Time-out can be an effective strategy when dealing with difficult behaviors if the parent/professional thinks through how to use time-out as a brief time-away from an unpleasant situation rather than punishment.

Time-out can give both adults and children some needed time away from a challenging situation. Some children need only a brief time away in order to make better choices. Proper use of time-out can help a child to learn self-control.

On the other hand, time-out can be used ineffectively and can easily become punishment, or feel like punishment to a child. Below is my personal list of do’s and don’ts, followed by a list of issues to think about before using this strategy.

Do…

• Put thought into the purpose of time-out and how/when you will use this technique
• Use time-out to help a child to regain self-control
• Use time-out for short periods of time
• Tailor your family’s use of time out to your individual child
• Devise a plan for consistency with other family members
• Involve your child in discussions of rules, guidelines along the purpose of time-out
• Use time-out before the situation escalates and child is uncontrollable
• Be sure your child is aware of specific guidelines and clear expectations
• Be sure your child is clear about specific undesirable behaviors that are not appropriate
• Be firm, fair and a positive role model
• Be sure your child feels safe while using this method
• Be available to talk with your child before s/he returns to play/work
• Be aware of the need to give yourself time out

Don’t…

• Think of time-out as punishment or an alternate to spanking
• Expect your child to quietly sit still for a long time with nothing to do
• Try to reason with your child or engage in discussion during time-out
• Misuse or overuse this strategy
• Use time-out as a form of humiliation
• Use time-out as a threat
• Use fear-based strategies with time-out
• Leave your child alone

Issues to think about:

• Will you go with the standard time-out – one minute for each year of age?
• Will you allow your child to engage in a quiet, calming activity or expect him/her to simply sit quietly?
• Will you involve your child in choices in how s/he uses time-out?
• What if your child calms down before the established time is up?
• What if your child refuses to go to time-out or to stay in time-out?
• Where will the time-out area be located?
• Will you keep a written record to see if the targeted behavior is reduced?
• Can you avoid time-out by using redirection strategies?
• Will you give your child a prompt or warning first?
• What if your child engages in unsafe unkind behaviors?
• How will you make sure your child does not think of time-out as punishment?

Children need help with learning about appropriate and inappropriate behaviors. They need help with learning self-control. Some children require more patience and perseverance than others. Sometimes they simply need a little time-away from a situation in order to make better choices.

If your child is in need of an online tutor, find the best solution for your family.

Following are some strategies and key questions that you can share with your child as you work together to solve word problems. Keep in mind that different problems may call for different strategies and, depending on your child’s learning style, some strategies may or may not be helpful.

Read and work to understand the problem.
Ask your child to read the problem aloud.
Suggest that s/he try ignoring the numbers at first and focus on the story.
Try to find a way for your child to relate to the problem.
Can s/he rewrite or retell the problem in his/her own words?
Can s/he use a formula that s/he already knows?

Look for and highlight clues and key words.
Key words for addition:
increased by,
more than,
combined,
together,
total of,
sum,
added to,

Key words for subtraction:
minus,
less,
less than,
fewer than,
reduced by,
decreased by,
difference between/of

Key words for multiplication:
of,
times,
multiplied by,
product of,
Key words for division:
per,
a,
out of,
ratio of,
quotient of,
percent (divide by 100)

Sort needed information from distracting information.
Cross out all information that is not needed.

Identify the problem and ask key questions.
What information do you already know?
What else do you need to know in order to answer the question?

Visualize the problem.
Draw and label a sketch of this problem.
Make a list.
Make a table or graph.

Translate the information into a math equation.

Guess
Predict the answer using the information provided before solving the problem.

Solve and check
Work out the problem one step at a time.
Asks/he pay attention to units?

Encourage your child to reflect on the process of solving this problem. Can s/he come up with a rule that will help with solving similar problems?

Daily life is full of problems that need to be solved. Learning to solve math word problems is a useful skill that relates to real life problem-solving, and is a skill that can improve with practice.

If your child needs help with math, find the best solution for your family.

Parents who consider having their child tested, quickly discover that there is a large amount of specific, unfamiliar vocabulary used by testing professionals that they need to learn in order to be a better advocate for their child(ren).

Some of the common terminology used with the different types of evaluations for the common problems that lead families to request testing are listed and briefly explained below. This information is simply an introduction to typical tests and related testing terminology.

Unless you have a photographic memory for food or just really, really love your accountant, you probably don’t recall exactly what you had for dinner two Sundays ago or where you stood when you last spoke to your accountant. However, chances are good that you know what you had for dinner last night and that you could name the exact day, time, and place your spouse proposed. That’s because we remember things that happened recently, and we remember things that had a major impact on our lives. Making memories is a very important part of the human thought process, and it’s a very important part of learning.

While some people might contend that certain individuals are just born with good memories — and while that’s true to some extent — it’s also true that powerful memories can be created. During your tutoring sessions, work with your child to improve her memory skills. A good memory is an incredibly valuable tool in virtually all academic areas, and it’s also integral to strong social skills (e.g., remembering names and faces, and remembering important things about people).

