Category Archives: Tutor Your Child

Gifted Children — But Gifted in What Way?

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Gifted Children — But Gifted in What Way?

Today’s Learning Curve with Roger & Virginia explores the many aspects of the ways in which children can be gifted and how you can benefit your child by knowing this; and what to do about it.

Our expert guest and friend today is Francie Alexander, the Vice President and Chief Academic Officer for Scholastic Education.  This is a return appearance for Francie; her last show with us addressed how to prevent your child from losing recently learned material in what is referred to as the “summer slide.”  (Click here for our June 6, 2012 show)

Francie reveals there are many different areas in which a child can be gifted.  A parent needs to appreciate this and the various many ways in which the child can express it.

Parents can too often be concerned that their child “is not academically gifted” and fail to see what particular gifts the child has and work to facilitate and strengthen those gifts.

Is your child gifted academically, socially, physically, artistically?  If academically, what particular part or subjects?

Learn how parents should focus on their child’s strengths and enhance them; not overly fret over apparent “below expectation” levels of skill or ability.  Validating what the child does well actually lifts all other aspects of the child’s endeavors.  But stressing and fretting over the child’s apparent lesser abilities only drags down the child’s confidence and self esteem and damages their overall achievement.

Learn why and how parents should keep their gifted children engaged and moving forward.

Learn about the extensive resources available at Scholastic, Inc., for parents to use with their variously gifted children.

Be alert to the possibility that your gifted child may have difficulty collaborating with other children; and the fact that gifted children need to be taught just as much as “regular” children.  But most important: let your gifted child follow the line of interest it has its attention on.

Learn the traits of gifted children:

  • Language development
  • Questioning and probing
  • Integrating advance words into their conversation
  • Focused on the pursuit of a purpose
  • They love to learn
  • Physically, they have good eye-hand coordination
  • Love to play and excel at a sport
  • Able to take any object (crayon, pencil, clay, cloth, etc.,) and create something from it

CLICK HERE TO HEAR FRANCIE ON GIFTED CHILDREN: 

092412 Gifted Children

Roger and Virginia at The Learning Curve

 

Did You Know Most Kids Lose a Lot of What They Recently Learned in School While on Summer Break? Teachers Call it the “Summer Slide.”

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Did You Know Most Kids Lose a Lot of What They Recently Learned in School While on Summer Break?  Teachers Call it the “Summer Slide.”

Nowhere is the adage: “If you don’t use it, you lose it” more accurate than in the case of young minds and the reason behind the “summer slide.”

In today’s Learning Curve Francie Alexander explains how you can protect your child’s learning and advancement.  Learn how you can easily prevent the “summer slide.”

Francie Alexander is Vice President and Chief Academic Officer for Scholastic Education. Francie has taught at all levels, was a district reading consultant for Pre-K through high school, and has authored professional articles for educators as well as 25 “Books Kids Can Read” for children.

In today’s Learning Curve we reveal:

  • What the “Summer Slide” is.
  • The fact that teachers typically need 4 to 6 weeks in the fall to re-teach material students have forgotten!
  • The importance of “summer reading in beating the summer slide.”
  • The wonderful treasure trove of tools and resources available at the scholastic.com website.

Learn of the many initiatives and tools Scholastic has made available to you so you can beat the “summer learning loss” and also help your child in everyday learning.

  • Scholastic Summer Challenge a program where students can win prizes by logging their reading minutes online or using a new mobile app. called The Scholastic Reading Timer.
  • Scholastic Reading Timer kids can set personal reading goals, using the built-in stopwatch to reach their target number of reading minutes.
  • Storia® is a free eReading app specifically designed to support kids’ reading
  • Sushi Monster, Scholastic‘s newest free math fact fluency game available on the iPad.
  • Summer book packs for all age groups.

Get tips for parents from Francie on how to keep kids learning over the summer

For teachers, the Scholastic website is an equally wonderful resource.  Their website has been set up to serve as the content and e-Commerce hub for everything a teacher needs most for use in the classroom.  Each week, more than 1.6 million visitors to Scholastic.com access over 100,000 pages of free content and teaching resources.

This show is one of the most enjoyable Roger & Virginia has done on the Learning Curve.  And the material it makes available to parents, teachers and students is truly valuable and quite amazing.

Scholastic, Inc., is a publishing and educational industry service company whose mission is stated as:

“The corporate mission of Scholastic is to encourage the intellectual and personal growth of all children, beginning with literacy, the cornerstone of all learning. With more than 90 years of experience supporting the learning lives of children, today Scholastic remains committed to providing quality, engaging educational content in digital and print formats for the next generation of learners, and the families and educators who guide them.”

But the big surprise to Roger is that Scholastic are also the people behind bringing the Harry Potter series to America!  So it’s not all serious academics at Scholastic.

