Mom it Forward » School

Summer Learning: Math and Reading Sidewalk Chalk Activities

Shell Roush — Thu, 17 May 2012 17:00:41 +0000

Very soon, the kids will be out of school for summer. While that means lots of fun activities, we don’t want them to experience too much of the “summer slide,” where they lose some of what they learned during the school year. To avoid this, it’s a good idea to add some educational activities to your summer plans. But that doesn’t mean you have to sit down at a desk and use workbooks. You can make learning fun!

All you need is sidewalk chalk and you can practice math and reading skills with your child all summer.

Reading Activities:

Write out the letters of the alphabet and have your child identify each as he/she jumps from one letter to another.
Have your child spell out common words by jumping to the correct letters in the word in order.
Write out capitals and lower case letters and have your child match them. Your child can jump from one to the next to make a match, or throw a ball or bean bag (or even water balloon!) at the matching letter.

Write out common sight words and have your child find the correct one as you call them out, or have them read the words as they hop from one to the next.
Have your child throw a bean bag and give rhyming words for the word they land on, or make a sentence using that word.

Math Activities:

Draw a number line. Depending on your child’s age, you can have them write in the numbers.
Practice number line math: start on 3 and take 5 steps. So 5+3=8. You can also do addition and subtraction or skip counting.

Write out numbers and have your child count their way up or down as they jump to the next correct number.
Toss a beanbag to land on an odd number or even number.

Your kids will see it as playing games with sidewalk chalk, but you’ll know that they are learning!

What other games can you play with sidewalk chalk?

Shell- known as @shellthings on Twitter- wrangles chaos and mayhem on a daily basis (otherwise known as raising three boys). When she’s not breaking up wrestling matches or ducking Legos, she spills her thoughts on her blog, Things I Can’t Say. Featuring the popular weekly link-up “Pour Your Heart Out” and a guest post series titled “Things They Can’t Say,” Shell’s blog is all about encouraging community and support among bloggers. In her free time (ha!), Shell is cofounder of Other Half Media, which takes on blogging and social media projects for bloggers and companies alike. She also team-teaches classes for bloggers on How to Rock Your Blog.

School: How to Find the Right School for Your Kids

Jill Greenlaw — Thu, 03 May 2012 17:00:45 +0000

We all do the best we can to make informed decisions about choosing our children’s school, and the first step is educating ourselves about the choices available. This was a huge learning curve for me as I grew up in England and had to learn a lot about American schools from baby day care through second grade, so far.

I guess the first discussion my husband and I had was pretty typical—public or private? If we chose public, what school district do we live in and how does it rate? We poured over school stats, visited a couple of schools, and crunched our budget, too. It was a lot of information to process.

When we decided to choose public we really did a lot of research. Not only did we talk to parents in our neighborhood, my husband also talked to the bus drivers of the school districts we were considering to get a different perspective.

We are doing everything we can to give our boys a strong educational foundation, but I also believe in allowing them to use that foundation to build their own lives. Of course, I want them all to succeed academically and head off to college and great careers, and I’m here to help them reach their goals. But it all starts with a great primary school education, and I’m so glad we chose the school we did. Now we’re dealing with the usual challenges—balancing work while helping with homework, school projects and other activities, such as baseball, and trying to support our local school district to the best of our ability.

In the eighteen months since I launched my start-up, I feel all of this has been easier than when I worked for a large corporation. As CEO, I implemented a “Comeback Mom” program with a flexible working program for the AboutOne team. This means all employees (including me) can work flexible hours so they can be a homeroom mom or attend school events, and doctor visits without feeling additional pressure to take time off work. We implemented technologies such as Skype and Zendesk mobile support to chat virtually and do customer support from the park if we want to!

While working in a start-up means much longer hours, of course, our home lives feel less stressful and we feel that we spend more time with our families because of these programs. It turns out that founding a start-up was the best choice for me when it comes to helping my children have the best school experience possible!

What do you do in your family to ensure your kids are getting a good education?

Joanne Lang is a mom of 4 boys, a wife, and the founder and CEO of AboutOne, an online family organizer that turns your phone into a remote control for your life, working with your existing calendar and contact tools so you can automatically organize, store, and share family memories and household paperwork. Through web and mobile apps, AboutOne guides you along the path to organization, rewarding you along the way for meeting your organizational goals.

Picture courtesy of flickr

School: How to Develop a Relationship with Your Child’s Teacher

amyestes — Sun, 08 Apr 2012 17:00:35 +0000

One of the biggest concerns that every parent has when sending their child off to school is whether or not their child’s teacher will be a good fit. A child’s relationship with their teacher can absolutely make or break a school year, but a parent-teacher relationship is important as well. There are a few simple ways that you can ensure that this relationship runs smoothly.

