attainable it doesn’t come effortlessly. Students who are naturally disorganized are at a disadvantage unless we, as professional organizers, can help them by implementing systems, support, and structure. Training students how to get organized and teaching them why being organized is critical to their success is essential. Uncovering the appropriate training techniques is often an overlooked step to becoming properly organized. Most often what I see when working with junior clients (between 3^rd and 6^th grades) is that their parents or teachers have implemented a seemingly flawless organizing system for the student. Unfortunately, it isn’t the right system for that particular child. Sometimes it’s too detailed. Or, maybe it doesn’t take into account the student’s learning style.

Enter the professional organizer
We have an opportunity to provide an organizing education for families seeking help. These clients are most often kinesthetic learners and auditory learners. So, we’ll focus here on these two modalities and the techniques that I have found to be especially helpful when working with these young clients and their parents.

First things first—Location, Location, Location!
Establish a quiet place in the home where the student can be close enough to ask questions yet far away enough not to be too distracted by family members (including pets) moving around the house. Younger children need adults nearby to answer questions and help them “perform” their homework.

Bite-Sized Portions
When it comes to repetitive work (such as math problems), set the student up for success. Just as we focus on a smaller area for an ADD adult, we want to focus on a smaller portion of the homework assignment rather than the whole. For example, if a student has a page of 15 math problems to solve, it is best to have him complete five at a time. Then, an adult can check them in three separate batches to ensure that the student is understanding the directions and receives immediate feedback before moving on to the next set of five problems. Nothing is more discouraging than letting a 4^th grader do 15 problems and then discovering that he did not get one correct answer because he didn’t understand the directions or wasn’t familiar with the order of operations.

Book Reports
When dealing with a written assignment such as a book report, break the assignment into a time-line type of checklist for them. Popsicle sticks and markers are perfect for the job. On each popsicle stick write something like the following:
Pick a book to read /January 10.
Record the title, author, publisher/January 12
Read chapters 1-3/January 17
Read chapters 4-6/January 22
Finish the book; chapters 7-10/January 27

Then, after the book is read, instead of asking the student to sit down and write the report, request that the student verbally present her rough draft via a “creative report.” Allowing the student to hear her own words will help her internalize the information and make the writing process much easier and straightforward.

The following ideas for Auditory Learners and Kinesthetic Learners incorporate both Part P and Part B because they provide a child with something physical (P) to do with his hands or an opportunity to move around, while simultaneously having a mental challenge for his brain (B).

Auditory Learners are great listeners and usually very vocal.
A good opening line for an organizer to use with an auditory learner is: “Tell me about your homework assignments. . . . .” but follow up this line with a twist!

• “and pretend you’re a TV reporter on the evening news.” The child may sit at the kitchen table and use a “mike” (vacuum cleaner attachments work well as do salt or pepper shakers).
• “and act out 3 main events in your day.” The child may stand on a small rug, but the rule is not to leave the rug while they’re acting. This exercise will help children with sequencing events, something they’re often expected to do at school.
• “and chat with me while this metronome is ticking. Can you bob your head back and forth and talk at the same time?”

Kinesthetic Learners usually think best on their feet.
Try these ideas with “Tell me about your homework assignments. . . .” or for helping with memory-related homework:

• Place yardsticks or rulers on the floor. The child can explain to you the order that they should do math, reading, and spelling words by laying out the sticks (one for math, one for reading, etc.) in order.
• As the child to explain or list her assignments (or whatever it is she’s trying to learn or memorize) directly to herself by talking in front of a mirror.
• Let the child use dolls or puppets to do the talking for her.
• Play Clap, Tap, Slap. This game has proven to be extremely effective for memorizing spelling or multiplication facts. The rhythm and cadence and sing-song style encourage the facts to stick. Boys especially enjoy the military marching tune of “left, right, left, right, left . . . .” You’ve heard children recite TV commercials or radio jingles – Clap, Tap, Slap works on the same principle and you can modify it to fit all sorts of memory work. Tapping rhythms, using “hand jive” motions and claps, and having fun with sing-song chants, like the ones used for jump-roping games, can be fun and easy ways to learn facts quickly.
• Ohhhhh, Macarena! Fun songs such as The Funky Chicken and the Macarena are wildly popular with kids – put the motions to work for learning spelling words. For example, if the word is “America,” ask the child to stand up and do the motions for the Macarena dance while they spell the words out loud. You probably know of other songs that use motions that would work well, also. The repetition of the motions can help the repetition and memory of math facts, lists, dates and other such memory work.

Use positive language as a reward.
Use simple statements such as:
Wow; you’re brainy. I wouldn’t have come up with that answer.
I like the way you think!
Hey, you’re a miniature Einstein!
How on earth did you do that? Impressive!

