Alot of children today are not developing a love of reading that will help them be successful adults. As parents, our fundamental duty is to prepare our children for adulthood. We give them our love and our time, and by doing this we are preparing them to face the world. Teaching them to read and to love reading will also help prepare them to face the world with confidence and to be successful. Let us not forget what our job is as we continue to help our children grow into healthy and happy adults.

One of my favorite pictures of me was taken when I was about 11/2 years old. I was sitting in a little red rocking chair made by my grandfather reading a book to a big orange a white cat who was sitting in my lap. I am 28 years old now and two of my greatest loves are reading and cats. Ok, maybe my love for cats has not made me successful, but I know that my love for reading has helped me become the person I am today. I am so grateful to my parents for instilling in me a love for reading and education. I don’t remember sitting in that little red chair reading that book, but I do have very fond memories of my mom and dad reading to me, helping me learn to read, and later on helping me with my homework. Because of that healthy respect I have for education, I was able to succeed in college and graduate school. I have a 11/2 year old son now, and I know how important it is to teach him to have a love for reading. I hope that all parents will realize this and will get their children involved in reading at an early age.

About The Author
Paula Wilson is the mother of a 1 year old son. She has developed the WAHM website http://www.wahmresourceplace.com. She is an Independent Consultant for Usborne Books, and her website can be found here: http://www.ubah.com/x1367

Remember high school? You could choose French or Spanish. What you couldn’t choose was to be the right age to learn a new language easily. You memorized verbs, but you probably didn’t learn to speak fluently.

Today, enlightened school systems know better. Second languages are introduced in elementary school. Little kids do learn more easily than high school students.

But current research says to really do it right, start even earlier. Start when the child is learning a first language. Babies have an astonishing ability to absorb. And in today’s complex world, a second language is not a luxury – it’s a necessity.

We know now that studying a second language offers surprising benefits to children. Research has demonstrated improved ability to communicate, better cognitive development, richer cultural awareness and, ultimately, better job opportunities for those who know a second language.

What’s more, today’s children will all be required to have command of two languages by the time they reach college.

Research suggests that from birth through age 10 is the best time to introduce new languages to a young child. The child will learn the language faster, retain it better and most often speak it with near-native pronunciation. Recent research indicates a young child up through age 5 can learn and process up to five languages!

Many parents deliberate over how to bring a new language into their little one’s life. Many experts agree the bilingual approach for the very young child is best. Teach the new language alongside the native language. It’s as easy as pointing to a cat and saying “cat” then following with “gato.”

This bilingual method provides continuing education in the child’s native tongue while acquiring skills in the new one. Language experts agree the strong sense of pride, higher self-esteem and long term retention are all reasons to introduce the new language with this bilingual/dual-language approach.

Today’s parents know the importance of being bilingual. Now they just need to know where to turn for assistance in finding fun and affordable bilingual products that will bring the target language into their child’s life. The internet has made their search much easier than five years ago. Look for bilingual programs that allow you to sample their visual or audio products on line so that you get a good feel for the content and style of the language learning within that particular program.

Remember to make it fun! Remember to start early! There is a reason Time and Newsweek both ran feature articles on the “window of opportunity” to learn a new language is between birth and age 10. The experts agree, the earlier the better. Don’t miss out on the prime time of your child’s development to provide your child with a lifetime of language skills.

About the Author
(c) 2005 – All Rights Reserved. Beth Butler is the creator of the BOCA BETH Program – a bilingual educational program geared towards helping young children get a head start on becoming bilingual. She motivates and assists educators in developing a bilingual environment for children, and she has developed a program that makes bilingual education a fun and easy part of the normal, child-raising routine for today’s parents. For more information, visit www.bocabeth.com.

Last week in my newsletter, I mentioned that my children knew how to behave in nice restaurants because they had been exposed to the atmosphere at an early age. My idea of well behaved might be different from yours, however, I think there are certain basics that are important and universal.

When my daughters were babies, we would take them wherever we went. If they began to fuss or cry, one of us would promptly remove them from the room/restaurant/market/wherever. Not because we felt their crying or fussing was a bad thing. No, it’s a perfectly normal occurrence for infants and toddlers. We removed them as a courtesy to others who we felt did not need to be as tolerant as we were with our children’s noise. In consequence, my daughters know that other people are not as wildly in love with their racket or with them as we are. Nor should they be expected to be.

As our children grew older, they were always told the rules of our outings, how to behave and to always speak softly if other adults were present. Sometimes, it’s fine to let them get a little crazy … just know your audience! If we are at a five star restaurant where many other diners have come to enjoy a gracious and expensive meal, would we expect everyone there to be enthralled with junior’s vocal or behavioral outbursts? Would we really expect them to care if our child is having a bout with walking pneumonia and coughing uncontrollably? Nope. It’s rude. And rudeness is basically nothing more than bad manners. If there is an emergency with your child, by all means don’t give a flying flamingo about what others think. But this is the exception. Besides, children who are that sick belong at home, not in public.

Last night, my girls and I were in a department store. There was a toddler carrying on and screaming for more than 15 minutes when my younger daughter said: “Now his mommy is going to tell him to stop because there are other people in here that don’t want to hear it!”