How to Develop a Relationship with Your Child’s Teacher

Here are four tips to improve or develop an effective relationship with teachers:

Be a Team Player

First of all, remember that you and the teacher are on the same team, with the same goal: making sure your child succeeds. Sure, there are some difficult teachers out there, but for the most part, teachers want every child to succeed. Approach the teacher with that in mind. Ask how you can help, give them information that would be helpful in getting to know your child. Whenever possible, support efforts in the classroom, whether it be chaperoning or ensuring your child does their homework.

Have an Open Mind

Secondly, be reasonable and open-minded. While your child is amazing and wonderful, they make mistakes. Before assuming your child’s version of a situation is 100% accurate, call or email and inquire. Ask for clarification before judging. Speak to a teacher the way you’d like to be spoken to in a professional situation. Give teachers a reasonable amount of time to reply to emails and phone calls.

Be Professional When Raising Concerns

If there really is a serious situation that requires further intervention, suggest meeting, and request that the teacher’s observing administrator be present. In secondary schools, and occasionally larger elementary schools, the teacher may not be observed by the principal, and reviews are often handled by another person. If you’re looking for intervention by someone in administration, this is the person you should talk with. Be specific in concerns; instead of saying, “You don’t like my child!” try explaining the issues you’ve heard about or observed. Document emails and phone calls, and above all, be respectful and willing to listen.

Say Thank You

Finally, don’t forget to say thank you. Working with students all day long is a difficult task. Many teachers help students make significant gains in their abilities during a school year and it means a lot when parents recognize that. A thank you doesn’t mean a gift, but a heartfelt note or card or better yet, a letter to the principal or school board recognizing their outstanding work with your child.

Who were your children’s favorite teachers and why?

Amy Estes is a high school English teacher living in Sacramento, CA. When she’s not in the classroom, you can find her in a yoga class, cheering on the San Francisco Giants or blogging at Just A Titch.

Image courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons.

Elementary Education: 6 Keys to Finding the Perfect Math Tutor

Jyl Johnson Pattee — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 18:00:35 +0000

My eight year-old son, Connor, has always been a pretty mellow and happy-go-lucky child. That is until this year. About a week before he entered 3rd grade, his half-full glass suddenly became half empty. He claimed he wasn’t starting school because he said he was “bad at math.” He had never complained about being bad at math before and had always received decent grades, so we dismissed his comment, thinking he was more concerned about summer ending and not being able to play with his neighborhood friends as much.

The first week of school was awesome. He came home one day proclaiming that he had “the best teacher ever.” Every day was awesome! The second week, even though he loved his teacher, he was back to not wanting to go to school again.

We finally got to the bottom of the problem. He just was not getting math. He felt stupid in class when he didn’t know the answers. Homework had been really difficult so far so we weren’t doubting him. But, it had escalated to the point where it impacted his confidence. He had little doubt he would always “suck at math” and since that was the case, there was no use in his mind for going to school.

Even though we worked with him every night on his homework and he was able to get through it, it was not without lots of tears, and candidly, lots of persuasive tactics. A friend finally suggested we hire a tutor. I won’t lie that we resisted for a while, feeling like we should be able to help him ourselves and like we were failures as parents if we didn’t. But finally, we gave in and hired a tutor.

6 Keys to Math Tutoring Success

We have found these six things to be helpful in creating a successful tutoring experience:

Find the right person. Finding a great tutor is critical to a successful tutoring experience. We decided to search through word of mouth and an email to Connor’s teacher, asking for help in locating a good tutor. She directed us to my 10 year-old son’s teacher, who happens to be fabulous at math. Score! She started the next week and came twice a week for an hour each time.
Hire the right person. A lot of people have math skills. A lot of people can teach math. But, fewer people come with the right attitude, which I have found to be critical in selecting the right tutor. Ours believes that attitude is half the battle. That if a child can increase his or her math confidence, that the math skills will follow. We have seen this in spades with Connor and are grateful to have found a tutor who focused first and foremost on building confidence.
Build in incentives. The tutor suggested an incentive-based approach to help Connor get over his initial fears of wanting to meet with the tutor. We went to the Dollar Store and bought lots of prizes the tutor could use to reward him. He resisted meeting with a tutor and doing more math until he learned about the prizes.
Create the right environment. Carving out a quiet space where the two could meet was really important. Connor has learned to love his one-on-one tutoring time and doesn’t want anyone to disrupt his learning experience. Even though they meet in our living room and prefer to sit on the carpet, we make sure they have peace and quiet so Connor can focus during the time she is here.
Have the right equipment. The tutor should come with activities and lessons. But, we found having basic supplies and equipment was also helpful. We ensure Connor has his math book from school, his latest tests, a pencil and some paper, as well as a lap top. This helps to maximize the tutor’s time and doesn’t require her to bring a lot of stuff with her.
Communicate! After most tutoring visits, I spend time with the tutor to get up to speed on how Connor is doing and what we can do at home to help him. She has amazing insight and has helped us a lot to be able to help him.

