Archive for May, 2008

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Develop reading habits in children

Thursday, May 15th, 2008

Most parents who love to read want their children to also love reading. With most children nowadays prefer watching TV and playing computer games than reading, instilling the love of reading can be a challenging task. Here are some good practices if you are serious about developing reading habits in your children.

First of all, collect and surround your children with good books.  Your collection must consist of a variety of books with different themes and with colorful and attractive pictures. Allow them to choose the books they are interested in.

The next thing in developing their love and skills in reading is to read aloud the books of their choice.  Other than stories, you can also read a lot of books with facts to draw them into the wonderful world of knowledge and of course to broaden their understanding of the world around them.

As a start, get the children in your life the personalized books. Most children will be excited to read a book that mentioned their names and has personalized story lines!

Posted in Parenting, Pre Reading Activities | 2 Comments »

Children who are underachieving

Thursday, May 8th, 2008

Being lazy and dumb are the two labels for students with poor grades ever since time immemorial. Parents and sadly many teachers are led to accept these as the reasons for poor academic performance. In actual fact, many children with considerable academic ability fail at subjects in which they should succeed. That’s why one often see on school reports these dreaded stereotyping comments such as ‘Not working to potential’, ‘Lazy’, or worse still, ‘Dumb’ but in disguised terms.

Why they are so many children work below their capacity? Underachieving is not a simple problem and should certainly be a matter of great concern for parents and the education system.

They are two types of situations under achievements are often identified. The first is where children only achieve on occasions when the mood takes them. It seems when an emotional crisis erupts: a relationship breaks up; a family crisis; a personality clash with a teacher, all these can trigger their refusal to work or put themselves forward.

The second situation is potentially much more serious. The child may have many characteristics that give him a label hard to remove. They may become aggressive, giving vent to their frustration by causing trouble or they may become sulky and withdrawn and refuse to develop their talent. Many concerned parents would try to motivate them or some would dangle carrot sticks to get them to work i.e. promise of expensive gifts, a Disney World or Vegas vacations!

Sadly, over eighty percent of identified underachievers are boys! Studies within the western world’s education and cultural setting even indicated a range of 25-75% among these under achievers are are actually gifted children!

Generally, these children have few long-term problems if they can get immediate help to overcome their difficulty and their progress at school is closely monitored. In the western world, there have started some boarding schools cater the teens with this aim, to help the many underachieving children from fallen victim to the expectations of society and of their families.

Posted in Education | No Comments »

Concern about socialization aspect of homeschooling

Thursday, May 8th, 2008

Many parents were concern about the aspect of socialization when it comes to homeschooling their children. They are afraid that homeschooling environment will provide limited interaction, which is detrimental to the growth and development of a child.

Generally, homeschooled children get individual attention thus are more aware of the implications and the purpose of their learning. They are encourage to be inquisitive, trained to ask intelligent questions and make careful and correct observations. They see what what and how their parents conduct themselves, thus begin their life by imitating their parents. In another word, they are protected from the detrimental influences of their peers.

Whereas children are often put into a fiercely competitive environment in public schools, which they are not encouraged to work cooperatively. What kind of social skills are we talking about and what kind of interaction do you get in this kind of environment?

Posted in homeschooling | No Comments »

Organizing educational tours

Thursday, May 8th, 2008

It’s never an easy task to organize an educational tour, it needs careful planning for a balance of educational travel experiences and cultural activities, combined with recreational opportunities. The educational travel components can be thematic or the content can be chronologically arranged, which essentially aim to provide participants with a well-rounded cultural and educational travel experience.

Most school won’t have enough resources to organize such a tour because it takes more effort than arranging a family vacation. You may just make a reservation at Outer Banks rentals for your family vacation and pack your suitcase to go there on the designated date.  But, there are a lot more arrangements and planning involved when organizing a vacation or tour for a group of school children. In most cases, it’s better to hire the professional to do the job. They are many companies specialized in organizing educational US tours and educational tours around the world for students. They are more likely to be able to negotiate for a group discount for all the entrance tickets i.e. for a trip to Disney World, getting discount Disney World tickets will save a lot of money! They can also organize the tour according to the precise cultural and educational requirements of your student tour group based on the dates, themes and destinations of your choice, and the specific goals for your educational student tour.

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More parents setup home based business

Thursday, May 8th, 2008

More and more people especially mothers are setting up home based business in order to have the best balance between earning and being close to family and children. With a home based business, the working hours can be flexible and schedule according to the needs of the family and children.

