Be Yourself: Everyone Else is Taken

This entry is part 1 of 2 in the series Be Yourself

We all go through a journey to define ourselves and develop our self-identity. Be the person you want to be instead of the person others want you to be.

During a very tough time in my life, I started a search to find out who I was and define my “self”. Much like everyone else, I grew up in a society in which the “self” was a very vague concept that kids never considered. I was 16. I went through a bit of crisis when I discovered that I did not know who “I” was. I needed to find and define “me”, to make the choice to be myself.

The second step of my journey was during the first year of my degree. I was studying psychology with one of the most incredible teachers I have ever met when I realized that self-concept, regardless of when you start defining, is something we all have to figure out. In our very first lesson, the teacher walked into a room full of students and asked, “Who are you?”. It sounded like such a simple questions, but we struggled, big time!

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200 Fun Things To Do With Your Kids

Up to 6 years ago, Gal was the person who worked outside of home while I stayed home with the kids. Being around kids has been a great joy for me. I think it allowed me to borrow some strength from my work and use it at home and vice versa. When I need an idea of what to do with the kids, I only need a couple of seconds and I can come up with heaps of ideas. Usually, the parent who stays at home with the kids is the one with most of the ideas. They have the task of spending time with the kids, taking care of them. It makes them very creative, flexible and preferably efficient.

One of my clients complained that her husband had to spend one evening with the kids, while she had to go studying, and that she was very stressed about it. Her husband said he had no idea what to do with them. When she gave him some entertainment suggestions he said, “No, I want to do something with them that will be meaningful”. This made me think that some parents do not understand that for kids, everything can be meaningful if it is in the form of play.

I hope this post will be great help for parents who are sometimes stuck for ideas.

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How to Raise Gifted Children: Find the switch

This entry is part 2 of 4 in the series How to Raise Gifted Children

In my parenting workshops, when I talk about ways to find that switch in the kids’ brain and talk about Eden, who is emotionally gifted, and Tsoof, who is musically gifted, I get a feeling that many of the participants believe that they were born gifted. The hardest thing for me to do in the workshop is to convince them that Eden and Tsoof were as ordinary and special as all other kids in the world. Sometimes, when I manage to convince my clients how we did it, they sit there in shock and in silence for a minute and ask, “Do you mean your kids are just regular kids?!”

Yes, I do!

“They are as regular as others and they are as special as others. All kids have the light inside. The only difference between them and others is that their parents dedicate enough energy to finding the switch that turns on the light”.

I believe that the essence of life is finding that switch and turning the light on. This light is where all good feeling resides. Where success can find a home, abundance is on our dinner table constantly and happiness shines in every corner of our being. I consider people lucky if their light is on or if they know where the switch is and they can turn it on at will.

The great thing about that light is that it can be used in dark times and life is full of dark moments.

The best time to find the switch and turn the light on is during childhood, long before the dark ages of our conditioned adulthood, long before we think of ourselves as frustrated and unable. This requires parents to dedicate much of their energy to finding that switch.

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How to Raise Gifted Children: Let there be light

This entry is part 1 of 4 in the series How to Raise Gifted Children

Last week, I ran two parenting workshops. At each one, I told the parents that I had found an amazing formula for raising gifted children and that my goal for the day was to share this formula, or at least the main parts of it, with them.

Every time I run a workshop, I get puzzled looks and parents ask, “How can you share such a thing with us? Aren’t kids either gifted or not?”

Well, no! Kids are gifted. Period. We just have to help them discover their particular gifts.

Imagine that the brain has switches. Kids are born with all the switches turned on. As they experience life, they learn to specialize, to switch some off and keep some on. It is impossible to have all these switches on all the time, so the mechanism of turning some of them off is very healthy and helps people survive. Can you imagine an expert who specializes in biology, art, history, electricity and music? I did not think so. The idea of specializing is that we narrow down our range interests to allow us to delve more deeply into the things we choose.