The benefits of hiring a tutor have far outweighed any cost or feelings of failure on our part as parents. Connor is confident at math now. He loves school. And he is acing his tests. Sure, he still has to work hard and maybe even harder than most. But, he is learning the basics early on and loves the subject. He is also learning that sometimes, mastering something requires hard work, diligence, and practice.

What is your experience in hiring a tutor for your kids? What tips do you have for finding the perfect tutor?

Recycling: Elmer’s Glue Crew Challenge for Schools

Jill Greenlaw — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 12:00:34 +0000

Recycling—Going Green is a really important topic right now. Each one of us can take steps and make better choices that will help protect our planet. There are many ways to do this. We can recycle common household items such as aluminum cans, plastic bottles, and paper products. We can also educate our schools on the things they can do to help the earth.

When Elmer’s asked me to take on the Glue Crew Challenge and talk about recycling glue sticks and bottles with my school, I was excited to do it!

First I went online to the www.elmersgluecrew.com and learned about recycling glue products. Second, I downloaded box templates from their website and put together 4 boxes where the students of our school could collect their used glue sticks and bottles. Then as a class we discussed why it is important to recycle. To finish the discussion we provided a hands-on experience where we created Thanksgiving napkin rings using Elmer’s glue and then recycled all of the empty glue bottles into our recycling box.

All bottles that are marked with a #1 or #2 recycling symbol are recyclable, but keep in mind that your Elmer’s Glue Sticks will not be marked because their special plastic can only be recycled at designated facilities.

A few of our students put collection boxes in the school’s kindergarten classrooms and also in the art room. Once a week, our class will go and collect the used containers from these classes.

When the collection boxes are full, there are two ways to return your empties. You can bring the box to a Walmart® store on or after Earth Day on April 22, 2012, and give it to one of the Walmart People Greeters. Another option is once you’ve collected at least 250 empties, put them into a reused box (about the size of a copy paper box). Sign into your account at teracycle.net and click on “Get Mailing Labels” on the left side of the Elmer’s Glue Crew Brigade page to print a pre-paid shipping label. Place the label on your box and take it to a UPS drop-off location.

Our schools use a lot of glue products. Most of them don’t even know they can recycle the used containers. It is important to help educate our schools and students about recycling these products and do our part to take care of the beautiful earth we live on.

What are you doing to recycle in your home? How can we help our schools get involved in recycling?

How to Help Your Child Establish a Successful Homework Schedule

Jyl Johnson Pattee — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 17:00:58 +0000

Now that school is back in session, our focus has shifted from bridging the summer learning gap to helping our kids complete their school assignments with success.

However, this year has been more difficult than most. Our 8-year-old son is struggling with math. His “I suck at math” attitude has made homework an unpleasant experience for everyone in our family.

10 Tips to Help Your Kids Establish a Successful Homework Routine

Here are 10 things that have made all the difference in helping us establish a homework routine:

Schedule a regular time each day to do homework.
Before homework starts, give your kids time to get a snack, decompress, and get exercise. This will help increase their focus.
Create a comfortable study space free of clutter.
Eliminate distractions like TV, noise, clutter, phone calls, video games, etc.
Create family homework time, where everyone does their version of homework at the same time. Our family has family reading time, for example, where everyone sits in the same room and reads for 30 minutes. We then share a brief summary of what we read.
Teach your kids to check their work and do their best. Only when they’ve done that, step in and give them feedback and assist them. Don’t do the work for them!
Give them time limits to finish their homework. If a child is having a particularly difficult time finishing an assignment, extend the time frame or step in and help. But, don’t let your child, either out of perfectionism or frustration, continue on and on with one single assignment.
Plan assignments in advance with a planner, calendar, or school bulletin board in your home. Go over the homework plan for the month at the beginning of each month. For bigger assignments like reports, break the requirements (if they already haven’t been broken down by the teacher) into bite-sized chunks of work so your children don’t get overwhelmed.
Reward your children for good grades, good behavior, and for their effort. Getting an A for effort is a thing of the past, but it shouldn’t be in our homes. Not every child is going to get an A, but their effort in sticking to a homework routine and doing their very best is worthy of a reward.
If your child struggles and homework time is simply unbearable for the both of you, first talk to the teacher to see how he or she is performing in class. If the subject is very difficult for him or her, create a plan to increase knowledge or to get caught up. If homework time becomes so negative that it starts to impact school attendance (if a child stops wanting to attend school, for example), consider Online tutoring options, getting an offline tutor, or working out an arrangement with the school to have some in-school help.