Unfortunately, his mommy did not tell him any such thing. She let him wail and scream and cry, much to the chagrin and annoyance of everyone else in the store. You know what? As much as I love kids and cannot bear to see or hear them suffering, I disliked this kid immensely!

My reasoning is this: if our kids learn that they are free to trample on the peace, space or rose gardens of others, they will develop into spoiled and inconsiderate brats. And then who will like them? Who will want to spend time with them? Who, besides their forgiving parents, will be able to tolerate their lack of social graces and good manners? No one … except maybe another ill-mannered person who feels at home with a similarly clueless individual. Do we really want our children reduced to such horrible options? I think not.

We teach our children not to steal, lie or punch their brother in the nose. Shouldn’t we teach them respect for others at the same time? That their whining and out-of-control behavior is something no one really wants to hear or witness, especially strangers who have no vested interest in their developing minds or self-esteem? A simple reminder of the rules, consistently, works wonders … eventually.

Good luck. Kids need to learn manners and social graces. They will go farther in life if we teach them well.

Copyright – 2000-2004- Rexanne Mancini

About The Author
Rexanne Mancini is the mother of two daughters, Justice and Liberty. She is a novelist, freelance writer and maintains an extensive yet informal parenting and family web site, www.rexanne.com. Visit her site for good advice, award-winning Internet holiday pages and some humor to help you cope. Subscribe to her free newsletter, Rexanne’s Web Review, for a monthly dose of Rexanne: www.rexanne.com/rwr-archives.html. You can reach her at rexanne@rexanne.com.

Children are under tremendous pressure to succeed, and parents feel tremendous pressure to help them succeed. But what does success mean? Going to the right school? Getting straight As in all subjects? Winning an athletic scholarship? Sure, those are laudable goals, but they may not necessarily mean your child will be happy or feel successful. To me, success means helping our children understand who they are, giving them opportunities to discover what interests them, and guiding and supporting their attempts to use their gifts to their fullest potential.

That said, parents need to keep in mind that all children are different. They come into this world with their own unique personality, temperament, skills, and interests. Parents must help each individual child find his or her own interests.

We can also help our kids become self-reliant by helping them to learn to make decisions for themselves. Heaven knows, we are not going to be around to do things for them forever. Self-reliance is the umbrella that enables children to know themselves, accept themselves (i.e., their strengths and weaknesses), and develop the confidence to make the best possible choices for themselves. Learning to make sound decisions means giving your kids the opportunity to try new things, allowing them some freedom to make their own choices, and helping them accept and learn from their mistakes.

Teaching kids to be self-reliant also involves helping them learn to accept life’s inevitable losses as well as wins. When our kids win or succeed we always give them a hearty congratulations and let them know how proud we are of them. And while we praise their performance, we also make sure they know we are really proud of them for trying so hard and winning. When they don’t succeed, we do the very same thing: We give them a big hug and a warm congratulations and we let them know that we value them, their hard work, and their great sportsmanship. We look for them to do their best — win or lose — and use the gifts God gave them to their fullest potential.

Share Your Own Losses
One of the best ways we can teach our kids the value of success and failure is by sharing our own successes and failures. When my kids lose an important game or do poorly on a test, I recall the story of when I lost in an important tennis match. After getting into the finals of a championship, my doubles partner and I lost. Was I disappointed, my kids want to know? Of course. But it didn’t stop me from continuing to enjoy tennis and play in matches.

Kids need to know that failing — or not winning — is part of playing the game. We all lose some and win some. Kids need to become comfortable with both the idea and the reality that practice is necessary, that we are not perfect, and that there is always another chance to get another, perhaps better, result.

Reprinted from Woman First, Family Always: Real-Life Wisdom from a Mother of Ten by Kathryn Sansone. Copyright © 2006 Kathryn Sansone. Published by Meredith Books; January 2006; $24.95US/$34.95CAN; 069622832-7

About the Author
Kathryn Sansone has captured national attention for her heartwarming and hands-on approach to managing motherhood and life. She has been interviewed for Inside Edition and magazines such as Parents, Fit Pregnancy, and Child, and been honored as Chief Everything Officer by America Online. Kathryn lives in St. Louis with her husband, Jim, and their ten children, ranging in age from eight months to eighteen years. For more information, please visit www.kathrynsansone.com.

If you’re a parent, it’s important to realize that in order for your child to be physically and emotionally healthy as well as a successful student, it’s vital for him to get a sufficient amount of quality sleep.

As research continues to emerge, we are realizing that a good night’s sleep is as important as proper nutrition — affecting mood, immunity, and the ability to learn. Unfortunately, children’s sleep problems are extremely common. In 2004, the National Sleep Foundation reported that a whopping 69 percent of children under the age of ten have sleep difficulties. Factors that contribute to this modern day malady include lax rules, difficulty transitioning from the family bed, stress, overstimulation and the media.

While the number of children with sleep problems is staggering, by improving sleep hygiene and teaching children to relax, the majority of them are relatively easy to solve. But most parenting books on the subject focus on babies and give scant attention to the most useful long term solution for children — which is to teach them to purposely relax their bodies and minds so that they can relax and fall asleep.

