Join the Social Network For Learning - 'ePals'

ePals is a community of connected classrooms, which is equally beneficial for students and teachers.

It is fastest growing K-12 online community for meaningful learning. More than half a million educators and millions of learners across 200 countries and territories safely connect, collaborate and build community.

It offers classroom e-mail, blogs, online literacy tools and Web-based collaborative projects on subjects like global warming and habitats.

EPals says 125,000 classrooms around the world are using at least some of its free tools, reaching 13 million students, and its ambition is to become a global “learning social network.”

What you can do at ePals:

1- Collaborate with another classroom
2- Find great projects and instructional materials at ePals
3- Chat with other teachers
4- Share your successful lessons and resources
5- Connect Your Families
6- Have a say! Cast a vote in the Polls
7- Connect with Email
8- Protect your students with Monitored Accounts
9- Create a Blog - We want to hear what you have to say
10-Ask an ePals Teacher

There are many forums where teachers or students where you can ask questions, read the other member's opinions and place comments.

I could see many posts which are about learning a foreign language. Especially for the people who learn English as a second language

Click on the "support" link to see what you can get from ePals and how to start discovering what ePal is.

Teachers and schools can now create blog at ePal.

"ePals is now making SchoolBlog available at no cost to schools, districts, and learners globally. ePal wants to partner with the education community to speed the rate of safe and collaborative learning around the world.

How to detect early visual problems of your child?

This post would help you understand how to detect if your child is having visual
problems. Earlier you notice vision problem, easier is to cure. I learned this important lesson from my life, because my vision problem was not detected earlier and I spent about one years without realizing it. Later my mother noticed my watching tv from a closer place and consulted an optometrist.

Parents and teachers often have difficulty recognizing some visual problems because children don't necessarily know how or what they're supposed to be seeing, so it's unlikely they will clearly describe visual problems. A child who has never known normal vision or depth perception doesn't know what he or she is missing.

Early detection of visual problems greatly increases the chances of successful rehabilitation. Children should be examined by an eye doctor during infancy and preschool years to detect potential problems with binocular vision. This is particularly important if any member of the family has had ambylopia or strabismus. Testing of binocular teaming skills should be a part of every child's comprehensive eye examination.

Children should be examined by an eye doctor during infancy and preschool years to detect potential vision defects

Look for these signs and symptoms!

You observe the following behavior in your child:

- one eye drifts or aims in a different direction than the other (look carefully -- this can be subtle). This is significant even if it only occurs when the child is tired or stressed.
- turns or tilts head to see
- head is frequently tilted to one side or one shoulder is noticeably higher
- squinting or closing of one eye
- excessive blinking or squinting
- poor visual/motor skills (often called, "hand-eye coordination")
- problems moving in space, frequently bumps into things or drops things

While reading or doing close work your child:

- holds the book or object unusually close
- closes one eye or covers eye with hand
- twists or tilts head toward book or object so as to favor one eye
- frequently loses place and fatigues easily
- uses finger to read
- rubs eyes during or after short periods of reading

Your child frequently complains of:

- only being able to read for short periods of time
- headaches or eyestrain
- nausea or dizziness
- motion sickness
- DOUBLE VISION!

If your child reports seeing double, please take your child for a binocular vision evaluation immediately.
Source: Children special needs.org A site from "The Optometrists Network" which educates the public about visual health and spreads the word about unique aspects of optometric care. Provides patient education free to the public.

Helpful articles:

* Parents' Guide to Children's Normal Visual Development from Infancy to Preschool

Time management tips for kids

Time management is an acquired skill. Parents can help their kids learn to be better managers of their time. The first step to help them learn is to accomplish your own daily task on time. Because you are the first role model for them.

"The difference between successful and unsuccessful people, a lot of times, is their ability to manage time," says Severson, who is a chemistry teacher in a suburb of St. Paul, Minnesota. "Fundamentally, it's a learned skill."