What is your homework routine? What rewards and incentives do you use to encourage your children? How do you help a child who is struggling with a particular subject?

Encouragement: Dream Big and Make Your Dreams Come True

tammykling — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 23:00:40 +0000

What is your biggest dream? Aside from raising happy healthy kids, what is it you aspire to do? My kids are accustomed to hearing me say, “Anything is possible!” Because it’s true. You can be anything you want to be and do anything you want to do in this great big world. My six year-old, a realist, finally said, ”No mom, anything is not possible. Humans can’t fly.”

Don’t get me started on the ways and possibilities. Sure, they can’t really fly. Not naturally, like a bird with wings. But we can, in fact fly, in so many ways. Gliders, airplanes, parasailing… Give me a second and I’ll make you a list!

I am drawn to anything is possible thinkers. Dreamers excite me. And that’s why recently at an Open Air Ministries Board meeting In Dallas, something inside me leapt with excitement when a girl mentioned building a homeless school. Nakina sat across the table and gave her vision.”Well, I didn’t really want to mention it right now,” she said quietly.

It was a big dream. But each one of us jumped all over it. “Yes!” one person said excitedly, and we discussed the possibility of serving the thousands of homeless children living in shelters or under bridges, who don’t fit in at a regular school. Talk about special needs!

The only school for homeless kids in the country is in California and they serve a hundred and fifty or so students. And the need is great. Dallas has thousands of homeless kids. They can’t buy new clothes, shoes, or the jerseys, balls, instruments, or supplies for extra-curricular activities. They cant afford to bring their lunches. I’ve worked with homeless families.

If there is a parent, they have no car to get the child to school. They have no home so the child has to go without showering or food a lot of the time. Many nights they roam the streets, sleep on the floor of a shelter, or under a bridge.

We will have night school for the adults. We will hire special teachers, with a heart for giving, over academics. We will provide great programs, clothing, shoes, resources, training, and health and wellness.

Building a homeless school for children who live on the street seems like a worthy dream. And as we sat around the table, the dream became bigger, all because one person dared to dream it.

What is your biggest dream? How will you pursue this dream and make it come true?

Photo courtesy of Flickr.

Tammy Kling is a life coach, advocate for the homeless, and international author of 29 books including The Compass. Tammy is also the founderr of Write it Out, an organization that helps gang members, the homeless, and those living on the street write out their hopes & dreams via writers workshops, free journals and various other resources.

In addition to writing and coaching, Tammy is a mom of two boys, an avid trail and mountain runner, blogger, and adventure travel writer.

Confidence: Spiderman Backpacks Increase Teen’s Self Esteem

Jill Greenlaw — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 11:00:40 +0000

Before the first day of school each year, I give my four children the chance to go through a bin of recycled backpacks. My daughter, a ninth grader, informed me that she didn’t need one. She had taken the initiative to buy her own and this backpack proudly displayed Spiderman!

You heard me right. My 14 yearold daughter is gracing the halls of her new charter high school with a Spiderman backpack. Her cousin, who is going with her, chose Phineous & Ferb.

I am amazed at how brave these two kids are. They decided to walk into a new situation confident, self assured, and unafraid of the unknowns.

At registration, instead of hanging back and being afraid, my daughter immediately ran up to people she knew an gave them all hugs. For people she didn’t know, she stuck out her hand and said, “Hi, my name is Jessica!” I was so proud of my daughter in this moment. People gravitate towards happy, positive people. All the times I told her that she was smart, kind, and beautiful had prepared her for this moment.

Since school began, more and more high school kids are sporting new action figure back packs. This is because two kids stood up for what they wanted to do, and didn’t care what other people thought of them.

What are you doing to build your child’s self esteem? How are you trying to raise future leaders?

Life Lessons: A Story About Bullying

Jen Tilley — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 11:00:04 +0000

When I was a kid, bullying was frowned upon but that’s about it. If something happened at school a common response would be for the teacher to simply say, “Well, he’s a bully.” Apparently, a child couldn’t help if he was a bully any more than he could help being left-handed. I may not have liked it, but that’s the way things were.