The majority of sleep experts advise parents to abruptly withdraw their attention at bedtime–with no mention of teaching a child self-soothing skills. But many parents are looking for help after having shared their bed or assisted their child to fall asleep for months or even years. When children are abruptly expected to fall asleep without any assistance it sets the scene for the all too familiar nightly bedtime battle.

If parents consistently ignore their children’s anguished pleas for attention, after weeks of tears and tantrums, children will eventually begin to fall asleep on their own. But in the same amount of time, parents could have avoided the battles–by teaching their kids to relax themselves to sleep while gradually and systematically decreasing their attention.

Children’s two most frequent sleep problems involve not being able to fall asleep and awakening during the night unable to fall back asleep. Brief night awakening is normal; however, once kids learn to fall asleep independently at bedtime, they will be able to fall back asleep when they briefly awaken during the night.

For children, learning to relax and fall asleep on their own is an important step towards independence. However, the benefits of conscious relaxation far outweigh even this worthwhile achievement. By learning to purposefully relax and calm themselves, children will become more resilient and better equipped to deal with life’s inevitable ups and downs.

Ways to solve your child’s sleep problems:

Pinpoint the problem by keeping a sleep journal.
For at least a week, record your child’s sleep habits. This will help you to recognize the behaviors or habits that are contributing to a child’s sleep difficulties or alert you to a more serious problem. If you determine that you need a physician’s assistance, your observations will be invaluable in helping your doctor make an accurate assessment.

Have a set bedtime.
Children should consistently go to bed at the same time every night. Even on the weekends, bedtime should not vary by more than one hour a night or a total of two hours for the entire weekend.

Have a consistent bedtime routine.
Create a consistent bedtime ritual — in a predictable calming environment that serves as a bridge between the excitement of daytime and the restful quiet of nighttime.

Practice relaxation techniques.
During the bedtime routine, take a few minutes to practice self-soothing relaxation techniques such as progressive relaxation, attending to the breath, and visualization.

If your child has trouble falling asleep, use the Fade Technique.
Gradually, give your child less and less direction as he uses self-soothing techniques to relax and fall asleep. At first, you may want to sit on the edge of your child’s bed while he or she follows the relaxation directions on The Floppy Sleep Game Book CD. Or, you can teach your child to relax through a relaxation routine that you create yourself. Over a period of time, as your child becomes more familiar with the relaxation routine, sit further and further away until he or she no longer needs you in the room to relax and fall asleep.

About The Author
Dubbed “The Dream Maker” by People magazine, Patti Teel is a former teacher and the author of The Floppy Sleep Game Book, which gives parents techniques to help their children relax or fall asleep. She is holding Dream Academy workshops at schools, hospitals, and libraries across the country where parents and children learn the playful relaxation techniques from her book and widely acclaimed children’s audio series. Children at the Dream Academy workshops practice the three R’s by resting their bodies, relaxing their minds, and refreshing their spirits. Visit her online at www.pattiteel.com.

We are all overwhelmed by constant advertising. Parents are likely overwhelmed by all the challenges of being parents. I was an early childhood teacher for six years and I have been a children’s entertainer for over eight years. When I browse through K-*rt and the like, I think “landfill waste” and crying children.

I hear over and over again, “she has so many toys” While I love the idea of moderation and know that this culture has way too many possessions, I am concerned about the quality of the toys children have and how carefully they were selected.

A close friend of mine is constantly says “no” to her children when we are shopping- perfect strangers comment to me about how good she is at saying no to her kids as if they have never heard a parent do so. She refuses to buy them cheap junk that they beg for…I suppose they are attracted to the bright colors or the anticipation of the plastic ball coming out of the gum ball machine.

I say value is everything. Selecting a toy should be a careful process- not one motivated by “mommy I want…” Play is so important to child development. Shouldn’t the toys they play with be an educational investment?

These are my personal pointers: 1) What will the toy teach my child? This answer should be obvious and there should be more then one answer.

2) How safe is this toy?

3) *** this one is so very important in the electronic age- Is it an active toy for a passive child or a passive toy for an active child. I am sorry to say that too many are active toys for passive children which is not only lacking in educational benefit, but also encouraging children to be passive therefore uninvolved, anti-social and inactive.

4) How long will this toy last? What is the guaranteed offered by the company selling the toy? Believe it or not Discovery Toys has a lifetime guarantee on all toys.

5) How long will my child make use of and learn from this toy? Does the toy grow with my child or does the child grow out of the toy? Remember if there is a lifetime guarantee younger siblings will also enjoy your toy investment.

About the Author
Candice Silsby has an extensive background in Early Childhood Education and Human Dev elopement. She have six years experience working with young children as a pre-school teacher and caregiver for children under 3. She worked with special ed children for two years. She has eight years experience as a child entertainer and currently has her own business doing puppet shows for children. She is a Discovery Toys Educational Consultant because the toys are educational and developmentally appropriate. These toys meet the high scrutiny of her Developmental Education background. Discovery Toys improve the quality of life for children and families therefore the world.