Tips to learn time management for kids:

This report provides advice to parents on managing their child's time. It focuses on critical transition times across a child's daily life when parents say they have the most problems.

Most parents find that by using the following strategies, they are able to increase the amount of time spent on positive interactions with their children while greatly reducing the amount of time they spend punishing and scolding their children.

Most of these strategies require time and effort from parents in the beginning to get their children to follow a schedule. However, by following these strategies, parents often find that they end up having more time in the end.

Morning Routine

Here are some tips for establishing a more pleasant morning routine:

- Get up early. Make sure you wake up at least 15-20 minutes before your children so that you can focus on what you need to get done to prepare for your day.

Many parents find its easiest to complete the majority of their personal morning routine (e.g., shower, get dressed, etc.) before waking their children.

After waking the kids, parents work on making breakfast or lunches so they can easily check up on the kids' progress in their morning routine.

Make a chart. Parents often complain that their children always "forgets" to do something when they're getting ready in the morning. Truth is, many of us "grizzly bears" are forgetful in the morning.

Help your kids to remember by creating a morning routine chart. (Chart is included in full article.)

Include things like washing their face, brushing their teeth, getting dressed, making the bed, etc.

List all the morning activities you can reasonably expect your child to complete on the left side of a piece of paper.

List the days of the week across the top of the paper.

Give your child a sticker or a star for every morning activity they successfully complete on time.

- Reward them with praise each time you give them a sticker.

Give a bigger reward at the end of the morning, or for older children, at the end of the week, for successfully completing a number of morning activities on time.

- Some examples of rewards include:

- choosing a snack or dessert for lunch

- earning 5-10 minutes of free time before school

- and choosing a fun weekend activity (big reward).

Don't demand perfection, especially if your child has not performed many of these activities on their own before.

Reward them for improvements even if it just means completing one activity per day.

Focusing on progress rather than perfection encourages your children to become more enthusiastic and take pride in completing their morning routine.


This document is, one of a series of the Department of University of Florida.

Read the document in detail: Time Management for Kids

- Download 8 page-pdf version

More readings about the topic:

- Download another report from 'Indiana.edu: 'time management'

- Time management, have-to's, want-to's, and goals at: Pbs-kids

- At "Better homes and Gardens" magazine: (There are ads on the page, you can skip by selecting 'skip the page')Time Management for Kids

Download Free 'Help your child' e-books

Parents who help their child in studies need some guidance which is usually provided by the schools, but for good grades, students need to search for extra resources and helping books. Internet is a rich source of information regarding educational stuff. But the information are scattered in a way that usually it is difficult or time consuming to find or search the material. I hope that this blog would be helpful for teachers, parents, or students in finding relevant information or resource links.

You can download these 12- "Helping your child" series e-books FREE. These are not educational or teaching syllabus books, but these books are a guideline for specific subjects. First 9 books are in pdf format, and you would get the downloading instruction from the post. Rest of the 3 books are in brochure form.

These e-books are provided by ED.gov a 'U.S Department of Education" site, to promote student achievement.
"The "Helping Your Child" publication series aims to provide parents with the tools and information necessary to help their children succeed in school and life. These booklets feature practical lessons and activities to help their school aged and preschool children master reading, understand the value of homework and develop the skills and values necessary to achieve and grow."

1- Helping Your Child Learn History

The booklet is designed to help families prepare their children to achieve the lifelong task of finding their place in history by helping them learn what shaped the world into which they were born. Employing the latest research, the booklet is largely comprised of activities that can be experienced at home or in the community for children in preschool through grade 5, yet also features information about the basics of history; practical suggestions for how to work with teachers and schools to help children succeed in school; and a list of federal sources, helpful Web sites and suggested books for parents and children
Download link: To download, click the right mouse button and select 'save as':PDF (2M)

