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| << May28, 2008 - Life Support for Mommies |
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Welcome to another edition of Life Support for Mommies. Summer is over and we are entering a new school year! Time to face the challenges of getting little minds ready to learn and grow through another year! Here are some articles to help . . . Goal-Setting for the New School Year By. Kelley Phillips For adults, the arrival of New Year?s Day inspires an optimistic, hopeful look toward the future. They set goals for themselves and endeavor to make positive changes for the New Year. They not only set their goals, but they also come up with a plan to achieve them. Students should be encouraged to approach a new school year in the same way. At the beginning of a new year in school, children should be taught how to set realistic goals and work every day to achieve them. Parents should reinforce the concept that a new year will give the child the opportunity to start new and fix old bad habits. Parents should provide positive encouragement and reinforce the idea that their student can be successful in achieving his or her goals. Within the first week of school, parents and students need to sit down and make a list of goals for the year. These goals should be specific. For example, instead of saying ?I will make better grades? the goal should state ?I will make at least a B in all of my classes?. Instead of saying ?I will improve my study skills? the goal should state, ?I will study for at least one hour a day?. The goals should be focused on areas that need improvement. They should also be realistic and attainable. Most importantly, goals should be stated in a positive way. It should be about what the child will do and not what the child won?t do. Once the list of goals is created transfer the list to a poster board. Let the student decorate the goal poster and then hang it in a prominent spot in his or her bedroom. This will serve as a constant reminder throughout the school year. Also, it is an excellent idea for the student to share the list of goals with the teacher. Often teachers are given negative information about students from prior teachers. By sharing his plan of action for the New Year, the student is letting the teacher know that he is motivated to make a positive change in his school performance. Finally, after the first semester is complete, the list of goals should be edited. Perhaps a new challenge has presented itself or an old one is no longer an issue. If necessary, parents and students can create a new list of goals to finish the school year with. It may be helpful to ask for input from the teacher when reassessing the list of goals. Goal setting is a great activity to reinforce the learning process with students. It is a skill that will be effective throughout the course of the child?s life. It also lets children know that they have the power to change for the better. Putting this power in a student?s hand is a great tool for creating a life-long learner. ********************************************************************* Homework and School - Two Sides of the Same Coin By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Angela_Norton_Tyler]Angela Norton Tyler Homework is sent directly from school, yet many parents don't understand the strong homework and school connection. We sit down, see what comes out of those messy backpacks and hope that between ourselves and our children we will figure it all out. But, in order to know if our children are doing the right homework the right way, parents must fully grasp what is going on at school. Here are some school-homework issues to consider: What is the school and district homework policy? How important is homework to the school? To the teacher? Is homework help available? What kind? Is it worth your child's time? What's Happening at the Schoolhouse? Back to School is the best time of the year, and Back to School Night is the most important night of the school year- at least when it comes to homework! Back to School Night is your opportunity to find out everything you want to know (and some things you don't!) about homework directly from the teacher- and in a public! Ask all of your homework questions, write down the answers, and you will have a clear idea of what your child should be doing for the next 10 months. If you cannot make it to Back to School Night, send someone else and tell them to write down everything! Also, you can meet with the teacher at another time. What's Happening After School? Talk about an obvious homework and school connection! After school programs allow students to do their homework while still at school! Sounds great, doesn't it? But, before you start celebrating, make certain that your child's after school program is good for homework; many are not. If your school's after-school program is good for doing homework, consider your family very, very lucky! What's Happening with the Teacher? Forget lucky- if your child has a teacher with reasonable homework expectations, your family is blessed! Think about it: if the teacher only assigns good homework for good reasons, never gives homework over weekends, vacations and holidays, allows families to be flexible in completing projects and assignments- WOW! You may actually be able to enjoy the school year. The teacher is really the most important variable in the school and homework equation. Find out how to work with your child's teacher so that homework and school can exist peacefully in your family's life. Angela Norton Tyler is the author of the book Tutor Your Child to Reading Success. She is also an educator, business owner and speaker-trainer. This mother of two wears many hats, but the common thread running through them all: empowering parents. Please visit her website http://www.family-homework-answers.com today to find out how Angela can help empower you, your family, your school or your organization. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Angela_Norton_Tyler http://EzineArticles.com/?Homework-and-School---Two-Sides-of-the-Same-Coin&id=1421136 ********************************************************************* Keep Your Kids Safe Online By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Mike_Man]Mike Man Now that kids are growing up with the internet available to them kids are starting to show interest at a younger age. Even my son who is younger than 10 wants to go onto websites that will allow him to play games while chatting with his friends. As a parent that concerns me. The people he is talking to may be there to cause harm. Also whatever your son or daughter does online you are liable under the law for. So what does a parent do? We all are not computer savvy. Here are some tips to help you parent your kids on the web. Learn More Like in any activity it is best you know what your kid is doing and the computer is no exception. Sit down with your child and watch what he or she is doing. Get your kid to explain what is going on. On your own time, do some research for yourself. There may be some things that your kid either forgot to mention or doesn't know about. Keep in View I am completely against kids having a computer in their room for two reasons. Keeping your computer in a high traffic area will encourage your kid not to hide and spend time with the family. Second, you are more available to spot trouble that your kid may not know he or she is in. Talk to Your Kid Have a conversation with your kid what your expectations are. Advise them that the rules on the internet are the same as in your home. Let's be honest. Everyone (including children) are a little more brave on the internet. Monitor and Block Everyone should have monitoring and blocking software on their computers to reduce the potential of bad content coming in. All it takes is misspelling a word and your child may end up at an adult site. There are great software packages out there that will monitor every website your browser goes to and blocks the bad sites. I recommend K9 Web Protection. It is easy to setup and use. It will have everything you need and even has more features than Windows Vista's Family Safety software. You can get K9 for free at http://www1.k9webprotection.com/ Social Networking Many teens are using Facebook and Myspace to communicate with their friends. There is so much that these sites are good for but a teen can get in a whole lot of trouble in these sites as well. It would be unrealistic to expect you're teen to stay off as he or she would just go to a friend's house to access those sites. I recommend being a frequent reader of your teen's profile. Know what's going on. You can even approach your teen asking if you can be their friend on the site. With all these tips you will have the situation under control. There is a little bit of learning involved to the whole process. Look at it this way. You have the opportunity to learn while protecting your kids. It's a win, win situation. For a whole lot more information visit http://safekids.com/ JuicyTek.com is your source to get every last drop out of your tech. Everything from computer hardware/software. Ipods and cell phones. Visit us at http://www.juicytek.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Mike_Man http://EzineArticles.com/?Keep-Your-Kids-Safe-Online&id=1417382 ********************************************************************* |
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