Have You Made Your Twylah Page Yet?

My Twylah Page

After viewing a friend’s Twylah page, I had to see what mine would be like. What you see above is the top part of it. You can see my entire Twylah page here. In case you haven’t heard of Twylah, its a free service that makes a page that looks like mine, above, except it organizes your own Twitter tweets in an attractive format. Best of all, it takes almost no work on your part. All you have to do is sign up on the Twylah site and they send you an email letting you know you’re on their list. Then after they approve you in a couple of days or so, they send you your link, and you see the magic.

This is a great way to share your interests with others, and it also makes it possible for you to share power tweets right from the Twylah site.  Whether you use only use Twitter on your home computer, or use it as part of your classroom activities, you can probably think up some interesting uses for it.

I’d love to see yours when you get it made. Feel free to post your own Twylah link here in the comments, along with your city, state, and country if you are outside the USA. I will moderate spam out of these, and will consider any comment with a link spam unless it includes your city and state.  Optionally, anything interesting about your education connections, if any, would be fun to know. Are you a parent, teacher, or home educator? What subjects do you most like to read about?

Getting Your Students Off to a Good Start in the New Year with Goals

 Perhaps you’ve made New Year’s Resolutions. But have you made measurable goals for your students this year beyond the objectives for individual lesson plans?  How about this for a starter? I will challenge each student to write down what  he want to be doing with his life when he is 22 and /or make a visual page for it.

It’s easy to make a page to visually represent a goal in life, short or longterm, using pictures from newspapers or old magazines. If those aren’t available, students could draw their own pictures or be invited to do this as homework or a first week project after coming back from the winter break. The information in the article  How to Set Goals with Pictures will give you some how-to’s and some inspiration you can adapt for any sort of goal-setting project.

Part of the reason our students don’t get where they’d like to be in life and have trouble breaking out of old family patterns is because they can’t visualize anything better. Even if they may secretly dream of going beyond where their parents have been in life, they may have no idea of how school might relate to getting there, or what baby steps or short-term goals they need to set to climb the ladder to where they’d like to be.

One of the most important things you need to do as a school or home educator is to inspire your students to aim high and help them begin to see what is possible for them in life.  If they are proactive in setting short term goals to achieve long term goals, they have a target to aim at and the arrows to shoot at that target.

If taking some time to do this exercise with your students this week will help even one to break out of old thought patterns and a tendency to just drift toward the future, you will have given your students more than any math, social studies or science lesson could. Those who at nothing will achieve it.

What will you do to inspire your students toward a better future when this break is over?

Rare Sun-bonnet Babies Book Sold

Every once in a while in a bookseller’s life comes the opportunity to acquire a special book. One of the special books I had the opportunity to own for a time was The Sun-Bonnet Babies.

Sun-bonnet Babies Introductory Picture

Most people aren’t old enough to have seen this book by Bertha L. Corbett, since it was published in 1900. If you follow the title link above you will learn more about this book, which I sold yesterday. I thought of taking it down, but since I had such a hard time finding any information on it when I was researching it, I decided to leave it up for anyone else who might happen to come across it.

I probably could have gotten more than I did for this book, but I was feeling generous and did not make the buyer a counter offer. It is, after all, close to Christmas. I was not sure exactly what the true value of the book was, so I went by the old adage that a book is worth what a willing buyer is willing to pay willing seller.  If someone took advantage of me, so be it.

I suppose this book was special because in my days as a card buyer I met the Sun-bonnet Babies in greeting card form. The greeting card babies were in color, but other than that they looked like the ones in the image above, except they were larger. Have you met the Sun-bonnet Babies before seeing them here?

One-to-One-Instruction

One-to-One-Instruction

A lot has been said about the importance of parents in a child’s education, but today I found an article that shows we were using the right approach in our homeschooling –Learning from Explaining: Does it Matter if Mom is Listening?

I’ve written a lot about the need to read aloud to young children often and in past posts we’ve given a lot of hints on how to to that, especially in When You Read Aloud, Ham it Up. I haven’t said as much about the other technique we used to see how much the children understood. That method was to ask the children to explain something to us or to put something they had read into their own words.

