Learning by Magic

When my brother and I were very young, my dad was deployed to Korea with the Air Force for 18 months, leaving my mom at home in a new city with an 18-month-old and a four-year-old.  A few days after my dad left, the neighbors came by to introduce themselves.  Their names were Jim and Coral and they were nearly the same age as my grandparents.  They had children about the age of my mom and dad, and grandchildren near the age of my brother and me, but they all lived out of town.  Jim had just been discharged from the Air Force after severing his index finger on duty.  They were unable to reattach it.  He offered to come over the next morning and have coffee with my mom  and help watch us kids.

Over the next weeks and months, Jim came over every morning.  He always greeted my brother with,  “Hey, Buddy!” and a hug. Before long, my brother started calling him Buddy.  He has been Buddy to us ever since.  Being a former engineer, Buddy became the one who could fix anything.  If one of my brother’s toys broke, Buddy fixed it.  Flat tire on the wagon; Buddy fixed it.  All my brother had to do was toddle up with his tiny hand outstretched and ask, “Buddy fix?” and Buddy fixed it.

After going to a little carnival one weekend, my brother came home with a goldfish he had won at a booth.  My mom  bought a bowl and some marbles for the bottom and we poured the goldfish into his new home.  The next morning, the goldfish was “sleeping” upside down.  My brother pulled Buddy into the house as soon as he entered the door and dragged him  over to the bowl.  “Buddy fix?”, he asked, his bright blue eyes staring up at Buddy in complete trust.  Buddy told him he needed to take the fish home to “fix it” and disappeared with the bowl.  About an hour later, he brought the fish back, magically all better.  By the afternoon, the fish was “sleeping” again.  Once again, Buddy “fixed” it.  By the next morning, we had a “sleeping” fish for the third time.  Buddy took the fish away to “fix”, worked his magic, and returned with it all better.  At this point, he quietly pulled my mom aside and told her that the people at the pet store had explained that you have to put de-chlorination drops in the fish’s water, and handed her a small bottle of drops.  The fish didn’t “fall asleep” again.  We had been lucky to have such a wonderful friend and a pet store nearby!

So, fast forward about 35 years.  We would really like for Beth to understand where food comes from.  Being four seems the perfect age to start a garden and teach her how to take care of the plants and how the plant life cycle works.  My mom has been wanting a garden and Beth stays with my mom three days a week, so this seemed like the perfect project for them to work on.  My mom went out and bought a big metal water trough and bags of potting soil.  She and Beth chose some seeds to plant - carrots, green beans, and basil.  They planted their garden in August and started caring for it.  The plants were doing beautifully and it wasn’t long until they had a virtual forest of plants growing all over the trough.  The beans were crawling up the trellis my mom had placed there, and the basil and carrots were growing daily.

Every day, my mom took Beth out to check on the garden.  She taught her how to check the soil for moisture and how to give the plants a drink when the soil was dry.  They pulled any weeds that tried to grow and sprayed the leaves with organic bug deterrent when something started eating the plants.  Beth took her job very seriously and took excellent care of the plants.

Somehow, though, although the carrots were growing tall, leafy tops, there were no orange carrots underneath.  After a few months, my mom checked them to see if they were ready for Beth to harvest and found tiny, little half-inch carrots at the bottom of 18 inch stalks.  Thinking quickly and remembering Buddy and the goldfish, my mom waited until Beth was at preschool, and drove to the nearby grocery store.  She bought a bunch of organic carrots with the leafy tops attached, hurried home and buried them in the garden where the failed carrots had been.  When Beth got home from school, my mom  invited her to pick “her carrots”.  Beth was delighted to see how her hard work had paid off!

My mom may have cheated a little, but to us, it was more important that Beth have the experience of working hard and being successful at something.  She will try even harder the next time we give her a project, because she will feel that she can be successful.  One of our biggest goals as parents (and educators) is to instill in our children a desire to try hard, persevere through to the end of a project, and enjoy being successful and learning as they go.  Sometimes it just takes a little magic to make that happen.

Discipline and the Intelligent Child

This is a topic that my husband and I discuss at length, sometimes late into the night.  How do you discipline an intelligent child?  We agreed long before she was born that we would never use any form of violence...no spanking, no swatting.  Studies show that violence teaches violence and we want Beth to understand that violence is never the answer to any question.  If we want peace in the world, we need to teach children that the best way to resolve a disagreement is through discussion, open-mindedness, and mutual understanding, not violence.  So, we agreed when Beth was born that we would use the “Time-Out” method of discipline.  