Providing positive, enjoyable literacy experiences give young children opportunities to gain the knowledge, awareness, skills, and love of learning that they need to later learn to read independently. Here are 8 ways you can provide those experiences:

Choose the Right Books
Choose books that have large colorful pictures or photos; a few words on a page; rich language; and relate to concepts, people, or things in children’s lives. With this exposure, young children learn that books and reading explain the world they live in and ultimately help them better understand themselves. Sound like a tall order for a toddler?

Not really when you consider perennial favorites such as The Hungry Caterpillar. This book does not contain many words but teaches counting and science concepts.

Read Out Loud
Read to children regularly and often. Pick a regular reading time, but also watch for opportunities to read books, signs, letters, or other print spontaneously. The experience of reading as a typical, everyday occurrence helps children gain confidence that they can learn to read themselves.

Stories influence children’s learning for life. Some research suggests that the more stories children hear before entering school, the more likely they will be successful academically. Listening to books benefits their vocabulary and comprehension.

Spending just 15 minutes a day on this worthwhile activity can reap tremendous benefits!

Make Reading Fun
Use a variety of expressions, tones, and voices to make a book even more fun.

Allow a child to listen at her own pace. If a baby fusses or a toddler wanders away, don’t worry. Set the book aside and try again later. A baby may only listen for a minute or two at a time. Toddlers may want to wander around while you read, or listen to a few pages, move on to something else, and then return for a few more pages.

Encourage a child to join in on repeating phrases or rhymes, and honor requests to read the same book over and over.

Make Books Available
Make books available to babies and toddlers every day. Babies don’t distinguish books from other toys and may pull, toss, or chew books. This tactile, physical exploration of books and how they work is important to literacy development.

Show how books work. Point out the cover, show which is the top and bottom, front and back of the book, and talk about how words are read from left to right on the page. Use your finger to point to a word and the corresponding picture on the page.

Talk To Your Child
Remember literacy is about more than reading the printed word, it is about communication and understanding.

According to the National Research Council in Starting Out Right: A Guide to Promoting Reading Success, “Talk is essential – the more meaningful and substantive the better.” Babies and toddlers learn about the sounds, meanings, and ideas in language when adults talk with them. Preschoolers expand their vocabulary and learn sentence structure.

Conversations with your children about what they are reading are critical to children’s learning. Discussing books helps them understand how stories work, and how language works. When reading, stop and talk about the pictures and words on the page.

Listen To Your Child
As much as babies, toddlers, and preschoolers need to hear language, they also need to practice and imitate sounds and words with interested listeners. Respond to your child’s conversation and repeat their words back to them. Ask questions to show you are listening and that encourage a child to talk. Listen carefully and acknowledge answers. Listen to children’s questions and take time to answer.

Sing With Your Child
Children love to sing and can learn a great deal about stories and language from many popular children’s songs. Songs also often teach through their content (alphabet, counting, etc.) Many nursery rhymes can also be learned through song and knowledge of nursery rhymes is an important part of overall literacy.

Pull out old favorites like “This Old Man” or “Where is Thumbkin?” and make up your own songs, too.

Let Your Child Write
When children write, they naturally begin to pay attention to the sounds words make and the letters that form words. And it doesn’t matter how they spell! Recent research shows that young children who are allowed to write often with invented spelling, develop the ability to become good readers.

About the author
Deanna Mascle is the publisher of Preschoolers Learn More. She has three post secondary degrees and 15 years professional experience teaching (plus more years than she’d like to admit as a camp counselor, Sunday School teacher, and Bible Camp staff member) and she needs every scrap of her education and experience to keep up with Noah Mascle, age 4. Visit for more tips and resources for teaching your preschooler including Teach Your Child the Alphabet and Learning to Read through Rhyme.

(NC)—The first few years of a child’s life are full of new and exciting experiences that are absorbed like a sponge through the five senses: touch, taste, smell, sight and sound. From birth, newborns are bombarded with a busy world that they must learn to master. It is the senses that pave the way for a child’s development throughout his or her life.

“From birth, parents must choose toys and learning tools for their child that are fun and enjoyable to play with and that also foster sensorial growth to ensure a more complete development process,” says Dr. Kathleen Alfano, leading child Researcher and Director of the Fisher-Price Child Research Department.

A baby can start to develop hand-eye coordination, watch moving objects and be able to distinguish color and form within the first few months. Toys that will help develop these skills include the Peek-A-Blocks line from Fisher-Price – a creative and fun alternative to classic building blocks. Different series of these clear, stackable blocks are filled with everything from cute animals to fun shapes and foster the development of different senses. Touch Sensations blocks are made of different textures for baby to explore and Sound Sensations include blocks that ring and squeak.

Finding toys that will stimulate a few senses at a time are also helpful in sensory development, as a child will have to learn that in most situations, combining senses are crucial to perception. The Winnie The Pooh 1, 2, 3 Exploring Tree from Fisher-Price will keep a baby engaged and captivated from the time he/she can sit up to the time he/she can stand. Along the base, basic infant activities nurture hand-eye coordination, while Winnie The Pooh sits atop the tree among a flurry of soft, bright butterflies.

