comes write off

Do you have a little writer? A little Shakespeare, Twain, or Dickenson? I do. Both of my older kids love to write. They write songs, poems, short stories, and news articles. They love journaling, although much of their journaling is devoted to these gifts of their imaginations as opposed to the goings on in their lives.

I have found a few websites that are great for encouraging reading and writing. The first one is Kahani. It is an amazing magazine for kids that focuses on bringing South Asian stories to kids living in North America. Kids who come from the Indian subcontinent can read fictional stories which relate to their backgrounds. The current issue has Diwali, Eid, and Christmas stories that my kids really enjoyed. It even had a little section that introduced kids to the concept of homeless Indian-Americans. My daughter couldn't believe that could happen to someone like her. It was an eye-opener.

Another website, which actually is for us adults too, is the National Novel Writing Month site. The companion kids site is the NANOWRIMO Young Writers Program. Apparently, November is National Novel Writing Month. Basically, the adult program is to write a 175 page, 50,000 word novel in one month!!! The kids program allows the child to set their own goal. Every novel needs to be started November 1st and finished on November 30th. The idea is to not worry if the work is good or not, but simply to go through the exercise of writing the novel with as much speed and energy as possible. They say right on the website "It's all about quantity, not quality." It's an incredibly popular event. In 2007, they had over 100,000 participants with 15,000 folks actually finishing!! Wow!

Both of my big kids displayed a love of writing early on. Now, as they take steps into their tweens, it is truly intensifying. There are few days when they don't take time out to write something down. I love it. They are even inspiring me to take up my pen (or keyboard)!

At the beginning of the school year, I researched math curriculums. Sounds exciting doesn't it? Well, I had to do start figuring out what is going on with the math curriculum in my county because both of my older kids were placed in upper level math groupings. I should be proud, right? Well, yes. I am. They are both smart kids, and they both work extremely hard. But, I had to ask myself if it is right for them to be accelerated so quickly. My older child was placed two years ahead of her grade level, and my middle child was placed a year ahead. After the initial burst of pride I felt, I started to worry whether they really had the skills to be placed in these math groupings. That's when I decided to start finding out more about the math curriculum in our county.

In our county, we use Everyday Math - The University of Chicago system. They use what is called spiraling methodology to teach math. So, children will be introduced to concepts again and again. but with different depth as they progress through the curriculum. So, a first grader will be introduced the concept of area and perimeter in the first grade, and again in the second, and so on an so forth. My research shows that most of the country uses it as well. I have mixed feelings about the system. In theory, it sounds pretty great, but I think the traditional approach probably works best. Math needs repetition to really hone the skills.

Also, what about introducing lofty concepts like perimeter, area, and algebra to these little ones? It doesn't matter that cognitively they are not ready for some of the subject matter. They also have no frame of reference for the subject matter. How does a 6 year old child wrap his head around the concept of area. To me, it seems the idea is simply to accelerate the kids just for the sake of acceleration. No matter that test scores in middle school are dropping because kids don't get enough practice with basic arithmetic or depth of knowledge.

Math takes time, practice, and is probably one of the most important skills you learn in school. Math is pervasive in everyday life. It turns you into a logical, creative thinker, and builds problem solving skills. I ended up taking the kids out of their accelerated classes. I think they need more practice. I don't want them to be struggling in middle school, because the glossed over key concepts in grammar school. Most teachers tell me how much they admire the decision and say they wish more parents would do the same. A lot of the kids hate math now, because it just crammed down their throats with an incredible intensity. I am just happy that my kids are happy, and they still love math.

It's been a long time since I posted last. Just have too much going on, but something inspired me to get back to this blog. I realized after talking to some people that this blog IS a good idea, and that I really should get back to it.
So what's the topic for today? A hodgepodge of good stuff for kids. I am always scouring the net for good websites for my kids. There's a lot of garbage out there - Junk they really don't need to waste their time on. Not just bad content, but badly produced web sites with links that don't work or broken images, etc. But, I will focus on just the "good stuff."

I have girls and girls like "American Girl" stuff. For the most part, I like the concept. The American Girl folks help to bring brave, strong, girls with a strong sense of what is right and wrong to the attention of little girls who are being hit with counter images. (I am not even going to name names.) Anyway, I like the idea of American Girl. I even like the way they are introducing more and more ethnically diverse characters, as well teaching girls some good history lessons. I hope in the future that they will have even more cultures represented.

I also like BBC-CBBC. It's the BBC site for kids. My kids like playing the math games, especially. Our oldest was able to practice simple multiplication and lattice multiplication at their Skillwise site. There are other games, not so educational but fun.

Another website closer to home, is GameGoo, which seems geared towards Kindergarten through 2nd grade. My kids love it. They don't even realize that they are learning something. The site has not been updated in years, but it is still strong.

Occasionally, I need worksheets to help supplement the kids' homework. Once in a while, they just need to practice something to get it right. There are a number of websites that I use for this. First-School Preschool Activities and Crafts helps with handwriting, learning the alphabet, and has tons of coloring pages. SuperKids is a website that reviews educational software, but also has great worksheet generators for math, games like Hangman, Checkers, Find-a-Word generators, and telling time worksheets. Sometimes you get worksheets with a lot of the same problems on them, but mostly there is enough variety.

My kids are growing up and as they grow, so will my worries that they will come across precarious websites. For now, I can monitor their usage, and allow them to only go to sites that I have scoped out. Little kids, little issues - Big kids, bigger issues. Let's be careful out there.

So what's my first topic? Traveling to Disney with kids.
I am about to embark on a week long trip to Disney World with my kids - all girls Don't even ask me if I think this will be fun!! My husband is losing his nerve and has on more than one occasion said that he doesn't want to take them anywhere. They are actually better behaved when they are out in the world rather than at home, but how can I convince him of this when I am feeling a little trepidacious myself. I think the main thing is just keep them well fed and don't tire them out too much. I personally can't wait for the big ones to go with me in the Teacup ride.
My husband turned me on to a great website that offers lots of advice and discount codes for hotels. http://www.allearsnet.com/
There's also another one that I found on my own that actually has the menus of the restaurants on the resort. This is great for picky eaters. My kids and I are vegetarians so that makes us PICKY!!
http://www.wdwinfo.com/index.htm
You can also buy tickets/passports to Sesame Place and get unlimited admission to other parks like Sea World Orlando and Busch Gardens Williamsburg. Since we are planning to go to these parks over the summer, it seems like this will be a good idea.
http://commerce.4adventure.com/store/
Just call me Theme Park Girl. I love those roller coasters. Maybe that's why I had three GIRLS!!!