Parent Education topics from 2009-2010
Having a Fun and Educational Summer
Summer is almost here and we will all be looking for fun, creative and educational things to keep our children busy during the dog days of summer. Here are a few sources to get started on your quest for a fun summer!
Visit the Waco McLennan County Library
The Waco McLennan Library has free activities all summer long for kids of all ages. They will have weekly performers at all 4 libraries, the Angel Paws Reading Buddies Program, the Summer Reading Club, movie Wednesdays, game nights for older kids, and some workshops. Check their website for more information about times, places and ages for each activity: http://www.waco-texas.com/cms-library/page.aspx?id=78
Waco Summer Camps
Take advantage of one of the many summer camp opportunities in Waco. Whether your kids are into sports, theater, music, cooking, sewing or computers, there's a summer camp in Waco for that! Check out the Waco Trib's Summer Sourcebook 2010 online for more information on camps and activities offered around town: Summer Sourcebook 2010 Waco camps activities and fun
Fun At Home
Enjoy the time you have with your kids while they are home this summer. Make the most of that time with fun, educational activities that will build memories that last a lifetime. Take a look at the following links for some great suggestions for activities with your kids. Enriching activities for your kids.
Here is a link for 65 activities to do with your kids this summer. This is a great place to start when you have the whole day ahead of you and the kids are looking for something to do. http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content2/summertime.fun.html
Have a great summer, be safe and enjoy your time with your children!
Resources to Ensuring Family Safety
There are many things we need to do to ensure that our family is safe at all times. Here are some great resources for the best ways of keeping your family safe.
This is a great website to teach kids about fire safety. It also has some fun games for kids.
www.firesafety.gov/kids/flash.shtm
Teaching your kids about stranger danger can be confusing. Parents tend to go too far or not far enough in teaching kids how to protect themselves. Here are ten stranger danger tips for keeping your child safe from stranger abduction or attack.
www.life123.com/parenting/young-children/stranger-safety/10-tips-for-stranger-safety.shtml
Safety in the car is such an important focus, from selecting the safest cars to properly restraining yourself and your children. Visit this site for articles and forums regarding safety in the car.
Follow this link for some tips on food safety.
www.consumersunion.org/food/0820nastdc898.htm
Here is another website your kids will enjoy. They can learn how to be safe in any kind of weather emergency, as well as play a few games.
www.weatherwizkids.com/weather-safety.htm
Keeping your home safe just got easier, and more fun, with this website from the Home Safety Council.
www.homesafetycouncil.org/index.asp
Make Reading FUN!
Want to help your child become a better reader? As parents, we are always looking for ways to help our children develop the skills that will make them more successful. The ability to read, as well as developing a love of reading, is one way to prepare our children for a bright future. The following links contain ideas for creating a fun, challenging, and creative reading atmosphere in your home. Take a little time right now to plan some fun reading activities with your family.
The Family Education website offers this article by the National PTA about how to make 15 minutes go a long way. Try these 15-minute reading activities.
Family Fun Reading Activities: take a look at this pamphlet filled with fun reading activities for the entire family. Click to see the pamphlet.
Taking your children to the library to let them choose their own book can be lots of fun. However, the public library doesn't rate all books by level like the school library does, so it is sometimes hard to find the right book for your child. This article offers some helpful advice on finding the right book and continuing reading fun into the summer months. View the Article.
Reading aloud with your kids can be such a rewarding activity. This article from the Reading Is Fundamental website offers some great tips for reading aloud. View the Article.
HAPPY READING!
Get Involved in Your Child's Education
Homework is an opportunity for children to learn and for families to be involved in their children's education. However, helping children with homework isn't always easy. Below are some practical tips for helping your children to complete homework assignments successfully and set good habits that may improve your child's chances of doing well in school and life.
Show that You Think Education is Important
- Set a regular time every day for homework.
- Make sure your child has the papers, books, pencils and other things needed to do assignments.
- Make sure your child has a well-lit, fairly quiet place to study.
- Set a good example by showing your child that the skills they are learning are an important part of the things they will do as an adult.
- Stay in touch with your child's teacher.
Monitor Assignments
- Know what your child's homework assignments are, how long they should take, and how the teacher wants you to be involved in them.
- See that your child starts and completes assignments.
- Read the teacher's comments on assignments that are returned.
- Make sure TV/computer/video games aren't cutting into your child's homework time.