2- Helping Your Child Learn Science

Every day is filled with opportunities to learn science—without expensive chemistry sets or books. Parents don't need degrees in chemistry or physics to help their children learn science. All that is needed is a willingness to observe and learn with them, and, above all, to make an effort and take the time to nurture their natural curiosity. This booklet provides parents of children ages 3 through 10 with information, tools and activities they can use in the home and community to help their child develop an interest in the sciences and learn about the world around them.
Download link: PDF (1M)

3- Helping Your Child Learn Mathematics

Our increasingly technological world demands strong skills in mathematics, not only in the workforce but also in everyday life, and these demands will only increase over the lifetimes of our children. The major portion of this booklet is made up of fun activities that parents can use with children from preschool age through grade 5 to strengthen their math skills and build strong positive attitudes toward math.
Download link: PDF (776K)

4- Helping Your Child Become a Reader

Other than helping your children to grow up healthy and happy, the most important thing that you can do for them is to help them develop their reading skills. This booklet offers pointers on how to build the language skills of young children, and includes a list of typical language accomplishments for different age groups, suggestions for books, and resources for children with reading problems or learning disabilities.
Download link: PDF

5- Helping Your Child With Homework

Homework can help children to develop positive study skills and habits, improve their thinking and memory abilities, and encourage them to use time well, learn independently, and take responsibility for their work. This booklet helps parents of elementary and junior high school students understand why homework is important and makes suggestions for helping children complete assignments successfully.
Download link: PDF (508K)

6- Helping Your Preschool Child

How well children will learn and develop and how well they will do in school depends on a number of things, including their health and physical well-being, social and emotional preparation, and language skills and general knowledge of the world. This booklet highlights techniques parents can use to encourage their children to develop the skills necessary for success in school and life by focusing on activities that make learning fun.
Download link: PDF (725K)

7- Helping Your Child Succeed in School

Every child has the power to succeed in school and in life and every parent, family member and caregiver can help. This booklet provides parents with information, tools and activities they can use in the home to help their child develop the skills critical to academic success.
Downlaod link: PDF (1,600K)

8- Helping Your Child Through Early Adolescence

Learning as much as you can about the world of early adolescents is an important step towards helping your child through the fascinating, confusing and wonderful years from ages 10 through 14. Based on the latest research in adolescent development and learning, this booklet addresses questions, provides suggestions and tackles issues that parents of young teens generally find most challenging.
Download link: PDF (2,090K)

9- Helping Your Child Become a Responsible Citizen

Just as children must be taught to read and write, solve math problems, and understand science concepts and events in history, so must they be guided in developing the qualities of character that are valued by their families and by the communities in which they live. This booklet provides information about the values and skills that make up character and good citizenship and what you can do to help your child develop strong character. It suggests activities that you and your school-aged children can do to put those values to work in your daily lives and tips for working with teachers and schools to ensure that you act together to promote the basic values that you want your child to learn and use.
Downlaod link: PDF (1,687K)

Few more brochures:

10- Help Your Child Improve in Test-Taking
It suggests some simple techniques parents can use to help their children develop the ability to do well on tests.
Link: Help Your Child Improve in Test-Taking

11- Help Your Child Learn to Write Well
This brochure gives parents simple and fun strategies for helping their children learn to write well—and to enjoy doing it!
Link: Help Your Child Learn to Write Well

12- Helping Your Child Learn Geography
Offers many simple, fun activities to teach youngsters the fundamentals of geography—from creating treasure maps to helping children find pen pals.
Link: Helping Your Child Learn Geography

Benefits of Access to Internet At Homes

There have been many studies in the UK and across the world on ICT's effect on learning and teaching, and on the importance of having access to computers and/or the internet at home, both for children and parents. ICT can improve the quality of teaching, learning and management in schools and so help raise standards.