The first thing God said in the book of Genesis was, “Let there be light”. Parenting and teaching are kind of like being God, because our job is to do just that – turn on the switches and say, “Let there be light”.

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School Horror: Untouchable

This entry is part 3 of 3 in the series School Horrors

School was not one of the best periods in my life. I have become a teacher in hope of making a different in the lives of the many children like I was who are not very good in their studies, have few or no friends and struggle.

It is hard for people to imagine this, but for some kids, school is a big struggle for survival. This struggle is carried with them for years to come, even when those kids become parents themselves. When I talk to my clients about the negative beliefs they have about themselves, I discover that many of them were formed in school, when other kids said nasty things that they had no way of overcoming. I understand this very well, because I was the same. It took me a long time get over it and what really helped me was moving from primary school to middle school.

In 1st Grade, I was not a very popular girl. If there was a hierarchy in class, I was at the bottom of it, with 2 other kids that had their own problems. I loved going to school, because my teacher was the angel for me. She was soft and understanding and always treated me nicely, but the other kids never wanted to play with me.

When I did not come to school, it was very hard for my teacher to get one of the kids to come over and give me the homework (although some kids lived in my neighborhood). In the morning, when we had to stand in pairs in front of the classroom door, I was always left at the end and the child that had to give me his hand did this it in disgust. Although my teacher was very kind to me, I was always alone. Every year, until the end of primary school, when the end of year came and my class gave a performance, I stood at the back, holding a sign or something, by myself.

Was I maybe just not a friendly girl?

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Parents are Failing Exams

Exams have been a big part of schooling for ages and I think they will be here for years to come, yet every year that goes by, I am more convinced they defeat the purpose they were created for. Teachers use exams to measure the kids’ success, which is OK, but they forget that the kids’ success is mainly related to how successful they were at teaching their subjects.

I am extremely upset with the way exams are conducted. My own children, Eden, Tsoof and Noff, vary greatly in age. They have studied in many places around the world with different teachers and in different school systems, and I have encountered this problem everywhere, so no matter where you live, this post is for you, because parents have the power to change it.

The reason I am extremely upset is that one of my students, a gorgeous girl who came for an assessment, was about to finish 7th Grade and go to 8th Grade, but could not read at 3rd Grade level and was doing very poorly in class. When I did her assessment, I was convinced I was wrong and made some mistake, but she could not read a short paragraph of instructions and failed at 3rd Grade comprehension level.

Now, I have a question for you. What is the point of having tests if a girl is allowed to move from one grade to the next without recognizing she has a problem and without giving her any help?! Her mother was very, very angry. She had sent her precious daughter to private schools from the first day of schooling, her school had complained during the previous year about her daughter’s behavior, but no one ever thought of saying anything about her poor academic achievements, never mind her enormous frustration.

The poor girl had been overlooked for nearly 5 years!

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School Horror: My Torn Notebook

This entry is part 1 of 3 in the series School Horrors

This week, I had the opportunity to discuss school horrors with 3 of my clients. One of them was a 45-year-old man who could not handle school because he had to “toughen up” at the age of 4 when his father left home. Another one was a 13-year-old girl who was about to start 8th Grade with a 3rd Grade reading abilities and was convinced she was stupid. The third one was a 48-year-old woman who was told all her life she was stupid, never succeeded in her schooling and thought it was an obstacle to finding a job. All three of them described school as a period of horror when they were scared to be there and when teaching was about pumping information without considering their life’s circumstances – teaching out of context.

During coaching, I usually share some of my personal experience with my clients, so it was very natural for me to share one of my horror stories from school. Unfortunately, I have had too many. When I tell them, I re-live them in my mind and have clear memories of them. I remember the names, the places, the settings and the feelings I have had. I shared these stories because I wanted my clients to consider that in spite the horrors of our childhood, we can all make it. In spite of our parents not protecting us, we can make it. In spite of our teachers not teaching us with the right context in mind, we can be very successful. And happy.