Time-Out gives Beth some quiet time to rethink and understand her actions (or lack thereof) and think about her choices.  We are very big on choices.  My husband is very good, both with his students and Beth, about discussing how choices can affect people and can have consequences.  (He says every Friday to his classes of high school Seniors, “Have fun, be safe, and make good choices!”)  He always stops Beth, before she does something wrong like throwing a toy, and calmly asks her, “Is throwing Elmo a good choice or a bad choice?”.  He explains that throwing the toy will not accomplish anything, will not fix the problem,and might break the toy.  Then he explains that the good choice is to ask for help or put the toy away, or whatever the appropriate thing to do happens to be.  Nine time out of ten, Beth calms down and makes the good choice.

The problem occurs when we get one of those one-out-of-ten situations.  Like when Beth was three and got upset that I wouldn’t let her play another game before dinner.  In frustration, she tried to hit me.  I stepped out of reach, but recognized what she had done.  She was sent to Time-Out for three minutes (remember their attention span is only as many minutes as they are years old, so three minutes for a three-year-old).  Time-Out means she has to sit on the love-seat in her bedroom all by herself without any toys.  

We hover outside her bedroom door the whole time she is in Time-Out, ready to rush in if she gets too upset.  In this particular instance, she was fine.  At the end of the three minutes, we went in to talk with her.  My husband, James, crouched down and looked Beth in the eye.  “I want to know if you know why you have been in Time-Out?” he asked.  Beth replied, “What I want to know is, why is this couch so comfortable?!?”  Her delivery was impeccable.  I completely lost it.  I had to put my head down on the couch, I was laughing so hard.  My whole body was shaking, and tears of silent laughter were raining from my eyes.  I have no idea how James kept a straight face, but he very calmly put a hand on my back and said, “See, Beth, you’re making Mommy sad because you don’t feel bad about trying to hit her.”  I finally pulled myself together and lifted my head.  Beth, upon seeing the tears rolling down my cheeks, got sad and apologised.  I told her that I was upset that she tried to hit me, but that I forgave her  We hugged her and went off to dinner.  I’m not saying guilt is the best tool to use, but I am glad it worked that time.  I really have no idea how I would have handled the situation by myself, or what we would have done had James not thought so quickly.  I mean, obviously, Beth had been thinking while in Time-Out, but definitely not about what we needed her to think about.

We had another similar situation this evening.  As a four-year-old, Beth has been having trouble “turning on her listening ears” and ignores us the first two or ten times we ask her to do something (especially something she doesn’t want to do, like take a bath).  She had been asked four times to please go to her bathroom and start getting ready for bath.  When she ignored my husband for the fifth time, he finally looked at her and said, “Beth!  I don’t know what to do to make you listen.  What will help you listen better?!?”  Beth enthusiastically replied, “Cheese!!!”  Once again, I failed in my duties of being the adult and had to dive behind the kitchen counter to hide my laughter.  My husband glared at me over the counter while explaining to Beth that we were not going to give her cheese to make her listen to us.

My mom, who was a Kindergarten teacher before she retired, told me that we needed to try rewarding the good behavior, rather than always punishing bad behavior.  We have tried a sticker chart for good behavior, and it worked to a point.  As long as we were at home, and could give her the sticker immediately, the sticker chart was great.  But, when we were out in public and didn’t have the chart nearby, or when my aunt is watching her, the sticker chart just wasn’t as appealing.  So far, the only thing that really worked for us was using Santa Claus as leverage from about Halloween through Christmas.  It wasn’t something I was especially proud of, but one mention of having to send Santa a message and tell him Beth wasn’t being good this year, and she was perfect.  Too bad we can’t use Santa all year round!

Sometimes I am at a complete loss on how to deal with this child.  She is so intelligent that most of the time we can reason with her like we would an adult and she understands and responds correctly.  I think that might be what makes it more difficult when she actually acts her age and throws a tantrum or acts out like a four-year-old.  Our biggest challenge right now is listening to instructions and doing things the first (or even second or third) time we ask.  I don’t know how many more times we can ask her not to use the sofa as a trampoline.  If you have a magical trick that works, please leave it in the comments!  We would love to hear what works for other intelligent kids.  What do you do to discipline your intelligent child in a way that they understand and learn?