Introducing a baby to sounds, bright colors and action-based toys will make playtime more fun and enjoyable and is a good way to enhance a child’s creative abilities and imagination from an early age, teaching him/her to unlock the wonder and excitement of the world around them by simply making “sense” of it.

- News Canada

About The Author
News Canada provides a wide selection of current, ready-to-use copyright free news stories and ideas for Television, Print, Radio, and the Web. News Canada is a niche service in public relations, offering access to print, radio, television, and now the Internet media, with ready-to-use, editorial “fill” items. Monitoring and analysis are two more of our primary services. The service supplies access to the national media for marketers in the private, the public, and the not-for-profit sectors. Your corporate and product news, consumer tips and information are packaged in a variety of ready-to-use formats and are made available to every Canadian media organization including weekly and daily newspapers, cable and commercial television stations, radio stations, as well as the Web sites Canadians visit most often. Visit News Canada and learn more about the NC services.

You want to raise a reader. That much you know. But how? That’s the $20,000 question. You could probably spend that $20,000 on how-to books for you, readers for your child, flash cards and other accessories, and specialized reading programs promoting every possible avenue to full literacy.

You could, but you don’t have to do all that. The facts are simple. Between 80-85 percent of children learn to read by the middle of first grade and most of those children will learn without the benefit of fancy reading programs and books. Many of those children will learn to read as the result of simple preliteracy activities they encountered at home and/or school.

In fact, studies show that starting early is not necessary and could do more harm than good. Formal reading instruction, especially if introduced too early and if focused on “skill and drill,” can actually interfere with emergent literacy. However there are things you can do before you get to that point–and these activities are fun and can lay a strong early literacy foundation to make it easier for your child to learn to read later on.

As a basic foundation for learning to read and write, kids need strong speaking and listening skills. When you and other adults around your kids encourage them to talk, ask questions, and use dramatic play, it increases their vocabulary, allows them to hear and practice building sentences, and gives them more knowledge to understand spoken and written language.

Simply reading, talking, and listening to a young child in a warm and positive environment at every opportunity are among the most important things you can do.

There are three skill areas that form the foundation for reading. Kids who develop strong skills in these areas have greater success learning to read: Print Knowledge, Literacy Awareness, and Language Understanding.

Print knowledge is simply the understanding that print (letters, words, symbols, and printed media such as books and signs) carries a message. This encompasses learning that people read text rather than pictures and the correct way to read a book or page (right side up, left to right, top to bottom).

Literacy awareness encompasses a child’s first efforts to use print in a meaningful way. This includes recognizing letters and groupings of letters (the child recognizes his or her name or the name of a store) and attempts to write letters and words such as his or her name.

Language understanding is just that-understanding how language works. This includes being able to sound out individual letters in a word and counting the words in a spoken sentence.

Children develop these skills by having many early experiences with language, books, and print. They can have these experiences as part of everyday life, through play, conversation, and a wide range of activities. Young children use play and talk as a way to expand, explore, and make sense of their world. When kids talk about daily tasks and special events, tell stories, sing songs, and scribble, they are laying the groundwork for reading and writing.

The primary reason many children struggle with learning to read is because they simply do not have enough experiences with language, books, and print. They need more time at home and in their early childhood programs devoted to helping them develop the skills that lead to reading. A lack of developmentally appropriate skill-building at an early age can significantly limit the reading and writing level a child attains.

Becoming literate
Becoming a literate person is something that every human begins almost from birth. In essence, we are actually programmed to become literate. However, that does not mean the path to literacy is smooth and easy.

While the progression to literacy is a natural evolution we are all programmed to follow, literacy does not occur in a vacuum. Literacy emerges in individuals only when they are immersed in a community of literacy. Interactions such as sharing a picture book, telling a story, and talking about experiences are central to emergent literacy.

Most parents are aware of the importance of reading to their child, but it is so important that it cannot be emphasized enough. According to the Partnership for Reading, a project administered by the National Institute for Literacy, “Reading aloud to children has been called the single most important activity for building the knowledge required for success in reading.”

Typically, parents play an important role in developing this skill by reading to children and showing how important reading is to their daily life. Find time to read aloud with your child every day. Lap time with picture books and stories can strongly motivate your child to enjoy reading.

Studies focusing on parents of successful readers found that they do more than simply read to their children. They also engage in specific strategies, which maximize the reading experience. These strategies are actually fairly simple: talk about the book with your child before reading it; read aloud using an enthusiastic voice; and let your child ask questions about the book. Parents can also encourage their child to “read” the story back to them (especially if it is a favorite that has been read many times to the child) and/or share fun variations of the story.

However, while this is significant, this is not the only way your child learns. Knowledge is constructed as a result of dynamic interactions between the individual and the physical and social environments. In a sense the child discovers knowledge through active experimentation. Try to make books available for your child to explore and enjoy on their own as well as with you.

It is important to remember that literacy is much broader than simply reading. Allowing a child to draw or color and playing word games and singing songs are also a part of literacy. Sometimes literacy development does not actually involve print. There are many ways of learning to read and write. Some of these ways may look suspiciously like play which makes them all the more effective.