 

Click her to listen to:  June 11, 2012 Francie Alexander

Roger and Virginia at The Learning Curve.

 

How to Repair a “Failing” Student’s Ability to Learn

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The Learning Curve July 11, 2011

How to Repair a “Failing” Student’s Ability to Learn

This week’s Learning Curve is important for all parents who have children who are failing at school or who have the consideration that they are “slow,” “dull,” “can’t learn” or “learning disabled.”

Roger and Virginia take you through the process that handles and restores a student’s certainty that they can learn.  It demonstrates to the student that learning is an ability we all have; and the procedure restores to the student their certainty that they can exercise it and actually, successfully learn anything they apply their attention to.

Last week we and our guests from www.3DLearner.com debunked the notion that dyslexia is a “disability.”  We showed that dyslexia is not correctly understood; and that, instead, these folks are what can be called “right brain learners” who exhibit quite remarkable abilities not enjoyed by others.

This week we take on another of the myths held by the educational establishment.

At the end of Chapter One of our book: How to Learn-How to Teach: Overcoming the Seven Barriers to Comprehension, (http://www.howtolearneasily.com) we have a section dealing with how to recover the ability and certainty for your child that they can learn and succeed one-hundred percent at their school studies.

This week’s program reveals some of that important information.

For the full discussion of the material, folks who have Kindles or Nooks, can obtain the Parent’s & Student’s Edition of How to Learn-How to Teach: Overcoming the Seven Barriers to Comprehension, from either Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/How-Learn-Overcoming-Comprehension-Parents-ebook/dp/B004RR1QPA/ref=pd_rhf_p_t_1)

or Barnes & Noble (http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/how-to-learn-how-to-teach-roger-e-boswarva/1030457406?ean=2940012187093&itm=2&usri=how%2bto%2blearn%2bhow%2bto%2bteach)

Alternatively, you can download the Nook or Kindle application to you computer and read it there.

 

Click here to listen July 11, 2011 Roger & Virginia

For more information go to http://www.howtolearneasily.com

send any questions you have to questions@howtolearneasily.com

How Do You Recognize if Your Child is Having Difficulty in School Early Enough to Properly Help? What to Do and How Do You Find the Help You Need?

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The Learning Curve March 5, 2012 Dean Larson

How Do You Recognize if Your Child is Having Difficulty in School Early Enough to Properly Help?  What to Do and How Do You Find the Help You Need?

Too often parents fail to recognize their child is having difficulty and by the time they spot it, too much damage and loss has occurred.

Even when parents are astute enough to recognize the struggling student in their child, they still have the problem of what to do to help and where to go to get proper professional help.

Today, on The Learning Curve with Roger & Virginia, we have the return of Dean Larson, Director of Access for Knowledge Learning Centers.

Dean has a wealth of experience in both preventing student difficulty in his own students and remedying the struggling conditions of students brought to him.

Hear Dean describe how you would first observe, and then proceed to handle, indications of your child having difficulty at school.

His first, critical word of advice is that a parent must stand back and examine the facts of the situation . . . don’t dub-in emotion or opinion.

Look for trends in grades and behavior; a change in friends and a change towards the family.

Write down only the facts.  Just gather data.

You must use “reflective listening” with your child—you must ask, and listen: not tell and assert your belief.

Kids don’t have enough life experience to yet be able to understand all the emotions and feelings they go through.

You’ll hear Dean explain how all this is done, and give you the key question to be asked:

  • What are the possibilities of change?
  • Are there medical conditions (hearing, eyesight, biochemical) behind the trouble?
  • What about tutoring services?  How do you evaluate the options?

Dean brilliantly and clearly answers all these questions . . . .

 

Click here to listen  Dean Larson 3-5-12 redo of e too large 

Jennifer Turner is an Honest to Goodness, Genuine Home-Schooling Mom Who Believes in student-led learning.

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The Learning Curve February 27, 2012   Jennifer Turner

Jennifer Turner is an Honest to Goodness, Genuine Home-Schooling Mom Who Believes in student-led learning.

Jennifer is lucky to be able to benefit from A Cyber Charter School with on-line curriculum along with on-line teacher back-up and testing.

The benefit of all this to Jennifer’s two children is that, while they have to meet the state testing standards, she can allow the kids to progress through each item on the curriculum at the pace that best suits the child and also ensure mastery on all subject matter.

Hear how Jennifer practices Student Led Learning.

Hear how she works the interests and needs of each child into the lesson plans and material.

She is also able to allow each of her children to learn in the style best suited to the child—indeed she pays special attention to facilitating her children’s two different learning styles.  And this further enhanced by her practice of Student Led Learning.

Jennifer says this method of educating her children has developed in them a wondrous love of learning, and the ability to discover and master anything they will ever have to deal with in later life.