All of them just looked at me quietly for a while. One of them started crying (and it was not the 13-year-old). Another one said, “Ronit, you are making this up”. The third one said, “It’s impossible! You look like you’ve been successful all your life”. Then, all of them left their sessions believing they can make it too.

Gal said I should write it down so more people will be inspired, more parents will be involved in their kids’ schooling and more teachers will teach within their students’ context, so here I am sharing with you my first horror story from school.

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Reading Skills for Kids

Most of the new information kids receive at school comes from reading. Even if that information is on the computer, they still need to read it. So if there is something you need to do well as a parent, it is to make sure your kids read well, that they understand what they read and that they read in order to find and use information.

Kids are not born with reading skills, but they still need them to build their knowledge and understanding. We develop these skills in them by reading for fun or by reading to get information.

Although I believe that reading for fun is very important and can help increase your vocabulary and understanding, I think it is limited, because kids cannot check on their own if they understood the stories or not. Many books have layers of understanding and the young reader cannot tell which layer he or she is reading at and what they might be missing.

School is pretty much the only place where we can check kids’ understanding and help them develop their reading skills and teachers are qualified to tell which level of reading and which reading skill is expected at each age, but as a parent, there are things you can teach your kids at home that will help them greatly with their reading development.

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Thanks to the Teachers

Today, my son Tsoof had his graduation ceremony and finished Year 12. Wow, it was fast! It did not only feel fast, but it was, because he only celebrated his 16th birthday last month.

In the past three weeks, he has had many awards night, celebrations, final concerts and farewell parties. During those events, Tsoof received many awards for excellence, for leadership, for showmanship, for his contribution to his school, his friends and his community and we felt honored and blessed for his talents, his kindness and his love for what he does.

You seen this in the movies: the parent of the star performing on stage is sits in the crowd, looks around and tells everyone that sits next to them in excitement, “This is my son” Well, this is how we felt at every event. Tsoof is so talented and so famous we introduce ourselves as “Tsoof’s mom/dad/sister” and we were very proud.

At the end-of-year Performing Arts evening, as the winner of the prestigious title “Performing Artist of the Year”, Tsoof opened the night and said, “Good evening. My name is Tsoof. I am a school captain, Vocal Harmony and Wind Symphony captain, a member of the Senior Percussion Ensemble (Mac-cussion), Show Choir and Big Band. Thank you for coming this evening”.

Gal, Eden, Noff and I sat the whole night proud as peacocks for being associated with him.

That was his last performance with all his ensembles, where he said goodbye to those who had contributed greatly to growing his talents, enthusiasm and passion for music – his music teachers. Three of them had been his musical mentors and had taught him for eight years, through both primary and high school.

I want to thank them too.

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Proud to Be a Teacher

World Teachers’ Day was this week (5th of October) and I had been approached by a pre-service student at the University of Queensland for an who wanted to interview me for an assignment she had about being a teacher. At the end of the interview, she said to me, “I think they should use you as a motivator to make people choose teaching as a profession. You make it sound like it’s the best profession in the world”. I told her I had heard that many times before, because I am a teacher by choice and not a teacher by necessity.

Teaching, as you probably know, is not the best-paid job in the world. In some places, it is even in the lowest income range, which I find shocking. At the beginning of my career, I thought I valued education only because I needed to justify my choice of becoming a teacher, but every year that passes, I see that this justification is the only one there is, as there are so many disadvantages to being a teacher.

Maybe it was no coincidence I received this story by email on the day I had the interview.

A school principal addressed his students during a graduation ceremony.

He said, “Doctors want their children to become doctors, engineers want their children to become engineers, businessmen want their children to become CEOs, but a teachers also want their children to become one of them. Nobody wants to become a teacher by choice. Very sad, but that’s the truth”.

Then, he told them this story.

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