Now in the article referenced above,  a study suggests that explaining something to Mom (and I think the same would be true of Dad) is the best way to fix the  problem solving method a child uses in his brain so that the information will transfer to a different situation. The study used four and five-year-old children and gave them some classification problems to solve. Some were instructed to just solve the problems and repeat the solutions. Others were asked to solve the problems and explain to themselves how they did it (while recording), and the third group was asked to explain to their moms how they solved the problems. (The article will give you several pages of details on this experiment and the data generated.)

The results showed that those who explained the solution to themselves or their moms did much better at retaining the information than those that just repeated the solution. But those who explained to their moms did better than the other two groups at transferring what they had learned to solving different problems.

Explaining a solution forces a child to think critically about his method. Explaining to a parent is even more helpful. I would imagine that this would also extend to explaining to a teacher or tutor, but it illustrated once again how important  verbal interaction with significant adults is in student learning. It’s not just important to get an answer correct, but also to know the process of getting that correct answer.  Remembering that process is much easier if the student has explained it to an adult.

 

Wizzley: A Quality Online Writing Site

Online Writer at Work

Have you heard of Wizzley? It’s a great place to read interesting and well-written online articles on a variety of subjects you’re interested in. It is run by some of the best writers at Squidoo and HubPages, my first writing sites, and it combines the best features of each to provide a first quality home base for those who want to write online

Wizzley is one of my newest writing sites, but not so new I have not had time to use and evaluate it. I am pleased with the traffic it brings me, and it gives me  do-follow links to promote my work elsewhere.  I can also market products there from my best affiliate programs, and earn  referral  rewards for finding new Wizzley authors.

Most online writers want to know right off the bat how they can earn money from a writing site.  Wizzley lets writers earn from Adsense and from promoting products from their own Zazzle, All Poster, and Amazon affiliate accounts. To pay its own bills, Wizzley keeps 40 to 50% of the page impressions your work generates. When you first start writing on Wizzley, you keep the income from 50% of the impressions.  When you have written and successfully published five articles on Wizzley, your links become “do follow,” giving you valuable backlinks to other work. When you have successfully published 50 Wizzley articles, you will begin to get the earnings from 60% of the impressions your pages generate.

Although Squidoo and HubPages are also wonderful sites for the beginning online writer, you might find Wizzley more user friendly. It’s modules are easy to use, and make it a breeze to write text and share photos and  videos from You Tube. You can also add polls, maps, links lists, and other enhancements to your article without having to know any code,  and it’s simple to move your modules around to make your work more visually appealing.  To get a feel for what you can do with these modules, take a look at my Recipe for Blueberry Buckwheat Breakfast Pudding – one of my First Wizzley articles.

Here’s what one Wizzley writer wrote on education: Math 101: Basic Functions and Order of Operations

Why not add some more articles in this category and lay the foundation for earning a bit of extra money to finance some of your own extra education expenses? Sign up at Wizzley now for free . It’s a great place to begin writing online.

New Consumer Math Series for Adolescents and Adults

The Mathematics of Banking and Credit

I am happy to announce that Steck-Vaughn has finally published a series of six  consumer math workbooks that go into detail on math subjects of great interest to teens and adults. These books are designed for classroom use in high schools, job training centers, and even junior colleges. The books can also be used for self-instruction at home.

Each 160-page book begins with instruction in basic math operations and concepts with whole numbers, fractions, and decimals, and percents. There is also help with solving real-life problems and interpreting data from tables and graphs.  The books also teach how to not only use a calculator, but also how to compute mentally and estimate — all necessary skills in the world of work.  The instruction pages at the beginning section of each book are the same, but the practice problems and tests are different. All student pages are reproducible for classroom use and answers for exercises are provided at the back of each book.

Once the student has finished the first section on basic math, each book has distinctly different instruction and practice in line with its title topic. Topics of books in the series include

• Housing and Taxes
• Banking and Credit
• Work
• Automobiles and Transportation
• Personal Finance and Investments
• Trades and Professions

Because each book is so specialized, a general class in consumer math might need to use all of them, whereas classes built around a special interest might only need one or two books to fit a math module into a unit study for a  class focused on learning what’s involved with car ownership, math in the workplace, or some other narrow topic.

