Education
Danny the Dragon Supports Deaf Literacy
A passionate literacy advocate, I was alarmed by the literacy statistic among the deaf, and now I’ve begun raising support for education for deaf children. Upon the release of my Danny the Dragon DREAMS, the proceeds of my Danny the Dragon DVD, which features a signed reading of the book for deaf children, will be donated to the local deaf children’s school, Blossom’s Montessori School for the Deaf in Clearwater, Florida. I’m very happy that I’m able to do something to improve deaf education!
Tina Turbin
Learn to Recognize the Difference between Malnourishment and Mental Disorders in Children
If you’re like me, you’re probably alarmed to hear so much about the prevalence of “mental disorders,” particularly among children. It seems that every year there are more and more disorders are emerging, along with psychotropic medications to treat them. However, as the mother of three grown-up, mentally healthy children and with a strong background and experience in nutritional research, I counsel mothers to be careful before mistaking your children’s odd behavior with a mental illness. It turns out the symptoms of malnourishment and mental disorders are actually quite similar in children.
Even just the signs of a deficiency in B vitamins will sounds familiar to you as the symptoms of childhood mental disease. Deficiency in Vitamin B1 can result in fatigue, poor memory, irritability, and insomnia. A B2 deficiency can cause depression. Deficiencies of B3 may begin as depression, but untreated may progress to psychosis or even dementia. Deficiencies in Biotin may cause a variety of problems, including skin disorders and eczema, dandruff or hair loss, fatigue, depression, even hallucinations.
Children can also suffer from a classic case of low blood sugar. Studies show that breakfasts rich in protein keep the body’s blood sugar level higher and more stable than breakfasts such as, say, the American breakfast staple of sugar-packed cereals. Kids are bound to peak in the morning and then crash later in the day, exhibiting hyperactivity and lethargy during the school day.
The consequences of improperly diagnosing a mental illness instead of treating malnourishment in a child can be severe. If you care about your child and children in general, it is imperative that you and your child’s teachers learn the crucial difference between children’s mental disorders and inadequate nutrition.
Tina Turbin
Encourage Social Skills in Children: Danny the Dragon Author Offers Tips
One of the ways parents can increase involvement is by supporting their child’s education and helping him achieve academic success. An important part of this, which parents don’t often think about, is teaching your kids the social skills they’ll need to succeed in school. Here are some tips for parents on how they can send their child to school with the social skills they need to successfully interact with teachers and other students.
First, it’s important to teach your child to ask for what he needs. How can he get help unless he’s able to admit he doesn’t understand something? A great way to instill this in your child is to practice it at home.
One of the most important things you can teach your child is manners. Teachers may attempt to teach students politeness and social skills, but if it’s not being practiced in the home, the child will not successfully absorb these lessons. Your child should be taught when to say, “please,” “thank you,” and “excuse me.” Have him practice sharing things, taking turns, and waiting his turn in line.
Point out good examples of behavior to your child when you see it. If you’re watching a movie or out in public, you can say to your child something such as, “Did you see how the man held open the door for the lady? He was being a gentleman.”
Finally, rehearse at home anything your child may feel awkward saying or doing with other people. In such a way, you’ll be able to get your child interacting with others with ease.
Success in school isn’t only determined by academic skills and knowledge. By following the helpful tips above in the time you spend with your child, you’ll notice an improvement in your child’s education experience in no time as they become more comfortable in their learning environment and better equipped to flourish in it.
Children Need Good Literature
The fact that kids need good literature is not a new one. Just look at the number of awards available in the United States alone to reward authors for superb children’s literature. The long list of such awards includes the Newbery Medal, Caldecott Medal, Coretta Scott King Award, and Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal. With such an extraordinary effort made to celebrate good children’s literature, there must be something important about it.
I know how short the attention span of a child can be yet how thrilling it is to watch a child’s imagination partake in an exciting adventure story. However, why should a child read good literature rather than watch an “educational” television show or an entertaining children’s movie? The answer lies in the benefits of reading to your child.