Here are some of the key findings:

- used effectively, ICT can improve attainment
- using ICT at home and at school develops a key life skill
- pupils with supportive and involved parents and carers do better at school
- pupils enjoy using ICT and find it both motivational and fun
- parents like to use ICT to communicate with and learn more about school, and want to use it more
- using ICT provides access to a wider and more flexible range of learning materials

How does learning from home using ICT and the internet benefit pupils/students?

Home use of ICT by pupils:

- improves their ICT skills
- provides more options for what they learn and how they learn it
- supports homework and revision
- provides increased motivation, and more efficient and improved presentation
- connects learning at school with learning at home
- makes learning more fun

All this can lead to better performance at school and an imporved standard of work in assessments and tests.

What about parents?

Parents can:

- find out information about current and prospective schools through websites, etc.
keep in touch with educational and social events being organised by the school
- play a more active role in school life, find out about the work of the governors, the parent-teacher organisation and more
- get details about their child's lessons and homework, and where to get help and useful background information
- keep in touch with the school, individual teachers, clubs and other parents
- access - from some schools - information about how well their child is doing, behaviour and attendance information, sporting and creative arts success, and details of personal assignments and homework

TIP 1: Sometimes speaking to parents and carers who have experienced the same issues as you can be a great way to get valuable advice and information. Read, respond or ask a question in the 'Using computers and the internet'section of the ParentsCentre forum.

TIP 2: Benefit from the advice and tips given by our experts by reading or asking a question in the Experts' views forum

source: Using computers and the internet:

Related study material:

* Pdf file: DOES ICT IMPROVE LEARNING AND TEACHING IN SCHOOLS?

* Impact of ICT on Learning and Teaching

Create your own free 'Blog'

Are you new to internet and don't know how to start a 'blog'?

When you log on to "Blogger", you are provided step by step instructions to follow. But if the process is still difficult for you, then the resources given at this post would be helpful for you to start your own blog.

- Blogger help page can help you in creating your own blog. But if you still need help, then 'The step by step guide provided by " Michigan State University" can surely help you :
- How to Establish a Blog

- A step by step guide to create blog

- Another tutorial at 'Digital divide': How to create your own blog?

- How to create and promote a blog?

- The Blogosphere and Creating Your Own Blog

- How to Create a Blog With WordPress

"Gayle's Preschool Rainbow" - For themes based activities

"Gayle's Preschool Rainbow" is one of the sites where teachers, students and parents can learn a lot. I have searched the site and found a lot of ideas, tips and themes, to keep children busy while learning. Drawing and art teachers can get ideas for their craft projects, and even these topic based ideas can offer us many bulletin board ideas.

Pre school rainbow offers Preschool education activities and early childhood education lesson plans that give preschool children choices. Ideas for pre-k and kindergarten teachers that enrich classroom curriculum are arranged by theme. Plus easy at home fun learning games.

Author of the site says: "Preschool Rainbow is my attempt to celebrate the dedicated teachers that I have worked with and to share a few ideas that I have collected during the past 30 years as an early childhood educator. Because parents often ask teachers to suggest fun things that they can do at home with their young children, I've included lots of easy to do ideas for them in Home Activities."

There are informative early childhood education sites for teachers to visit in the links page. Look closely and you'll also discover a free, just for teachers offer. There's a section for parents in the links page too.

He says:

Years ago early childhood educators were considered babysitters, not any longer. With the recent scientific findings in brain development the value of early childhood education is becoming increasingly apparent.

From the list of themes, you can estimate, how many kind of thems based activities are offered at the site. Now only teachers but parents can get ideas and tips from this section:

Alphabet Theme,
Animal Activities,
Back to School Theme,
Book Themes,
Counting and Number Theme,
Dinosaur Theme,
Easter Theme,
Fall Theme,
Spring Theme,
Summer Theme, Winter Theme,
The Five Senses,
Holiday Craft Activities,
Home Activities,
Indoor Activities,
Toddler Theme ,
Preschool Rhyme

- Brain Growth

Sites points out to other resources: links to other sites for teachers and parents

* Lesson plan ideas for teachers from Scholastic

7 Activities to stimulate creativity

Can we develop the creative skills?