Teachers using these books will not have to explain to their students why they might need to learn the skills covered. Everything taught has practical applications in the real world and that is reflceted in both the practice problems and the illustrations. Each book also has practice forms and supporting resources related to its topic. Example: the Trades and Professions book includes a Unit Estimate Sheet and  Job Application. The supporting materials in the book include a chart of  Fraction, Decimal and Percent Equivalents, a chart of Formulas for Perimeter, Area, and Volume, a Conversion Chart of measurements, a chart for Plumbing Measurements and Conversions, an Advertising Rates chart, and a graph of Education and Job Opportunities. Each book also includes a topic-specific Glossary.

For more specific information about what is included in each title, see our new Consumer Math Page, which includes all of our books one can use for consumer math. If you are more interested in books organized by specific math skills that are needed in the workplace, you might also check out the Math Skills for the Workforce books. You can order individual titles at discounted prices by following the title links on our web site to their shopping cart pages on our secure server at tomfolio.com. These books can also be ordered with a school purchase order.

It’s Time to Teach the World Geography in Earnest

Building Skills by Exploring Maps: The World

I remember in high school I took a ninth grade geography class, but it didn’t mean much to me. About all I can recall from that class was that the teacher had a habit of writing on the board and then sitting on her desk with her feet dangling very near the trash can beside it. We spent most of the time as we listened to her talk of products and regions, etc, waiting for the big moment that usually came — the moment the teacher would get off her desk. Very often, on her way to the classroom floor, she would land in the waste basket, and we anticipated it every day. What I don’t remember is if we ever saw a map of the world. We must have, but I don’t remember it.

I inherited a lack of interest in geography from my mother, who told me she used to keep a book she’d rather read inside her geography book in class. I think my first interest in the subject surfaced when I was homeschooling my children. A couple of things happened during those years that rekindled that interest. First we read a lot of books aloud that were set throughout the United States. We found an old AAA map of the USA and put it on the hall wall. As we read each book, we would use a map tack to pin the name of the book in the place it was set in. Later, we actually visited many of the placed we had read about and pinned.That travel helped all of us learn more about the geography of our country. Here’s how we incorporated this travel into our homeschool curriculum.

We got more interested in world geography when Desert Storm, the first war in Iraq took place. We used a globe and a map of the Middle East in a reproducible book we had so that we could follow what was happening as we got the news reports each day. All of a sudden what was happening in that part of the world became very relevant to our lives. We decided it was  a good time to study the Middle East and why it was important.

I’m wondering how many of our young people today would be able to find Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Egypt, or Israel on a map or globe quickly , and how many could give at least one reason why the United States is interested in them.  Perhaps someday soon I will conduct my own student in the street interview and find out.

When your students look back at the geography they learned in your class or at home, what do you think  they will remember?  Parents, do you ever get out the globe or a map after the news and see if your children can find the places the news anchors pointed to or talked about? Do you discuss the news with your children? Could you find these places yourself?

Teachers, do you care about what’s happening in far away countries? Do you know how to make your students understand what those countries  have to do with their lives? Or are they reading a textbook and memorizing population figures or product lists that they will soon forget after they are tested? The future of the world will someday be in the hands of today’s students? Will they know much about that world?  The answer is partly up to you.

National Constitution Week is September 17-23

We the People: Exploring the U.S. Constitution

In 2004 Public Law 108-447 came into being requiring each school that receives Federal Funding in the United States to hold a special program on the Constitution on September 17. This year this it happens to be a Saturday, but you can pick any day between September 17 and September 23, which is designated as National Constitution Week. Has your school decided how to implement this program yet? 

If you’d like a quick and easy solution that will fulfill the requirements, I have a suggestion. The National Center for Constitutional Studies has produced a curriculum for National Constitution Week  that complies with the law’s requirement. Its main component is the DVD, A More Perfect Union – America Becomes a Nation, a two-hour movie which brings the Constitutional Convention to life. I saw it myself, and it was easy to follow the issues and controversies that were part of the process of putting the Constitution together.  After seeing this movie, the Constitution will no longer be a “dead” document, but the result of men trying to lay the best possible foundation for the United States of America. Your students will learn how and why the Constitution was written.