And the big bonus Jennifer has found is that Home Schooling allows families to be flexible in meeting all of the needs of each member of the family.

Hear Jennifer answer these questions:

  • What is student-led learning?
  • How do home school parents incorporate their children’s interests during instructed learning time?
  • How do our children meet state and federal school requirements by following the student led philosophy?
  • Can traditional school settings incorporate a student-led philosophy?

More wisdom from Jennifer at her Blog: http://www.studentsathome.wordpress.com/

 

Click here to listen  February 27, 2012 Jennifer Turner

Roger & Virginia at The Learning Curve

 

 

Imagine a parenting technique that doesn’t tell you what to do, but teaches the art of self discovery that can be implemented with your child for its benefit.

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The Learning Curve February 20, 2012 Socratic Parenting

Imagine a parenting technique that doesn’t tell you what to do, but teaches the art of self discovery that can be implemented with your child for its benefit.

The big question parents should be asking is: when it works, why is it working; and if it doesn’t work, why not?

Our guest today with Roger and Virginia on The Learning Curve is Laurie Gray, the founder of Socratic Parenting.  Laurie’s experience includes having been a high school teacher, a civil and criminal trial attorney and author of young adult literature.  Currently she writes, speaks and consults through Socratic Parenting LLC as well as working as a child forensic interviewer and as a College Professor.

What would happen of you used “open inquiry” questions with your child instead of telling and indoctrinating?  Would it lead to greater self discovery and appreciation of truth?

Socrates is said to have stated: I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.

Only the practice of “open inquiry” opens the mind for thinking.

Many wise educators have deplored the current educational system’s practice of treating kids as sponges to be filled with the attempt to wring them dry at exam time.  It is an unwise parenting practice also.

As Laurie explains, there is nothing more useless than a mind filled with others’ thoughts.

Hear Laurie explain the principles of Socratic Parenting — principles such as:

  • Be aware versus beware.
  • Don’t cause a child’s life to be ruled by fear.
  • Have the child being present with interested.
  • Acknowledgement and appreciation is a very important first step.
  • Accept who your child is.
  • Appreciate the positives.
  • And much more.

 

Clock here to listen February 20, 2012 Socratic Parenting

Roger and Virginia at The Learning Curve

 

How Can Parents and Students Work the Educational System to Best Advantage? What Are the Advanced and Innovative Ways to Tutor Your Child to Top Grades?

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The Learning Curve January 30, 2012 Elaine Sigal

How Can Parents and Students Work the Educational System to Best Advantage?

What Are the Advanced and Innovative Ways to Tutor Your Child to Top Grades?

Today’s educational system is a labyrinth of bureaucratic pitfalls.  Even going outside the school system for private tutoring services has its short-comings.

Today’s guest is Elaine Sigal who has had near 40 years of experience in education at all levels from grades 8-12 and teaching at university.  At one point in her career in education she founded and ran a classroom based ‘brick and mortar’ educational company (from 1995 – 2009)

Based on this experience, Elaine founded STIZZiL.com.

STIZZiL is quite unique in that it is an online supplemental education company that offers tutoring, enrichment and support for students, parents and professionals of all ages. STIZZiL brings together the best US licensed, credentialed, and experienced educators from all over the United States and matches them to students, parents and professionals in need of help.  

 

Elaine’s experience has shown that “not just anyone can teach.” So she created a service that enables students, from the privacy and safety of their own home, to work with STIZZiL’s vetted educators, who teach in a synchronous manner using the best and latest in modern technology: audio, video, chat, whiteboard, and archiving capabilities.

 

Hear Elaine answer our question of how can a parent best raise concerns within the educational system regarding concerns they have about the learning environment of their child.  Who can or should you report to and how best to do it?  What are the best avenues to take action on?  How should you prepare?

What are the pit-falls in “No Child Left Behind”?  How can you “work” this part of the system?

In actuality, No Child Left Behind has drastically altered educational practices . . . teachers have been driven away from educating with the end result of the children actually learning things of value: instead teachers are forced to “teach to the test.”  This results in approximately half of teaching time being spent on practicing to pass mandated tests versus actually learning something.

It’s true . . . boys and girls behave and learn differently!  Learn how best to work with the difference.

Learn how you can help your child get better grades by providing a better learning environment at home.

 

Click here to listen January 30, 2012 Elaine Sigal

Roger and Virginia at The Learning Curve 

 

 

How to Benefit From Home Schooling Internet Resources Whether You Home School or Not! Part 2.

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The Learning Curve August 15, 2011 –Terry Neven Part 2

How to Benefit From Home Schooling Internet Resources Whether You Home School or Not!  Part 2.

What internet resources are there available to help you help your kids get good grade?

What about Public Home School Programs?  Getting Your Program Accredited?