Children learn through play. Play provides opportunities for exploration, experimentation, and manipulation that are essential for constructing knowledge and contributes to the development of representational thought. During play, children examine and refine their learning in light of the feedback they receive from the environment and other people. It is through play that children develop their imaginations and creativity. During the primary grades, children’s play becomes more rule-oriented and promotes the development of autonomy and cooperation which contributes to social, emotional, and intellectual development.

Make-believe among peers also plays an important role in emergent literacy. Pretending is, in fact, an ideal area in which children can develop literacy-related language skills. In pretend play, children use language to create imaginary worlds; and the manner in which language is used when pretending has much in common with reading. It is important to provide children time and settings in which they can use language with each other in a variety of social dramatic play activities.

Block play, too, can serve as a foundation for literacy. While reading and writing and playing with blocks seem miles apart at first glance, block play offers the literacy-related benefits of helping children understand symbolization, refine visual discrimination, develop fine-motor coordination, and practice oral language.

So remember, your goal is not to teach your child to read so much as it is to help them become literate. Immerse your child in literacy by talking, reading, singing, pretending, and playing and you will have done a great deal to prepare your child to become a reader.

About The Author
Deanna Mascle is the publisher of Preschoolers Learn More. She has three post secondary degrees and 15 years professional experience teaching (plus more years than she’d like to admit as a camp counselor, Sunday School teacher, and Bible Camp staff member) and she needs every scrap of her education and experience to keep up with Noah Mascle, age 4. Visit for more tips and resources for teaching your preschooler including Teach Your Child the Alphabet and Learning to Read through Rhyme

Nurture and Teach
The single most important thing caregivers can do for a child is provide a nurturing environment. By doing this, we influence children’s brain development and their ability to learn. Introducing nurtured children to learning opportunities every day will help them become happy, well-adjusted adults. In all stages of child development, each experience builds on the one before it. The most basic foundations can serve as the basis for the comprehension of more complex ideas in future years.

Learning Begins at Birth
We are born with billions of brain cells – in fact, all we will ever have. What is missing is a large amount of connections – synapses – between those brain cells. Synapses start developing based on a child’s experiences. Children’s brains develop faster from birth to age three than any other time; and more learning takes place during this time than any other. The more learning opportunities parents provide for their children from birth until school age, the more synapses are made. The connections will serve as a pool of knowledge for a child to access in later years.

Because children’s earliest experiences affect how they will think, learn and behave, helping children learn from birth to school age is a crucial activity. Parents and other caregivers can create a strong foundation for learning by providing a nurturing and rich learning environment from the very beginning.

Children Seek Learning Experiences
Not only do children need to be physically active, it is their nature to look for opportunities to learn. They participate in learning by using their senses and asking countless questions in order to more fully understand the task at hand.

Creating a Learning Environment
Children enjoy learning when they can master an activity. Begin with a simple task and expand or complicate it after your child has enjoyed some successes.

Create a safe and secure learning environment. This will help children do their best learning rather than distract them. Key to creating this environment is treating your child with respect and caring.

Where Do Children Learn?
Children learn everywhere from school to the doctor’s office to the grocery store. As do adults, children learn from interacting with others and watching their parents’ behavior. Kids are highly influenced by the people in their lives, especially adults who they are close to.

Not All Children Learn in the Same Way
In the book Frame of Mind, Howard Gardner described his theory of multiple intelligences. We all have a certain way we prefer to learn. The seven multiple intelligences Gardner points to are interpersonal, intrapersonal, bodily-kinesthetic, spatial, musical, logical-mathematical and linguistic. We have the most success teaching our children when we can recognize their style of learning (as well as our style of teaching) and incorporate activities accordingly.

Playing and Learning
The main way children collect and process information is through play. Play is the repetition that reinforces old skills and encourages new ones. Because play is enjoyable, children’s minds are open. Children are capable of much learning through play because they are very receptive and relaxed. Take advantage of this benefit and select activities that are fun and educational. Your children will learn, and you will both enjoy the experience.

About The Author
Shelley Ruiz is a homeschooling parent and the owner of Magic Lark Learning which provides parents and teachers with resources for making learning fun, including a free quarterly online journal of poems and stories for kids. anything@magiclarklearning.com.

Did you know that cooking with your kids is a natural way for them to develop motor skills? If you’ve never looked at cooking that way before, think again. There’s a reason why kids have a universal love for cooking – just like for stacking blocks and banging!

Cooking is especially good for preschoolers and here’s how:

1. Two year olds are developing large muscles in their arms: They will enjoy stirring and stirring and stirring . My two year old is always asking to stir; and her subconscious knows why! At 2 years old, a child naturally imitates circular strokes as part of their normal physical development. So, let them stir at every opportunity.Here are some ways to encourage arm muscle development through cooking:
   • stirring: flour, eggs, pancake batter, gelatin making, etc.
   • scrubbing potatoes and vegetables
   • cleaning the cutting board: Give them a washcloth and some lukewarm water with the cutting board in the sink. They’ll have a blast rubbing the wet washcloth up and down the cutting board to clean it.
   • pouring from large measuring cups into a bowl

    

2. Two year olds are developing the ability to turn pages: Another motor skill developed during the preschool age is the ability to turn pages.So – just pondering here…is it the story they love so much or just turning the pages of the book? Well, actually both. They need the motor development of turning the pages; and the pictures and vocabulary improve their intellectual development.