The entire curriculum package includes a teacher guide , posters of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, the DVD of the movie, and an individual pocket-sized copy of the Constitution. For a limited time, schools can order this entire package for only $19.95 plus shipping . It’s an opportunity your school should take advantage of , especially if you don’t have a curriculum for National Constitution Week in place yet. 

If you would like to go into more detail on the history, founders, and issues of the Constitution, click on the picture of the We the People book above, which is found at Barb’s Teaching help, my e-commerce website. It also contains vocabulary activities, a series of critical and creative thinking activities, and a list of additional resources.

Be aware that the local chapters of the Tea Party Patriots will be monitoring schools, as part of their “Adopt a School” program,  to see if they are going to comply with the law. They might be contacting your school district to see what you are planning to do. They also might be letting the media know if you are in compliance or not, since they are very interested in citizens being educated about the Constitution.

If you aren’t in school any more or connected to a school, but still want to see this movie, the DVD alone is currently on sale (as I write this) for only $9.95 at the web site linked to above. I saw the movie with a group of my neighbors in a home, and that’s a very good setting, as it allows friends and neighbors to discuss it informally afterwards. Enjoy!

The Election Season Seems to Have Started

We just got the results of the Straw Poll in Iowa today, and whatever you think  of them, they are evidence that the presidential campaigns are in full swing. Even some preliminary debates have occurred as candidates vie with each other to look electable.

Educators at home and in schools need to be ready to answer student questions about what they are seeing and hearing in the news. It’s time for students to learn more about the election process. That’s why Barb’s People Builders is ready to help you find just the right resources to help you teach your children or students what elections are all about .

You might want a simulation of the election process that your class in grades 4-8 can enact in a week of class time such as Electing the President: The Electoral Process in Action.  If you prefer hands-on activites for students in grades three or over for teaching about the forms of government, voting, and elections in the United States, including the Electoral College, Elections in the U.S.A. Activity Book might be just what you are looking for. It’s companion, Elections in the U.S.A. Photo Activity Cards, provides photos for bulletin boards, as well as research and hands-on activities for groups and individuals on the back.  If you are teaching at the high school level, Cast Your Vote High School , will be one of your best bets. It covers national, state, and local governments, and provides an opportunity for students to elect a student liason between students and the local police department to see how the process works. For additional resources, please check out Barb’s People Builder’s  page on Government and Elections.

My Flip Camcorder Died This Week

Shadow of Me and My Flip Camcorder in Action on a Walk Together

My Flip has gone almost everywhere with me for over a year. It has walked with me and recorded my conversations with people and the words of speakers at events. Just four days ago I used it to tape a pair of birds courting. Then, later in the day, I wanted to tape them in a different place and my Flip wouldn’t turn on. There was no friendly electronic chirp when I pressed the power button, but I was sure the batteries weren’t drained. Here I was, all ready to go for a photo walk, and my trusty Flip was incapacitated.  I haven’t walked without my Flip in so long I almost didn’t go.

On the walk, I regretted no one would hear the brook or the birdsong but me. Instead of being able to scan the tree with the broken branch so my blog readers could see it all connected, I had to break it into three separate pictures that didn’t really do the same job. When I passed the horses, I couldn’t get their conversation on tape. I almost felt I’d lost part of myself. For sure I lost an important tool.

So today I decided to see if there was any way to resurrect it. I called Flip tech support, hoping, I guess, for a miracle. After an hour with chat at the end of which my messages no longer went through, I called. I worked with phone support, who reminded me my camera was no longer under warranty. I did know that, but I’d hoped my camera would outlive its warranty. We tried deleting everything from the Flip and updating the software. We tried jumpstarting it plugged into the computer. Nothing worked. It was truly dead, after only about 14 months of use.  It’s now back in the box it came in.

My Flip Camcorder in the Box It Came In

Now I must replace it, since I’m supposed to be the videographer for an event in mid-April. I’ve spent  a good part of today reading reviews on line. Though I love my Flip, I really am hoping to get something that will last a bit longer. If you, my readers, have a suggestion for a simple to use and easy to carry camcorder, I’d love your suggestions. I prefer something that does not rely completely on a rechargeable battery pack that can give out in the middle of an event.

Meanwhile, I will have to rediscover traveling with only a still camera. Or learn to operate its video features — if I could only find the my English version of the manual.