Other than starting a business, you can also get a job that allows you to stay home. There are many forms of home based jobs. If you are looking at the classifieds for jobs in Boston for instance, you can find jobs that allow you to telecommute, which is essentially moving the office back to home. Or it can be providing customers oriented services that deals with catalog, mail orders, delivery services, etc. It can also be a freelancing job that you essentially work as an independent contractor at home i.e. architect, writer, tutor, etc.

The Internet and modern telecommunication system have make it possible to conduct a lot of business activities without an “office”. Communication through telephone, emails and facsimiles are inexpensive and convenient, they help you to connect with the outside world and customers without stepping out the door!

Posted in misc | No Comments »

Order prescriptions online

Tuesday, May 6th, 2008

Being home bound and could not drive after a recent surgery, I could understand the inconvenient of getting prescription drugs for people who are not able to get out the door and have no one around to help. One can be immobile due to physical illness or simply because she or he could not drive out of the door due to healing wounds.

With the availability of online pharmacy, it’s convenient to order your online prescriptions or even acne home treatments send right to your doorstep. However, you do want to make sure you are ordering from a reputable online pharmacy store with licensed pharmacists and physicians who ONLY dispenses FDA-approved medications.

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Ideas for children birthday party

Tuesday, May 6th, 2008

If you are planning a birthday party for your child and are running out of idea for theme of the birthday party, you may want to seek out the help of this professionals i.e. party rental and event organizer.

Nowadays, we can find party rentals that offer so many great equipments and ideas for children, from inflatable play equipment, water works, games and events, you name it. Some of this businesses may have started as home business run out of a garage, but many are providing comprehensive  party ideas and one stop services. If you would like a unique birthday party for your child, you can have bouncing moon, slides and even Jurassic Park inflatable playground, or if your child is older, the inflatable water slide party rentals will offer a greater challenge for a great time with his friends. What more can you ask?

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Wound care delivered to your doorstep

Tuesday, May 6th, 2008

One of the big responsibilities of running a preschool is to ensure the safety of the children and to make sure no one gets hurt. One thing about having active children around, accidents are bound to happen no matter how many precautions are being taken and the adults are paying careful attention! If it happens at home, so it will happen in preschool too, so be understanding and kind if it’s just an accident, not a oversight of the school operator.

Do you have first aids kit around the house? So do make sure you always have dressing, alcohol preps, wound cleanser and antiseptic lying around the house.

Nowadays, you can even order wound care or Beautifeel products online and have them delivered to your doorstep!

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The strength of a family unit

Tuesday, May 6th, 2008

The children and the parents constitute a family unit. The strength of a family lies in the ties and bondage of love that bind all the members of the family together and feel for each other. It’s important to retain this structure in the world that is getting more volatile and chaotic.

Having a peaceful family life experience and supportive parents who protect them certainly help children to grow into responsible and confident adult with well built personalities and strong character who can bear the rough and tough of life.

Children don’t  always remember how many expensive toys you bought them or how many Las Vegas Shows they went or what kind of luxury hotel rooms they stay in during their last vacation trip to Las Vegas, but they would remember you took time to be together with them and how fun it was to do family together.

Children are innocent and immature, but they are pretty sensitive towards the lack of attention or parents who practice favoritism. As parents, it’s our responsibilities to pay equal attention to all of our children, without discrimination and partiality.

When they are younger, it’s the best time to train them with chores and responsibilities as they usually are eager to help. So do not push them away nor discourage them when they want to help. Help them build basic life skills and they will become more confident once they master them. If your children feel that you are genuinely interested in their lives they will actually feel at home with you and will be more cooperative. They will start talking to you. They will share themselves with you.

Posted in Parenting | No Comments »

Do you know of anyone who doesn’t like chocolates?

Tuesday, May 6th, 2008

My niece announced excitedly to her grandparents that her teachers are bringing them to visit a factory next week. Hey, children today have all the luck. Where did we go when we were little children? My teacher took us on a field trip to a shitty little farm where we saw cows and stepped in their shit. Oh my god, I think I hate my childhood. : - )

I jokingly asked her whether her aunt can go along and she didn’t have to think twice before replying “No, it’s for children only!”

Not that I really have time to join the school children to visit to a chocolate factory. But, then, my mind swirled in a vortex of endless free-flowing, creamy Chocolate syrup as it drifted into caramel-flavored, candy-coated, sugar encrusted fantasy factory, whereupon an array of beautifully wrapped chocolate.

Some people believe eating chocolates can cause pimples. I have no idea whether it’s a myth or a truth. But guess you can always use pimple creams to get rid of the pimples if the myth is true! :-)

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