academic performance Tag

Posts tagged 'academic performance'

Raising Gifted and Talented Kids with Music

Every parent wants their child to be gifted and talented. We want our kids to be able to manage themselves throughout the challenges of the education process, which takes between 13 and 18 years. My kids have done that, and people who know them often ask, “What have you done to raise such gifted and talented children?”

Recently, I was at an event, where my son Tsoof performed a piece he had written in front of hundreds of people. After the event, some people came to me to congratulate me for his successful performance, and I stood there like a peacock, as if I had played it myself. It felt great, but the real benefit of playing music was in the development of his brain.

I specialize in children with learning difficulties, as well as gifted and talented children. After studying and doing Special Education work for many years, I developed methods to make sure my kids wouldn’t develop learning difficulties, and if they did, to get rid of them quickly (I am a great believer in the plasticity of the brain). But beyond that, I used these methods to make them gifted and talented.

Why? Because life is easier that way.

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How to Make Learning Fun with 50 Great Activities

If your kids go to school, you must be wondering how to make learning fun. Some teachers are good at this, but many are not, so it’s up to parents to add spice to the learning process.

Learning takes a big part of our life. As babies, we learn all the time. I can look at my granddaughter after not seeing her for 3 days and see she’s learned new things. And she has a lot of fun learning.

Later in life, we go to school to learn in a structured, controlled environment that doesn’t take into consideration that the brain needs to be open to absorb new knowledge. Sadly, I think that in the format it is now, school destroys a big part of our ability to learn.

I work with many children and the system has failed to instill the love for learning in them. I also work with grownups that consider school a traumatic period of their life.

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Who’s Afraid of Exams?

Many children hate exams. If you ask them what they hate more than homework, they will tell you it is exams. They hate them because it is natural to be anxious in a situation that puts our abilities to the test.

Someone is looking at what you do, checking what you do and then judges you for it. Children don’t like to be judged. Well, in fact, no one likes to be judged.

Many parents say to me, “This is life and kids need to learn to live with it!” and I wonder if this really must be part of life and whether we must live in such a judgmental environment. Maybe we can transfer the focus from what others think about us to self-awareness and what we think about ourselves.

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Education System on Trial and Found Guilty

Until I studied Education, I had not questioned the education system. I do not think I’d had the tools to question it. But by the time I graduated (in Special Education), I had realized something was wrong. It was easy to see this while working with kids who were different (both gifted and those with learning difficulties).

Why?

Because special education kids did not fit into the “education box” and the school system did not cater for them. It got worse when I realized, thanks to my amazingly wonderful teachers, that the system just did not care for any of the kids, because every child is special and different in some way. The system cared for itself.

It was devastating!

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Children with Auditory Processing Disorders or Not?

A brain made from words marking the different brain functions

I went to study special education to help children and adults with learning difficulties. When I started my journey, over 30 years ago, I thought there were many people with learning difficulties. I still think there are, but in the past, I was convinced they were “organic” – physical, possibly genetic – and therefore hard to change.

Now, after seeing so many children and people of all ages, I think that social attitude creates or aggravates the problems in many cases. Many people have small difficulties that are blown out of proportion and labeled as disorders.

Auditory processing disorders are very popular and easily labeled, even among very young children. Every year that passes, I hear about younger and younger kids with auditory processing disorders. Recently, I even talked to a mother whose son was one year old and she insisted he had an auditory processing disorder. I am qualified enough to know that I cannot assess a child for APD at one year of age.

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Reading Challenges: Children with Weak Visual Perception

There are many possible causes for kids’ reading challenges. Sometimes, the kids need to deal with such overwhelming emotions they cannot learn anything, including reading. Other time, the teacher is not teaching how to read properly (yes, you will be surprised how many kids cannot read because their teachers did not teach them how to read properly).

However, some children have reading challenges due to their weak visual ability. This means that their brain is wired so that they are not very good at absorbing and processing visual input. It is important to understand that this is a brain function and has nothing to do with eyesight.

Many parents think that when their kids cannot read, we just need to read with them more, but that is not the case. It is like giving someone who cannot hold a pen different kinds of pens to solve the problem. Yes, reading more brings some benefit, but a weak visual ability requires stimulating the visual perception at a more basic level. Once this is done, reading becomes easier and more natural and no longer frustrates the child.

Strong visual perception is essential for good decoding and memory of symbols. Reading requires mostly visual perception to analyze and memorize, and some auditory support for non-basic words.

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Children with the Kinesthetic Communication Style

Kinesthetic kids love mess. Two boys cutting out Halloween pumpkins

The idea that all kids are the same is false and brings parents and teachers into lots of trouble. Every time these kids are not “the same” as others, they think something is wrong with them. Nothing is wrong with them! They are just different and we should all be happy that there is not such a thing as “one size fits all”.

In my kids’ assessments, I check children’s communication styles. If I know their communication styles, I know what challenges they have and why, and I know the best ways to introduce new information to them.

During our sessions together, I pay attention to how they move. I check if they stand up while they work and if they move their legs or other body part. I notice if they are social and friendly and pay attention to how they talk about others. Moving a lot and talking about emotions, fairness, kindness and caring are typical for kinesthetic children.

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Tips for Teens: How to Make Good Career Choices

Wrench and a note saying "job search" in the back pocket of jeans

Teens have a bad reputation. Many people believe that they generally make bad choices, misbehave and lash out in ways that hurt them (and others) later. Among other things, they think that teens do not know how to make good career choices.

I have had the honor of working with many teens. This has given me a chance to prove to many of them, and to their families, that the bad reputation teens have is wrong. There are always teens who choose well, behave well and do well. And if they can do it, so can other teens!

Many of my clients share teen horror stories, like “You know teens. They never have any money”. I do not know what they are talking about. My own teens have always had money, and it was their own money.

Another common belief is “You know teens. They don’t want to work”. No, I do not know, because my own teens have always wanted to work. My kids also have friends who started working as soon as they could and are doing very well.

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The Truth About Teachers’ Poor Social Responsibility

What if we stopped testing so much and just used thhe extra time for things like ... teaching?

I think that teachers have a social responsibility. Teaching is all about making a difference in the world by inspiring children to be the best they can be. Being in education myself, I often think of my role as that of a social activist.

You see, teaching is the best way to make the ripple continue. I have a social responsibility to give my students the tools to build this world. And to live in it in peace and harmony, with themselves, with the land they live, on and with others. This way, they will continue this cycle with everyone they meet in their life.

Making a difference is on the agenda of everyone who considers becoming a teacher. It’s part of the job description nobody ever reads before embarking on their teaching adventure, but everyone totally understands within a very short time of teaching.

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The 10,000-hour Rule and Becoming a Facebook Expert

When my son had some friends over for lunch one day, we had a talk about what they did in their spare time. This question always interested me, because my son, Tsoof, never had any spare time in high school. In the last year of high school, he started at 7am and finished around 5pm most days of the week. Since he was in bed by 8:30-9:00pm, there was not much time left for other things.

I was very surprised when some of them told me they spent 3-4 hours during weekdays on Facebook, and on the weekend, they even got to 6-8 hours.

I was shocked!

It made me realize why Tsoof was in a different state to them. Back then, he had no Facebook account, he was a student leader, he was taking a university course, he had 8 before-school and after-school activities every week and he was an excellent student.

I told them that if they understood the 10,000-hour rule, they would see that they were gearing up to be experts in … Facebook.

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