Provide Guidance
- Help your child to get organized with a schedule or assignment book, a book bag or backpack and a folder for papers.
- Encourage your child to develop good study habits (for example, scheduling enough time for big assignments; making up practice tests).
- Talk with your child about homework assignments to make sure they understand them.
Talk with Teachers to Resolve Problems
- Meet with the teacher early in the year before any problems arise or as need when problems do arise.
- Cooperate with the teacher to work out a plan and a schedule to solve homework problems.
- Follow up with the teacher and with your child to make sure the plan is working.
For more information on helping your child with homework and to access other publications in the Helping Your Child series from the Department of Education (Helping Your Child Learn Science/Mathematics/Reading and much more), please visit www2.ed.gov/parents/academic/help/hyc.html
Drunk and Drugged Driving Prevention
December is National Drunk and Drugged Driving Prevention month.
With holiday parties abound, December is the perfect time to take a look at the consequences of impaired driving and consider what you and your community can do to make injuries and deaths from impaired driving less of a threat.
The following websites have a lot of helpful information for you and your family about preventing unnecessary holiday tragedies resulting from driving while impared.
www.cdc.gov/MotorVehicleSafety/Impaired_Driving/3d.html
Help do your part by setting good examples and educating your children from an early age about the dangers of drunk and drugged driving.
Why Healthy Lifestyles?
As parents, we want to be certain that we are doing the right things to ensure our children will grow into healthy, happy adults. Listed here are a few facts about healthy lifestyles and some suggested links to find more information about healthier lifestyles for our kids and us.
Our kids don't always make the most nutritious choices, but with a few good ideas from this healthy snacking article, your kids may just learn to love their fruits and veggies! Tips on how to serve fruits and vegetables as well as whole grains, diary, other snacks and beverages are detailed in this easy to read document.
Tips for Healthy School Snacks**
This Active Children, Active Families guide can give you ideas for getting kids interested in physical activity. This printable flyer gives families fun ideas about how to get their kids away from the TV, video games, or computer and interested in physical activity.
Your family can work together to form healthy habits that will last a lifetime. This link to the American Heart Association guides you in the top 10 ways to help children develop healthy habits for a lifetime.
Teach Them Healthy Habits for Life**
New Laws Regarding Your Children
Did you know that a recent law went into effect on September 1 regarding driving and child passenger safety? This new law requires that:
- Teens under 18 are prohibited from texting and talking on a cell phone while driving.
- Every person in a car, regardless of their age or where they are sitting, is now required to wear a seatbelt.
- All children younger than 8 years old and less than 4 foot 9 inches are required to be in a child safety seat system. Once a child is over 8 years old or taller than 4'9", they are no longer legally required to be in a child safety seat.
For more information regarding this new law, check out these links:
New Booster Seat Law Clarified**
DPS Child Passenger Safety Information
Texas PTA New Laws Regarding Driving**
**PDF files require Adobe Reader™ to open/view files.
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Monitoring Entertainment Media Ratings
As parents, our job of screening what our kids watch on TV and movies, play on video games, see on the internet, listen to on the radio, and even read in books can be absolutely unmanagable! There is just no way to view everything before our kids see them, especially as our kids get older. Two websites I've found recently do a great job of giving parents a realistic heads-up about much of the media that reaches our children every day. Read below about those sites:
www.Kids-in-Mind.com
This website rates movies, currently at the theater and older movies too, and gives each a numerical score on sex & nudity, violence & gore, and profanity.
So at a glance, you can view each movie's 3 number score (example: G force rating is 3.5.2) and have an idea of the content of that movie. You can also get more detailed information about each movie, with specific descriptions of scenes that may be objectionable for children. In addition, the site details any occurances of substance abuse, discussion topics, and overall message, although these are not numerically rated.
www.CommonSenseMedia.org
This website has a wealth of information for parents, but is particularly helpful in navigating the mass of media in our children's lives. It offers ratings and reviews for movies, video games, websites, television shows, books and music. Every source is assigned an appropriate age rating and reasons for that rating are detailed. In addition, members are given the opportunity to review and 5-star rate each source. So you may want to read other's reviews or you may want to voice your own opinion.
Both of these websites make it easier for parents to make an informed choice about what to allow their children to view and they are helpful to parents with children of all ages. I hope you spend some time to check them out.
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