The Reticular Activating System is either your friend or your foe as a teacher. I recommend making it your friend, and I’ve got 16 tips to help you activate the RAS in the classroom. What is the Reticular Activating System? First, what is the Reticular Activating System? I’ll explain it
It’s true: I loved the show Child Genius. I’ve got five things I specifically loved about it. Many others did as well, apparently, because it’s currently casting a second season. Others disagreed. This became apparent when I got tweets like this Ouch. And this So, Jon, I take it you’re not
Don’t let that girl on the cover throw you: I’ve got three ways to get boys to read books about girls. First, do boys resist books with female protagonists? It’s a commonly held belief, and if you look at BoysRead.org created by Jon Scieszka (I can actually pronounce that), you’ll see
In this article: Exactly what to do when your child’s needs aren’t being met at school It’s an open secret that the relationship between parents and schools can be complicated, and this is especially true if parents feel the school isn’t meeting the needs of the child. It can get
Reading is one of the great joys of life, yet for gifted children, reading can become a tedious exercise, fraught with difficulty and frustration. This happens when they are forced to follow along in class while others read aloud. You know how you feel when you’re stuck in traffic and
The reasons not to give IQ tests to young children are compelling. As the Youth & Education Ambassador for Mensa, I received inquiries every day (sometimes with accompanying videos) from parents (and grandparents) wanting to know how to get a young child tested. Mensa allows youth fourteen and over to
Readers are always on the lookout for great resources to feed their reading habit. Here is a list of 24 awesome free resources for readers I compiled for Read Across America Day that we tweeted out from Mensa. 1. Find books for kids recommended by kids at Mensa’s Pinterest page
Finding work/life balance is so difficult and such a common problem that it’s almost silly to even attempt to add to the discussion. Yet I’m going to try because I care deeply about so many educators, both classroom teachers and homeschooling parents, who struggle with it. Several of my former
Daniel Regalado was a Renaissance man. A loving father and husband. A gifted photographer. A talented and caring teacher. A connoisseur of Lego. A dreamer of dreams. A nice guy. My friend. This summer, Daniel died as a result of a brain aneurysm. I like to think that there were so
Everyone is a kinesthetic learner. Teachers need to get students moving in class to get students learning in class and out of it. Everyone knows that, right? Yet often it can be tricky to know just how to infuse that into a classroom. Here’s the slidedeck that accompanies my session
This may come as a surprise, but your child is not the center of the universe. Your child, is, in fact, not even special. I’m ducking right now, but please, hear me out. Special means “better, greater, or otherwise different from what is usual.” If everyone feels this way about
Want to try something really daunting? Raise a bunch of kids who are smarter than you are. Been there… Is your child’s magical power an atypical mind? This is great, but it comes with its own set of issues and fears. We don’t have every answer to the question, “How