    

3. Two year olds love “patting” and “pressing”: From being fascinated with “patty-cake” chants at an early age, preschooler’s still love to pat and press.I’m sure you’ll recognize your preschooler doing this at the park: scooping up rocks or sand, piling them up, and patting the top into different shapes.

   Well, here’s some suggestions to bring the “patting” inside:

   • packing down brown sugar in the measuring cup
   • gently pressing a fork on top of peanut butter cookie dough on the cookie sheet
   • patting to level off the top of a cup of sugar
   • patting and pressing on pizza dough
   • pressing down with a cookie cutter on rolled sugar cookie dough

    

4. Two year olds love to dip – and this develops arm muscles skills too!: it takes a lot of coordination to dip! Getting the food in the dip, then moving the arm and somehow getting it into your mouth. If it wasn’t difficult, they wouldn’t get food all over their face! So, unless your 2 year old always has a clean face when he or she is done eating, here’s some dipping opportunities:
   • carrots in salad dressing
   • french fries in catsup
   • dipping a spoon in the emptied batter bowl to clean out the goodies
   • dipping fruit in a fruit dip or chocolate (like frozen bananas or strawberries)
   • dipping chicken or fish in a batter for you to cook
   • dipping the bread in French toast mix

    

So, instead of “shooing” your preschoolers and 2 year olds out of the kitchen, let them dive in with these simple tasks that not only give them great pleasure, but help them develop their age appropriate motor skills.

About The Author
Laura Bankston is author of Internationally selling Cooking with Kids Curriculum: “Homeschool Cooking in a Box” and the “Homeschool Cookbook”. She currently home schools her three children, maintains home school support websites, and manages their family-owned service business. For information on her curriculum and free home school support services, please visit www.homeschoolcookbook.com.  laura@homeschoolcookbook.com

How can we help children blossom socially and emotionally? Read on for some specific tips.

Look for opportunities to discuss other people’s feelings
By explaining how other people would feel if a particular act occurred, you teach your child to take the perspective of others. “If you hit Irving over the head with that truck, he will probably feel very bad and cry. Do you want that to happen?”

Creating a sensitive human being takes work! It often seems a lot easier to just stop vexing and dangerous toddler behavior without explaining what consequences would follow and why, and how someone would feel as a result. Of course, tomorrow someone will probably come out with a video that claims to teach your child how to work and play well with others. But that product would be a drop in the bucket compared with the power that comes from ongoing human relationships where both mind and heart are learning together. What fills the bucket is the interaction children and adults experience: a product of basic social need.

Watch your language
One way to bring up the perspectives of others is to ask your child about the characters in the stories you read together. Ask questions such as “How do you think this person (the character) feels? How would you feel if you were this person? What do you think the person’s friends could do to help him to feel better?”

In fact, many of the current social and emotional programs that teach children about how to be a good person use games in which children adopt different perspectives. One example is the Interpersonal Cognitive Problem Solving program for elementary school children, which was developed by Professor Myrna Shure of Drexel University in Philadelphia. After the adult shows the children pictures of scenes or verbally describes scenarios such as a fight in school or a moment of frustration, the children are asked, “How do you think this person felt in the story? How might you feel if you were that person? How would you want others to react to you?” At Pennsylvania State University, Professor Mark Greenberg created another program of this type called PATHS (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies) that helps children talk about their feelings. These programs have been maximally effective in reducing aggressive behavior and are training children on how to understand others’ minds. They are now used widely in school programs.

Explain to your child that there are causes for people’s feelings
Research by Professor Judy Dunn and her colleagues at Pennsylvania State University examined the conversations that fifty 33-month-old children had in their homes with their mothers about feelings and about what causes them. For example, a mother might say, “You broke my glass (the cause) and that makes me sad (the outcome).” Such conversations were just what Professor Dunn and her colleagues looked for in the parent-child dialogues.

She found that at 40 months, children differed widely in their appreciation of emotions and other minds. The results of this study tell us that talk about emotions and what causes emotions impacts children’s developing theory of mind. Hearing an explanation for others’ behavior does at least two things. It may help stunt the natural anger that arises when you are thwarted so you can respond more constructively. It may also help you look for such mitigating explanations on your own in future altercations. And these differences, in turn, will influence how well children interact with their peers and teachers.

Stop bullying in its tracks
The extreme example of children who are not thinking of the welfare of others is the bully. If your child is frequently the target of bullies, it may be a sign that she is less socially competent and, therefore, has fewer friends and is seen as vulnerable. It turns out that children who are more socially competent and who have more friends are less likely to be bullied.