Creating a Reading Child

As educators, my husband and I recognize the importance of reading.  We want Beth to enjoy reading, to inhale books the way I do.  I am, in fact, a school librarian, so reading is very near and dear to my heart.  I have watched students come into the library with their classes to pick books for independent reading, and have seen the huge gap between the “reading kids” and the “non-reading kids”.  The reading kids joyfully browse through the shelves, loading their arms with books and asking about the next book in their favorite series.  The “non-reading kids” try to hide behind the stacks or in a corner of the library, hoping that nobody will notice that they haven’t selected a book.  When they finally,usually with coercion,select a book, it is usually one that we invisibly label as “below reading level” or for struggling readers.  One thing that I notice over and over is that the biggest difference between these students isn’t about intelligence.  It is usually based on their ability to read...if reading is difficult, it is not fun,and if it is not fun, why would they willingly do it? If reading is easy, the reader can sit back and enjoy the story, rather than struggle with vocabulary and grammar.  With that in mind, we set out to start Beth on the path to becoming a lifelong reader and lover of books.   As educators, we are uniquely prepared to offer Beth the support she needs to become a lifelong reader.  And, we want to share that with you.

The first step towards creating a reading child is to read to them.  We read to Beth everyday, and have since she was born.  In fact, we even read to her in utero, because we had been told that she could hear us.  We have made it a priority to make sure there are plenty of books accessible to her and to read to her every day.  In the car, she doesn’t have toys to play with; she has books and a MeReader.  (The reader is really cool and reminds  me of a modern version of the cassette books we used to listen to as kids.  Do you remember those?  It would read the story to you and ding when it was time to turn the page.)

One thing I think people forget in this process is modeling.  Model the behavior you want to achieve.  In this case, let your kid see you reading.  Not just reading, but enjoying your reading.  Pick something you actually want to read and sit down in the middle of the house and read.  You will be amazed at how quickly your child climbs into your lap and asks about what you are reading.  Don't be annoyed by the interruption (trust me, I know how hard it is not to get annoyed when you are interrupted during reading).  They are doing exactly what you want….getting interested in reading!  This is the perfect time to hand them a book and read it together.  Put your book down (sorry, you'll have to read later) and read with your child.  If you have started working on the alphabet, start asking them to identify letters as you read (Can you find a “t” on this page?).  If you haven't started the alphabet yet, that's the next step.

Ready to tackle the alphabet?  There are many resources to help you.  We bought flashcards for Beth (found them at the $1 store), but you could easily make your own with a pack of index cards.  We also downloaded several apps to her tablet and tested them out.  The best one we found is Starfall ABCs.  All of the Starfall apps are terrific (more about those later).  We also bought Dr. Seuss’s Alphabet Book and a package of magnetic letters.  Then, we took all of these resources and started practicing with her.  Short sessions every day.  Keep in mind that the average attention span is the number of minutes that corresponds with your age.  So, for a three-year-old, that means they essentially have a three minute attention span.  Keep your letter sessions to five minutes.  You can do three or four sessions a day, but if your child seems uninterested or resistant, back off.  The key is to make reading fun.  For many kids, they enjoy the “work” just because it means extra one-on-one time with mommy or daddy.  If they don't seem to be enjoying it, try to make it into a game or incorporate some of their favorite things (Rrrrocket starts with “rrrr”.  “R” says “rrrr”.  Rrrrocket starts with “R”.  Can you find “R” for rrrrocket?).  They also love to learn the letters in their name.  (“B” says “bbbb”.  “B” for Beth.). As they learn the alphabet and what each letter says, they are building the foundations to start reading.

Once your child can recognize all the letters of the alphabet and tell you which sound they make, it is time to start putting those letters together to read.  One  of my favorite apps for this level  is the Starfall Learn To Read app; another free one.  With the help of this app, some fun games we play, and lots of practice, Beth is now sounding out words.  Mostly three letter words right now.  We use the magnetic letters and a small whiteboard to play “The Letter Game”.  The game starts when I put up a three letter word. Beth has to sound it out, tell me what it is, them she gets to change one letter to make a new word (for example, “hop” becomes “hot”). Then I get to change one letter (“hot” becomes “pot”).  The game continues back and forth until she gets tired of playing; usually about 10-15 minutes.  I love this game!  Beth lives to make silly words for me, then she giggles like crazy when I have to read the word (“poop” is one of her favorites, although “toot” may be a close second).  