Research continues to support that reading benefits children of all ages in a number of ways. Reading helps to build your child’s vocabulary, develop his imagination, and improve his ability to communicate. In fact, there is a direct relationship between how many words an infant hears in a day and his language skills, and even his intelligence quotient. Reading is crucial in exposing your baby or young child to a variety of words. The images and colors in children picture books and illustrated books are also stimulating of the imagination. This is part of the reason why I spent a whole year interviewing illustrators after writing the first book in my series, Danny the Dragon—I knew from reading to my own children just how much children appreciate art in children’s literature.
So the next time you’re shopping for the kids at Wal-Mart, think twice before you get them another DVD, remember the pleasure you get from curling up with a good book, and pick out some high-quality children’s literature instead.
Helpful Tips to Encourage Learning in Your Children
First of all, read to your children! Studies show that reading to your child can begin before the age of six months, as soon as they’re able to enjoy the images and pictures inside of their books. Children have varying attention spans and you should keep in mind not to push too far past these limits and not to force them to read, as children tend to dislike things they are forced to do when it’s not on their own determinism. You can read to your child or have them read you, or take turns.
Play board games to stimulate an interest in learning. Not only are they tons of fun, but they help your child develop his reading skills and practice following rules.
A family day at the museum, library, or other stimulating place will encourage your child to be interested in his environment and take a hands-on approach to learning. Ask your child questions about the artwork he sees at museums, such as “Why do you think the painter chose this color?”
Volunteer at your child’s school whenever possible. You can go along on field trips, help decorate for class parties, or read to the class. This will show that you care about your child’s schooling enough to go to his school yourself.
Finally, make sit-down dinners a regular part of your family’s evening, turning off the TV and cell phones so you can sit and talk without distractions. Take advantage of this time to show a genuine interest in your child’s schooling and in academic subjects in general. Ask him lots of questions, tell him funny anecdotes about when you were in school, or tell him what you thought of the book he’s reading in his literature class when you read it in high school yourself. This gets across the important message that learning is important, one of the most valuable lessons you’ll teach your child and which will help ensure his success in all his future endeavors.
Getting Involved in Your Child’s Education
First, make sure your child is well-rested and well-fed. A well-balanced diet, with nutritious meals at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and healthy snacks after school, has been shown to improve academic performance in children. Kids also need to be well-rested in order to focus during the day.
Next, take advantage of every opportunity to meet your child’s teachers, such as parent-teacher or open-school nights. Not only will you make sure you’re not missing vital information, such as what the teacher expects of your child’s homework assignments, but you’ll show your child and his teachers that you care about his education.
Familiarize yourself with your child’s daily routine by making a copy of his schedule. If you know gym class is on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, you can make sure your child brings his gym clothes on these days.
Check your child’s backpack and planner to make sure you see teacher’s notes, important dates, permission slips, and graded assignments and tests. You prevent your child’s embarrassment in school by making sure your child is prepared for the special events and activities you’ll find out about through your backpack inspections and can provide your child with help for anything you find he may need help with.
Stay connected with other parents. Sometimes your child’s perception of what’s occurring in the classroom may not be accurate, or perhaps your child hasn’t been mentioning some essential information. By forming connections with other parents, you can ensure that you’re not missing out on vital data.
Is Your Child Struggling with His Homework? Tips on How to Help
If your child is clearly upset or unable to figure things out, or if his teacher isn’t giving him the help he needs during the school day, you should step in and work out the child’s misunderstandings. The idea is to keep your child winning. Academic confusions can build up over time so that kids may eventually take a loss on studies. You will help to create independent learners by making sure they understand the basics of arithmetic, reading, grammar, etc. so that as they progress in school, they’ll be able to grasp new lessons and apply what they learn effectively.
Another way to foster independence is to read over his work and make a challenge for him to find the words you see are misspelled or other mistakes. This will get him interested in and used to checking over his own work for errors. It is also essential to get your child in the habit of using reference materials on his own. Get him a good, age-appropriate dictionary and encyclopedia set (or online encyclopedia subscription) so he can look up what he doesn’t understand. The dictionary is too difficult if your child frequently doesn’t understand the words in the definitions of words he’s looking up.
If your child is averse to doing homework, it’s probably not because he’s inherited his father’s stubbornness but more likely that he is having difficulties that need to be straightened out as soon as possible before his confusions multiply.