Researchers have determined that both the bullies and the bullied tend to have certain typical characteristics: The majority of victims, for instance, reinforce bullies by giving in to their demands, crying, assuming defensive postures, and failing to fight back. Victims tend to have a history of overly intrusive parenting, with parents who are controlling and overprotective. These parenting behaviors prompt anxiety, low self-esteem, and dependency, which combine to radiate vulnerability. Bullies often bank on their victim’s dependency and vulnerability; they know the other child won’t fight back. This makes the bully feel powerful. Of course, bullies have their own social deficits. They tend to come from families where there is little warmth or affection. The families also report trouble sharing their feelings. Sometimes parents of bullies have very punitive and rigid discipline styles. Finally, bullies feel less discomfort than average children at the thought of causing pain and suffering.

So what can be done for bullies and their victims? Preschools and kindergartens where peer socialization is integrated into the curriculum are good places to start helping them. Anxious, withdrawn children will benefit greatly from developing just one good friendship. And even when they have conflicts with their peers (yes, conflict is inevitable), they’ll be learning valuable lessons in how to interpret social cues accurately. But in addition to the teaching of social skills at school, it’s also important to evaluate the relationship you have with your child, especially if you suspect that he’s a bully. Remember: Bullies tend to come from families where there’s a lack of affection or little sharing of feelings. Take the time to ask your child how he’s feeling and to really listen to his answer. When he expresses anger or rage, work with him to help him regulate his negative emotions and find peaceful ways to resolve them. Finally, when he talks about problems he’s having with his peers, brainstorm with him to come up with skillful ways he could resolve them.

Finally, children who are not bullies or victims have a powerful role to play in shaping the behavior of other children. Teach your children to speak up on behalf of children being bullied. “Don’t treat her that way; it’s not nice.” “Hitting is not a good way to solve problems. Let’s find a teacher and talk about what happened.” For more examples and role-play situations, check out Sherryll Kraizer’s The Safe Child Book.

Make space for social time
Children sometimes just need to hang out with others or to be by themselves. It might seem as if they are doing “nothing,” but there’s a lot to learn from unscheduled time on their own or with other children. Children need to be able to be spontaneous — to be able to just goof off! Creating playdates for our children helps them diversify their social world and develop additional social tools for dealing with a greater variety of social challenges. And social interactions give you opportunities for discussing emotional situations and others’ perspectives. This cannot be obtained on the fly, in the car between activities, but only from real social interaction that you are present to observe and comment on and coach as the occasion arises.

If your child is in child care or preschool, be sure to build strong connections with your child’s caregiver or teacher
You want your child’s emotions taken seriously when he is not with you, too, and you want that emotional coaching going on whenever a conflict comes up. If you talk with the caregiver on a daily basis about how your child is doing and ask questions about how he gets along with his peers and how disagreements are handled, you’ll have a better sense of whether emotional coaching and mentoring is going on. Get in the habit of building strong ties to the people whom your child spends time with just as it makes a difference when children get consistent messages from their parents, it’s important that the messages they receive from their child care providers are consistent as well.

While there are many things we can do to foster social development, here are some general suggestions for helping your children to tune in to their own feelings.

Avoid ignoring or belittling your child’s feelings
Although often you’d wish such moments would just go away, times of emotional upset can be understood as key opportunities for teaching children how to avoid or resolve such situations, while also taking the feelings of others into consideration. View these times as opportunities to teach your children how to make lemonade out of lemons, while still allowing them to experience their feelings of hurt or disappointment. A versatile recipe for lemonade will be very useful for dealing with life’s inevitable frustrations.

Try to see the world through your children’s eyes
Once you do, you’ll recognize that the things that cause our children pain are often different from the things that cause us, as adults, pain. You don’t want to treat your children any differently than you would want to be treated when you express your emotions. How would you feel if you confided in a friend about something that bothered you and she made fun of you and laughed? Make a point of teaching your child that it’s okay to show negative emotion, such as sadness or fear. Likewise, try to demonstrate positive ways of coping with your own anger and negative feelings. Remember: Your children are watching you for lessons on regulating their emotions.

The bottom line is to talk to your children and invite them to talk to you. The more you try to understand how they feel and help them understand how an event happened, the more coping skills your child will develop. And, as we have documented, social skills are essential for doing well, both in school and in life.

Reprinted from: Einstein Never Used Flash Cards: How Our Children Really Learn — And Why They Need to Play More and Memorize Less by Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Ph.D., and Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, Ph.D., with Diane Eyer, Ph.D. © 2003 by Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Ph.D., and Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, Ph.D.

About the Authors
Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Ph.D., is a member of the psychology department at Temple University, where she directs the Infant Language Laboratory and participated in one of the nation’s largest studies of the effects of child care. The mother of three sons, she also composes and performs children’s music. Roberta Michnick Golinkoff, Ph.D., is the H. Rodney Sharp Professor in the School of Education at the University of Delaware, where she holds a joint appointment with the departments of linguistics and psychology and directs the Infant Language Project. She has also been a recipient of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship and is the mother of a son and a daughter. Together, the authors were featured on the PBS Human Language series and are the authors of How Babies Talk. Diane Eyer, Ph.D., is a member of the psychology department at Temple University and author of Motherguilt and Mother-Infant Bonding.

For more information, please visitwww.writtenvoices.com.