I was very proud of her tonight.  She read her first five letter word (stars).  Her daddy and I made a big deal about it and sang the “Proud of You” song.  She was proud of herself and excited to read more.  That is the goal.  As long as she always wants to read more, I will know I have done my job well.

Your Kid(s) Can Code: Even Before They Start Going To School!

We live in a world full of technology, and what parent wouldn’t want their kid to become a successful tech person?  Think of all of the jobs out there available to someone who knows how to code.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, software development jobs are projected to rise by 19% by 2024.  Not only would learning to code help to line your kid up for one of those jobs, but the prices of learning to code also teaches some valuable lessons and thinking methods.  Learning to code teaches logical thinking, problem solving, and computational literacy.  Not every child will become a coder for their profession, but the skills that coding teaches can be applied to any career out there.

So, when should your child start learning to code?  They can start as young as three years old.  We started Beth when she was three and she loved it!  She constantly asks to play “her code game”.  There are several ways to access coding games for children.  The place to start online is Code.org.  Code.org is a fantastic non-profit organization that encourages kids of all ages, locations, and situations to learn to code.   They are that every child should have an opportunity to learn computer science skills, and they especially target females and underrepresented minorities.  The Code.org Hour of Code program is a great place to start with any child.  They have coding games that will appeal to any child.

If you have an iPad or Android tablet, there are excellent free apps that you can download to let your child use to start learning the basics of coding.  Some of our favorites are Lightbot: Code Hour, Tynker, and Hopscotch (iOS only).  Beth desperately wanted to do the Code.org Frozen coding game, but it was a little too difficult for her when she was three.  We found that the Lightbot: Code Hour app was very doable for her at that age, as long as we monitored and helped out as needed.   

The Lightbot: Code Hour app features a robot that has to move across a maze of tiles and light up certain tiles.  The player has to give the bot commands (move forward, turn, jump, and light up) using buttons with pictures on them to illustrate the command.  Once the player has placed all the commands in the command box, they can run the commands and watch the bot do what the player has told them to do.  Beth loved telling the bot what to do and got so excited every time she got a command sequence right.  The mazes increase in difficulty as the player gets better.  One they move up to level two, they start creating instructional sequences that repeat.  It all seems like fun and games, but they really are learning the building blocks of coding.

A second app that is pretty fun is called Tynker.  This app allows the player to choose from several different games and characters.  Once they start the game, the player has to connect puzzle type command prompts (“walk”, “jump”, etc.) to move their character through the challenges.  Unlike the prompt pieces in Lightbot Hour, which have pictures of arrows and turn signals on them, the pieces in Tynker have the actual words written on them.  For this reason, I would recommend waiting on this app until Kindergarten or First Grade, when your child is able to read.

Hopscotch is another app that is geared toward elementary kids.  I would say that this is the most advanced and difficult of the the apps I am talking about.  It offers players the choice of many different projects to work on, them guides them through writing the code.  This one does require a bit of reading, so I think it is better suited to older kids (second grade and up), unless you are prepared to sit with them the whole time to read instructions and explain.  One thing I really like about using this app as a step-up app for coding though, is that it actually has the player create “when this, then this” type of coding instructions, which are more like the logic sequences required for real coding.

All that being said, I truly believe that any type of coding or pre-coding that kids do will improve their critical thinking and logic skills, skills that will serve them well as they grow. So get your kid(s) coding!

How to Entertain and Involve Your Kids During NFL Playoffs

If you're anything like us, you would love to be able to watch the Playoff games and Superbowl.  The question that always comes up…how to occupy the kids.  Of course, the easy answer is to put on a movie.  But, why not entertain them with some educational activities that you can supervise while still watching the game?

This whole thing does take some prep before the game starts, but doing a little work before the game will benefit the actual watching of the game immensely.  Totally worth it.

Things to do before the game:

• Print out a few football related coloring pages from online and have a good box of crayons or markers ready.  You will tell them they need to color them in using the colors of the team you are rooting for. Do a Google search for "free football coloring pages" and you will find plenty of sites with free pages for you to print.
• Make Bingo cards with all types of animals on them.  Buy a few cheap prizes (I love $1 stores!).  You will use these Bingo cards to look for animals during the commercials.  If they get a Bingo, they get a prize. There are several websites that you can use to make your bingo cards if you search for "free bingo card generator".
• Make sure you have plenty of snacks that you don't mind your kid(s) eating (fruit, veggie sticks with dip, popcorn, etc.)
• Convince your child to create a touchdown dance they can perform each time your team scores (good exercise for them, too).
• Create a safe path to somewhere in your house that they have to run and touch for luck on each 4th down.  Make sure they can get back and forth without getting hurt.  This one will really wear them out...sometimes Beth sits and watched the whole second half after doing this one the first half!