“It might seem like an attitude problem, but his reluctance may be a sign that he’s having difficulty with the material,” says Jed Baker, PhD, author of No More Meltdowns. You should talk to your child’s teacher to see how he’s doing in class; if he’s struggling, he needs help. Go back through the beginning of his material and move forward clearing up any misunderstandings about terms and symbols. Also, make sure he didn’t skip a vital step in his learning. For example, some kids have a very hard time doing long division because they didn’t fully understand multiplication or because they were absent when the class was learning about estimating. Go back to basic concepts and make sure he understands these.
With these tips you’ll soon find that your child is not only able to get through his homework better, but he’ll even perform better in school, and you and your family can focus on a variety of other fun activities to do together after school.
Getting the Kids to Listen
First of all, maintain eye contact, looking at your child when you talk to him, Tina says. Talking over his shoulder while he watches TV or calling to him from another room is not conducive to communicating effectively. Turn off the TV for a minute and kneel down to your child’s level so that you’re facing each other, Tina advises, and then go ahead and talk to him.
Be realistic in what you’re asking him to do. Sometimes I see parents who ask their children to do age-inappropriate things that they’re just not yet capable of, and it overwhelms them. You may just be asking too much of them.
How do you get along when you’re starving or after a poor night’s sleep? If you suspect your kid is hungry, get him a high-protein snack to give him a blood sugar boost, and then go ahead and repeat your demands.
Next, when you offer your child choices, only give him one or two at a time because too many choices can overwhelm him. Instead of asking, “What do you want to do?” ask “Would you rather help with the laundry or set the table?”
Finally, be positive and supportive when your children do what you want. When they do listen, say thank you or tell them they did a good job. You’ll get more of what you support with positive remarks.
Developing listening skills in your children isn’t usually an overnight task, but by following these tips, you’ll find that soon there will be a recognizable change in how your kids respond to what you say.
Packing the Kids a Healthy Lunch
What exactly should you look for in a healthy, well-balanced lunch? You should make sure to include whole grains, fruits and vegetables, calcium, and lean protein. The USDA has daily recommendations for children for each of these food groups, and you should aim to provide as much as possible in each category when preparing your child’s lunch.
Collect recipes just as you would for dinners which can deliver to your child the nutrition he needs in a variety of creative ways. You can make lunch for the whole family in large servings—for Mom, Dad, and all the kids. Not only will this ensure that you’re feeding your child a variety of tasty foods, since you’ll be eating it yourself, but you’ll also save money and time by simplifying lunch-making.
If you’re strapped for time, get your kids to prepare their own lunches the night before (this is usually better than rushing in the morning). Kids are actually happy to help with cooking are able to pull it off with success with some supervision. It is with this in mind that I’ve created Danny the Dragon Children’s Cookbook as part of my Danny the Dragon children’s series.
Give your child the daily gift of a well-balanced lunch and watch him thrive!
Homework Help Advice to Parents
First of all, consistency is key. Except for when extracurricular activities interfere, your child should aim to do his homework at the same time every day as part of his daily afterschool routine. You can test to see when the best time is for homework. Make sure your child has eaten a healthy, high-protein snack before he begins his homework, and studies have shown that many children perform work better after physical exercise, which can increase a child’s concentration.
Another part of the routine is where your child will study. It’s important to create a regular study space. If they settle down at the kitchen table near you, they will be able to get the help they need, and you’ll be able to get them back on track if they start wandering from their task. Make sure you provide lots of room and keep supplies well-stocked and nearby.
Next, it’s important to reduce distractions. I recommend making study time a family affair with all kids doing their homework at the same time while you sit down with your own “homework” such as bills or some reading. This will help create an atmosphere of diligence and concentration, as your kids will follow the example you set. Also, make it a rule that there’s to be no TV or videogames, or other distractions, until your child is done with his homework.
Aim to help your child become an independent student. Elementary-school kids usually need help, but you can check with your child’s teacher to see how much you should be helping him and how much he should be able to do on his own. Sometimes teachers prefer that parental involvement in homework stay at a minimum so they can determine the progress of your child. Show your child how to use a dictionary and encyclopedia so he can try helping himself before he goes to you for help.