Encourage children with such phrases as:
Keep thinking like that—I think you’ve almost solved it.
You really tried hard – I’m proud of your effort.
I can tell that this is getting easier for you. You amaze me.
You should feel really proud of yourself.

The following ideas offer some suggestions on how to organize schoolwork, personal stuff, and schedules.

Crate on Wheels or Portable Hanging File Folder
Why a crate? It’s a mini file cabinet on wheels that can easily be moved from room to room. Novelty is a must for ADD students; a moveable crate allows their homework environment to change periodically. The crate, containing color-coded file folders, is a system that most kids enjoy using once they learn how. Create both a business and a personal section.

The business section contains all things relating to school with a folder for each subject and an extra one for projects that are works-in-progress. After the project is complete, it should be filed under the appropriate subject. I suggest blue for business, for example, because the first letters match. Make sure you explain the color scheme you choose—again, teach them why you are doing things a certain way. An older child may be able to choose the colors himself and explain why he or she has chosen that particular color for a particular subject. He should have a specific reason why he relates, say, red to business. Maybe it fires him up!

The “p” for personal folders could also be “p” for pink, purple, passionate red, papaya orange, or even pepperoni brownish-red. They hold documents related to topics such as:
Memorabilia: photographs, ticket stubs and awards
Passwords: i-tune account information, PSP and Game Boy data, etc.
Sports: schedules, registration forms, contact information on teammates
Hobbies: choir, music, scouting, articles they tear out of magazines related to crafts, etc.
Religion: Sunday school activities, confirmation class schedules, youth group outings, etc. Equipment: warranty and purchase information for their personal property: bikes, software installations, calculator instructions, etc.

Calendars
A year-at-a-glance academic calendar can be a great organizational tool for children in 3^rd grade or older.

* Print a copy of the year-long calendar and highlight all holidays, teacher workdays, and early release days. Place it in a page protector and clip it to the front of their portable crate. Younger students will need to be taught how to use a calendar but once explained, using a calendar becomes a learned skill that will be incredibly useful for them.

* Most students younger than 3^rd grade don’t understand the linear significance of a calendar. It’s a surprise to some younger children that calendars are arranged in lines and rows and read left to right like a book. This concept is foreign to them. Interestingly, more than one junior client has commented that they thought calendars should be like clocks—round.

Binders can be a thing of beauty.

Pocket Folders
Pocket folders help children avoid having to dig in their backpacks and having their papers scattered everywhere. Label one side Homework and the other side Sign and Return.
Either buy a pocket folder that is already hole-punched or punch holes in one yourself and put the pocket folder in the student’s binder. Pocket folders help children avoid having to dig in their backpacks and having their papers scattered everywhere. Label one side and the other side. Either buy a pocket folder that is already hole-punched or punch holes in one yourself and put the pocket folder in the student’s binder.

Tabbed Dividers
Color-coded dividers help the student keep his binder organized because the colors make subjects easy to “read”. For example, green may represent science, blue for reading, red for writing, yellow for social studies, etc. A child may want to represent his favorite subject with his favorite color, for example. Again, encourage the child to attach some significance to the relationship of the color and the subject, but there’s no right or wrong here. Within each color-coded section, create a section for quizzes and tests. Use the same color tab and place a gold star on it; put this divider behind the first divider of the same subject. It is important that students learn to hang on to old quizzes and tests that will help them study and reflect upon what they have learned. Collected tests and graded papers also serve as progress indicators so the child can see how much she’s learning throughout the year.

[1] ADD-Friendly Ways to Organize Your Life, Judith Kolberg p4

Copyright Š 2006-2007, Metropolitan Organizing Ž
All Rights Reserved
All content herein published with permission and remains the intellectual property of the contributor.

Looking for a fun way to encourage reading-readiness in your children? Let Word Chase! be your guide. With Word Chase!, an eco-friendly reading-readiness board game for children ages 4 and up, children become familiar with the top 25 building block words – the most commonly used words – in the English language. Called “sight words” or “instant words” (as, and, the, he, she, you, I, …) and known also as the “Dolch List” and “Fry’s Instant Words”, these building block words are are essential for reading fluency.

Jill Gaynor and Erin Smith, business partners who both started their careers in education by teaching at the elementary school level, created Word Chase! together. The game is designed for 2 to 4 players. Each player starts with a game piece (a cow, a fish, a cat or a bird) and five cards, each card containing one of the 25 building block words. Taking turns, players move ahead in the game by moving via a bee path to an area containing a group of words, then by recognizing and stating the matching word from their hands. As children learn the game, they can incorporate additional fun alternative ways to play, as listed in the board game instructions.