This is Part 2 of Roger & Virginia interviewing Terry Neven, the Administrator of the Sundland Home School Program. Terry founded Sundland in 1981. In 2008, Terry, Sundland and their attorneys won the case before the California Supreme Court that established as law the right of caring parents to home school their children. This win established the precedent that affected home-schooling rights for all Americans.

Terry runs the “Home School Program” at http://www.home-schooling.org which we recommend listeners go to to feast on the available resources provided.  It is one of the very best sites we’ve found to help parents help their kids get good grades.  Coaching is available, as are curricula accreditations.

See the High School Manual here: http://www.home-schooling.org/High_School_Manual/high_school_manual.html

In this interview key issues are addressed, such as:

  • To home school or not — all questions are answered.
  • How to begin your home schooling endeavor.
  • How home schooling recovers and enhances your best relationships with your child.
  • Only 52 minutes in a six hour school day are spent actually learning in a conventional school.
  • Learn about the superior scholastic achievement of home schooled children.
  • Is the public school system really just tax sponsored daycare?
  • The Montessori Method works very easily with the home schooling environment.
  • Student learning styles are facilitated and worked with so the child’s natural ability to learn is enhanced.
  • Why some parents choose to home school to protect their children from the conventional system.
  • Choosing an accredited program so your home school work is accepted academically for college entry.
  • Erasing the unfounded fears of whether or not you will succeed in home schooling.
  • Did you know some public schools have been trying to sabotage some home schoolers?
  • The benefits of accreditation and how to get it.
  • How to handle the fallacy that home schooling impedes “socialization” of a child.

And much, much more.

 

Click here to listen  081511 Terry Neven–Part 2

Roger & Virginia

How to Benefit From Home Schooling Internet Resources Whether You Home School or Not!

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The Learning Curve August 8, 2011 Terry Neven Part 1

How to Benefit From Home Schooling Internet Resources Whether You Home School or Not!

What internet resources are there available to help you help your kids get good grade?

Roger & Virginia interview Terry Neven, the Administrator of the Sundland Home School Program.  Terry founded Sundland in 1981.  In 2008, Terry, Sundland and their attorneys won the case before the California Supreme Court that established as law the right of caring parents to home school their children.  This win established the precedent that affected home-schooling rights for all Americans.

See Court Briefs here: http://www.home-schooling.org/Court_Briefs___Custody/court_briefs___custody.html

HomeSchoolLegal defense: http://www.home-schooling.org/Home_School_Legal_Defense/homeschool_legal_defense.html

Terry runs the “Home School Program” at http://www.home-schooling.org which we recommend listeners go to to feast on the available resources provided.

See the High School Manual here: http://www.home-schooling.org/High_School_Manual/high_school_manual.html

In this interview key issues are addressed, such as:

  •  To home school or not — all questions are answered.
  •  How home schooling recovers and enhances your best relationships with your child.
  •  Only 52 minutes in a six hour school day is spent actually learning in a conventional school.
  • Learn about the superior scholastic achievement of home schooled children.
  •  Is the public school system really just tax sponsored daycare?
  • The Montessori Method works very easily with the home schooling environment.
  •  Student learning styles are facilitated and worked with so the child’s natural ability to learn is enhanced.
  •  Why some parents choose to home school to protect their children from the conventional system.
  • Choosing an accredited program so your home school work is accepted academically for college entry.
  • Erasing the unfounded fears of whether or not you will succeed in home schooling.

And much, much more.

More details at http://www.home-schooling.org

Click here to listen August 8, 2011 Terry Neven — part 1

For more information on this important subject, visit our website http://www.howtolearneasily.com.

Send any questions you have to questions@howtolearneasily.com

 

Home School Enrichment—A Reason Why Home Schooled Kids Score Thirty-Five Percent Higher Than the National Average

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The Learning Curve July 18, 2011

Today’s guest on The Learning Curve is Jonathan Lewis, Editor-in-Chief of Home School Enrichment Magazine.  Home School Enrichment Magazine is a bi-monthly print magazine, but also on-line at: http://www.homeschoolenrichment.com/

This is a must hear show for parents who want good grades for their kids.

There are now more than two-million children being home-schooled in theUS, with numbers fast increasing each year.  Jonathan reveals that home-schooled kids on average score 35% higher than the national average on standardized achievement tests!  He also reveals that the US is spending $10,500 a year for each enrolled student in regular schools, but the average cost of home-school education is $500 per child . . . and what a difference in result!

Learn the reasons why parents opt for home schooling.  Learn how easy it is, how to go about setting up your home school endeavor; what resources, help, free advice and services are available for potential home-schoolers.

Hear how parental involvement, even for non-home-schooled kids, is an important key to good grades.

 

Click her to listen July 18, 2011

For more information on this important subject, visit Roger & Virginia at our website http://www.howtolearneasily.com.

Send any questions you have to questions@howtolearneasily.com