Aside from the occasional schoolyard scrap, it wasn’t until the fifth grade that I had a bullying experience that I considered worth mentioning. We sat four to a table in Miss Kinney’s class, with two of us on one side and two on the other. James was assigned to sit across from me. He was a new student, and he didn’t play well with others. I can look back now and see that he probably had ADHD, and he certainly had a difficult situation at home.

As I was leaving the school to walk home one day, I ran into James. We were at a far corner of the schoolyard and there wasn’t anyone else around. Except his mom. She was leaning against their car and was yelling something to him as he walked toward me. I remember being puzzled because it sounded like she was telling him to hit me. I just kept on walking but James quickly closed the gap and gave me a shove. With his mom eagerly egging him on, telling him to beat me up.

I was wearing a heavy winter coat and I kept my hands in my coat pockets the entire time. He hit me. He pushed me. He knocked me down. It wasn’t so much that I was scared, as I was confused because my mind simply couldn’t process that an adult was doing this. I remember hearing James’ mom yell for him to hit me in the face, which he must have done because I ended up with a bloody nose. Shortly thereafter she said he could stop.

And then she told us to get in the car, and she drove me home.

It wasn’t my finest moment, as I never really did fight back. But through the experience I formed a firm resolve that I would never be dominated like that again. Through the years, I occasionally came across a few other tormentors, but I met their fire with bigger fire and the situations were quickly defused.

Times have changed since I was a kid and bullying is far less tolerated. My boys’ school makes very clear that such behavior will not be tolerated, and they mean it. Any time I’ve become aware of a problem the school has been quick to resolve the situation.

I have no doubt that bullying will always occur to some extent. But as a parent, I am thrilled that the issue is not considered simply a part of growing up.

Has your child ever been bullied? What steps did you take to stop the bullying? What rules does your school have in place to deal with bullying?

Possibilities: 5 Ways Mom Can Overcome Back-to-School Blues

Jyl Johnson Pattee — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 23:00:40 +0000

I’ve been seeing a lot of tweets and hearing a lot of chatter among my mom friends about their kids entering pre-school, going into kindergarten, or their youngest progressing to all-day school. Back-to-school time can be a bitter sweet mixture of tears and smiles for all involved.

My youngest entered all-day kindergarten only a year after I had quit my corporate job. I remember feeling almost violated. “Why would I quit my job only to have one year at home with my kids? And furthermore, what on earth was I going to do with a seven-hour stretch during the day now that they were gone?”

Tips to Making the Most of Your Time While Kids Are in School

Whether your oldest just entered school or your youngest left you feeling like an empty nester prematurely, here are five ways to overcome the back-to-school blues:

Dream big! Write down a list of things you’d like to do, things just for you. When I first started blogging, my youngest was just entering all-day kindergarten. I wrote this post, outlining the various possibilities of what I could do during school hours. After reading that post yesterday and thinking back on how hard that moment had been, I couldn’t believe how much has changed in my life in three years. I even accomplished one of the things I wrote down, which was to visit Africa and get involved in global initiatives. So, dream big! Write down your possibilities and you’ll be amazed at what you accomplish.
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Get together with other moms in your area. Don’t go through the tough times alone. Lots of other moms are experiencing what you’re going through. Plan a monthly lunch club, join a book club, ask a friend to go to exercise classes at the gym with you while the kids are in school. Have a fun time building relationships and getting to know other moms.
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Develop your skills. Admit it! You have been wanting to learn photography or how to decorate cakes or to improve your gardening skills. Maybe you want to go back to school or start freelancing. Whether you want to start or continue a hobby, get educated, or get a job, look into your options! See what choices are out there for you and go for it!
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Have the right attitude! I think a lot of times, especially if we’re stay-at-home moms, we think we still need to be watching after the kids while they are in school all day. Remember that by making me time and strengthening yourself, you will be better able to raise strong kids. Don’t let your house go to pot, but just make sure to carve out time for yourself and no guilt allowed when you do!
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Be part of their school experience. The first couple of years my kids were in school seemed busier than my past job. I was PTO president one year, designed the yearbook the next year, chaired the cultural awareness committee as well as the school carnival in addition to volunteering weekly in the classroom. To say I went overboard is an understatement. But, at the same time, I really knew what was going on in their school lives and I was happy to help make a difference. Volunteering at the school comes in so many forms. And statistics show that kids do better when their parents are involved. So don’t be afraid to use some of your new found time to go into the classroom and make a difference in your child’s education.

Whatever you do, know that these back-to-school blues don’t last forever. The school year is such a fun time for both parents and children and there is so much to look forward to!

What is the biggest joy and challenge of sending your kids off to school each year? Tips for making the most of the school years?