Word Chase! also uses soy-based ink, as opposed to traditional petroleum-based ink; and all of Beyond Learning products, including packaging, are printed with soy-based ink on recycled paper. What’s more, a percentage of profits are donated to CHEC’s Blue Butterfly Campaign, a coalition working to educate the public about preventable childhood illnesses and disabilities caused by exposure to toxins in the environment.

Word Chase! retails for $19.95. Buy one for your family and several for those 4 or 5 year old birthday parties that are just around the corner – www.beyond-learning.com.

As a Clever Parent, you know how important it is to let kids be kids. Playtime is learning time. You don’t want to be that parent who is endlessly throwing flashcards in your child’s face without ever letting him see the light of day. (Every child should be fluent in Russian at two, right?) But, by the same token, wouldn’t it be nice to have a resource that could help you know that your child is on track with his development and age? Your answer… True Learning.

The brainchild of Jinhee Kim, True Learning offers more than 3,000 printable exercises in 6 different subject areas and 4 progress levels. Parents go online and print exercises from topics ranging from math, literacy and thinking to motor skills, art and world and then spend 15 minutes a day going through a few activities of their choosing. Child development experts agree that 15 minutes is the ideal amount of time that young children should spend in an educational setting each day so the exercises were created to be quick and fun activities designed to be shared with your child for that length of time.

One of the many things we find clever about True Learning? The activities are not online. The site is not a slick, animated, “let me entertain your child for 15 minutes while you go and do something else” thing to do. Instead, you print the activities, step away from the computer and spend fun, quality learning time with your little one.

See how much we love True Learning on a recent Clever Parents vidcast.

Learn more about True Learning at www.true-learning.com

• Tookie’s: Holiday Shoppers Want to Know – What Holiday Toys Won’t Cool Off?
• Magneatos: Jumbo Size Magnetic Construction for the Toddler Set
• Sculpting material that never dries out: Play Foam
• Rock, spin, hide under, peek through, fill with water, wear as a shell or as a hat. Bilibo
• Dado Cubes: A New Twist on Classic Building Blocks
• Smithsonian Chemistry Set — On Sale!
• Li’l DaVinci Art Frames: Children’s Artwork Storage & Display in a Beautiful Frame
• Help your preschooler learn and have fun at the same time. My True Learning

Download the Quicktime video.
Download the Flash video.
Previous Clever Parents vidcast episodes.

Top Ten Reasons for Your Children to Learn Spanish

10. Exposure to multiple languages at an early age enhances their speaking and cognitive skills.

9. Learn words and phrases that can be useful in everyday situations.

8. To give them a chance to actually retain the language, rather than learning it later in life and losing it (until age 13, children’s brain retains it’s plasticity, allowing them to easily absorb and retain languages).

7. To have a head start in their required language education in school.

6. To communicate with classmates, store clerks, friends, neighbors, etc……. as Spanish is being heard more and more everyday in the U.S.

5. Unlike adults, children learn languages without prejudices or inhibitions.

4. Beling bilingual opens up a multitude of doors for their furture educational and professional careers.

3. To allow them to keep up with the adventures of Dora and Diego.

2. To facilitate the restaraunt ordering experience on your next trip to Mexico (or your local authentic Mexican restaraunt).

1. To open their minds and worlds to the multicultural environment we live in today!

Whether it is Spanish or any other language, kids love to learn how others communicate. Young children have the fortunate ability to learn and retain languages much more easily than adults. Early language education is essential in the world we live in today. Being bilingual is one of the greatest gifts you can give your child! Expose them to a second language today! Second language books, videos, music, games, online activities, or travel allow children to hear and learn the language while having fun! Visit www.bilingualfun.com for more resources and information about second language acquisition. Happy Holidays!

• Finally. A Clever First Aid Kit for Families
• Visit the Me4Kidz website.
• Cool Dad Resource: Mob Boss Teaches New Dads How to Swaddle
• Pick up your Double Daddy Gift Combo Pack
• Visit Dr.MOZ at www.drmoz.com
• GeoToys Makes Learning Geography Fun
• Pick up GeoPuzzles at geotoystore.com

Download the Quicktime video.
Download the Flash video.
Previous Clever Parents vidcast episodes.

• How long has itz been? Remembering the details of basic eating, sleeping and pooping habits of infants.
• Visit the itzbeen website.
• Teaching your children to save, spend and give. Read the Clever Parents feature on the Learning Cents bank.
• Visit the Learning Cents website.
• Squeezable Cookbook Makes Eating Veggies Fun
• Buy the California Squisine cookbook on Amazon or learn more about California Squisine at www.californiasquisine.com
• Learn about Best Buddies
• Visit the Best Buddies website.

Download the Quicktime video.
Download the Flash video.
Previous Clever Parents vidcast episodes.