Yes, there are many activities and games which can help us make ourselves or our children more creative.

A quotation about 'creativity':

- The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself. (Alan Alda)

Now read the 7 activities which parents or teachers both can use to stimulate creativity among children.

Brain storming activities

These group activities are rooted in the practicalities of real life. They can be used to help students see how original and creative thinking can be applied to their daily lives.

1- Not Just for Breakfast

Place a box of ready-to-eat cereal (like Cheerios or Trix) on a desk or ledge at the front of the room. Ask the students to generate as many uses for the product as they can in two minutes. (Some of the more creative suggestions students might come up with—using the cereal as fertilizer or a component in jewelry.)

2- New Devices

Break students into groups of three. Have each group member draw a picture of someone doing something. (The ideal subject will be someone caught mid-movement.) After all the drawings are complete, have the students study them with the object of creating for each a device that will support the position shown in a steady state. Explain that the devices the students create can be made of paper, wood, plastic, or metal. (What the students will end up with are various forms of furniture, but they will have designed their creations without limiting themselves to their prior knowledge of furniture. The object of the exercise is to show the value of ambiguity in stimulating creativity.)

3- Troubleshooters

Once again, break the students into groups of three. Name a problem with which everyone is familiar—say, how to reduce the number of homeless people on the streets. Then assign each group a familiar figure from history, fiction, or current events, and have them determine how that person would solve the problem. For example, what if Martin Luther King, Jr. were to tackle the homeless problem? What if the Ninja Turtles were to try it? Barbara Walters? General Schwarzkopf? As a starting point, suggest that the students consider what particular expertise the person would bring to the problem and what his or her objectives would be

4- What If?

Divide the class into brainstorming groups of about ten students each. Ask the students to come up with the most unique "what if" question and answer they can think of. (In other words, start with "what if" and finish with some unusual situation.) Here are some examples: What if people didn't need to sleep? What if we "elected" presidents by lottery? After the groups have settled on their particular questions and answers, have the class compare them and vote on the most creative.

5- Questioning Authority

Divide the class into small groups (4-6 students). Have each group make a list of ten unwritten rules that they seem to follow each day. Examples might be where they buy groceries, what time they get up in the morning, and what television programs they watch. Have the groups discuss why they follow these "rules" and what it would take to get them to break them. Alternative: Try the same sort of activity, this time having students list beliefs they accept without question-truisms like "Recessions are bad" or "It takes money to make money."

6- Unusual Analogies

Divide the class into brainstorming groups of about ten students each. Have each group develop as many clever or unusual analogies as they can. For example: Going to school is like riding an elevator-some days you're up, some days you're down, and some days you get the shaft.

7- The Roots

Divide the class into small groups (4-6 students) for some problem analysis. First have the groups compile lists of problems their members face, such as poor grades or neighborhood vandalism. By way of analysis, have the group ask (and answer) the following questions:
Where does the problem happen?

When does it happen?

How does it happen?

To whom does it happen, and who causes it?

Have the groups finish by using the Toyota Suggestion System and asking Why? four times. For example, using the problem of poor grades:

Why did I receive a poor grade on the history test?
(The teacher is a hard grader.)

Why is the teacher a hard grader?
(She expects a lot of her students.)

Why does the teacher expect a lot of her students?
(She knows we can do it if we study hard.)

Why does she know we can do it if we study hard?
(She has seen students like us do it in the past.)

Source link: glencoe

- Creativity is a type of learning process where the teacher and pupil are located in the same individual. (Arthur Koestler)

Related posts:

Games That Stimulate Creativity

* The HEART of Creativity: Questions to Stimulate Creativity Training

* A very interesting story: How to stimulate creativity?

Reawakening the creative mind

Creativity - Its Place in Education (PDF document; 120kb)