Once the game starts, the first thing we do is make sure Beth knows which team we are rooting for.  Since she is only four, we just go by the colors and mascot.  We then tell her to work throughout the game to color her pictures in the color of “her” team.  We make sure to tell her when she needs to do a 4th Down Run.  When she returns from the run, we all give her high fives, like she’s coming out of the tunnel.  During the commercials, we watch for animals (or whatever pictures you choose) and play Bingo.  Her favorites (and Daddy’s too, for obvious reasons) are the touchdown dances...she loves to perform the dance and song made up for the touchdowns, while we cheer.  

It takes some prep, but it IS possible to watch a football game with your four-year-old.  And, the time spent together is even more fun than watching the game.

Weather Forecast Looking Bad? How About Using the Cold to Entertain and Educate Your Kids!

The weather forecast is predicting some cold weather for us this weekend, so I thought it might be fun to come up with some activities to use the weather to our advantage. We don't get really cold weather very often and Beth is fascinated by the icy air. Any time she is fascinated by something, we try to use that as a learning opportunity. I don't know about you, but I know that I am way more likely to actually learn about things I am interested in.

So, we decided to start with a simple overnight activity. We filled a plastic cup half way with water and plastic pony beads (just to make it prettier) and drew a line on the cup at the water level.

We put the cup on our back porch before bedtime. The next morning, the temperature 18 degrees. We went outside and got our frozen cup. We talked to Beth about how water gets bigger when it freezes and takes up more space (“See how the ice is higher than the line where the water was?”). We talked about how to get the beads out of the firm water (“Can you think of a way for us to get the beads out without breaking the cup?”). We talked about other things that can freeze when the temperature gets low outside and things you can do to prevent freezing (“Why do you think Daddy put covers over the faucets in the yard?”)

There are abundant opportunities for critical thinking. Science is fun. Cold weather doesn't have to mean we sit on the couch and watch TV (although there will certainly be a little of that, too).

Tomorrow, we will blow up a balloon and take it out in the cold air to deflate, then back into the warm house to re-inflate, so she can observe what happens to air when it gets colder and hotter. These are simple science learning activities that are fun, easy, and cheap...right up our alley!

Want more ideas for cool things you can do with your kids in cold weather? It's easy to look for sites with great ideas...Just do a Google search for "weather experiments for kids" and you'll be entertaining and learning in no time!

How to Turn a Bad Choice into a Learning Experience

We are very lucky.  We have family nearby who are willing to watch our daughter, Beth, for us while we work full-time.  We are both educators, working in the same large public high school. My husband teaches classes and I am one of the librarians.

Today, my aunt brought Beth for a visit at the school around lunch time.  They came to visit me first, then Beth wanted to see Daddy.  We walked down to his room and said hi for a minute (high school girls love seeing 4-year-olds!).  We then returned to the library and told Beth it was time for her to leave and go to lunch.  She is having a hard time with our return to work after the two week Holiday Break.  She repeatedly ran back to me to say goodbye.  The first two times I tried to redirect her by giving her an important job to do (text me a picture of her lunch).  The third time I had to be firm and tell her it was time for Mommy to go back to work.  They successfully left.

It wasn't until the end of the day that I learned that after leaving the library, Beth broke away from my aunt and ran all the way through the very large school (nearly 4,000 students), through the cafeteria crowded with high school students, and returned triumphantly to my husband's classroom.  She was very excited that she found the way.  She ran so fast, my aunt couldn't keep up and quickly lost her in the maze of halls.  Luckily, Beth remembered the way to Daddy's classroom, and he was able to walk her back to my, now panicked, aunt.

The dilemma: how to reprimand her for the bad behavior, but compliment her memory?  We explained that we were proud of her for finding Daddy's classroom, but that she made a choice when she ran away, and that it was not a good choice to make.  We asked if she understood the choice that she made, and she confirmed that she chose not to stay with my aunt.  We asked her what might have been a better choice, and she replied, "to stay with Aunt".

Beth is extremely sensitive and thoughtful.  If we had simply berated her for running away, she would have broken down.  We strive to always turn mistakes into learning experiences.  She is smart enough, even at four, to comprehend.