There are many simple, fun ways to incorporate memory-enhancing activities into everyday tutoring sessions. One effective, and often amusing, way to practice memory skills, particularly with a younger child, is to “change character.” You can enter the room wearing a certain shirt and certain pair of glasses, with your hair parted a certain way and a ring on a certain finger. Then, leave the room and change things around. Ask your child if he can identify all of the things that are different between the “before” you and the “after” you. The classic game of Memory (available on Amazon, at many toy retailers, and also in Internet versions) is also a wonderful, time-tested tool for memory improvement.

Regardless of how you choose to teach your child memory-improving skills, you will be helping her get ahead both in school and in life. And, who knows, your own memory might benefit in the process!

If you need to find a tutor for your child, compare solutions and decide which is best for your family.

At its most basic level, a WebQuest is a lesson that gives students support as they develop research skills. WebQuests are frequently utilized in differentiated-learning environments, as the levels of support can be increased for students who need additional help and, conversely, decreased for students who are working above their grade level. A tutor can create a WebQuest for a student on nearly any topic although science and social studies lessons can make for particularly robust WebQuests. For example, if a student is studying the plant and animal kingdoms, a WebQuest could require him to name the levels of taxonomy and to share interesting facts about certain members of each species. A more structured WebQuest would provide clues about where to look, while a less structured WebQuest would leave it up to the student to choose the appropriate sources.

Teachers across the nation have been using WebQuests, with great results and plenty of student engagement. Below are a few of my favorites from around the Web.

The Copacabana Restaurant: This WebQuest combines a nutrition lesson with plenty of practice for English Language Learners. Students are asked to search the Web — and to interact with one another — in designing a menu for the fictitious Copacabana Restaurant.

Space Science Academy: Students must develop an experiment that will be taken aboard a shuttle mission. Then, they must defend their experiment to a group of laypeople who also happen to be the project's financial backers. This WebQuest provides great experience in "translating science" into everyday language.

Students United for Humanity: In this WebQuest, students learn about the United Nations' humanitarian policies, and think of ways to make sure that their student body is treated as fairly and respectfully as possible.

Interested in hiring a tutor who can help to develop an individualized WebQuest for your child? Check out the many qualified instructors here.

Billy's pictures and patterns changed as he used ChalkTalk

Today’s post is a follow-up to a previous post about the risks and benefits of sharing an iPhone with a young child. I am sure that I am not alone in wanting to be protective of my phone, but after communicating and reinforcing specific guidelines, have shared this handheld learning tool with my five year old nephew. I carefully found and downloaded several learning apps for Billy, and enjoyed watching his response, with the goal of informally discovering what app(s) resulted in the most learning.

Although he was presented with some of the best learning apps that I could find for his age level, along with some “fun” games, Billy’s FAVORITES were ChalkTalk and Flick Fishing. I believe that that the MOST learning resulted from his interest and motivation to keep using the programs that HE wanted to use. It seems that it is more motivating for Billy to engage in games that are more challenging and/or games that invite creativity and extra options with an added element of surprise.

With ChalkTalk, Billy created patterns with the stamp feature. The feature of creating a background, and then adding stamped patterns held his interest – and his funny patterns changed and improved. The sound effects of each different stamp added to the fun of creating pictures and patterns. When prompted, he had a silly story to go along with each of his pictures. With practice, he learned to “screen capture” his art, and enjoyed reviewing and comparing his pictures/stories.

I did not expect that the most learning would result from the Flick Fishing app because this game was designed for children above Billy’s age level and was not advertised as an educational game. Because of the complexity of the game and the need to read text in order to play the game, I did not expect that he would be able to use this game on his own. I am surprised and pleased with Billy’s desire to play this game independently, resulting in the need to read directions and to recognize similarities and differences in the fish he caught. Billy compared, contrasted and noticed details in the fish body parts, colors, sizes, names, and locations! He decided to use the “screen capture” feature to create a photo album to keep a virtual collection of his fish.

The interest in this technology game inspired Billy to want to look at books about fish, listen to me read facts about different fish, and to do some real fishing. So far, he has not caught one live fish, but he enjoys the challenge of casting and reeling in the line over and over again with and/or without bait or a nibble.

Due to this new interest in learning about fish, Billy and I have worked together to create a fishing game with a stick, string and magnets. He has engaged in drawing, coloring and cutting out all varieties of fish and he continues to enjoy catching, releasing and thinking about his growing collection of self-created fish. He enjoys moving like a manta ray, and trying to role-play the actions of EVERY fish we read about. Lately, he is careful to not place favorite fish next to sharks, swordfish, or fish that eat other fish before fishing. It is interesting to watch his natural desire to mix creativity and make-believe actions and thoughts with his growing storage of factual information about fish.

I am glad that I took the risk to share my iPhone with Billy. I feel that Billy has reminded me that when given interesting tools and choices, kids can surprise us. They might go above and beyond our expectations – learning much more than we could imagine or measure.

But just how can you help your child become an independent learner? You can't — or, at least, you shouldn't — just plunk a big pile of books in front of her and expect her to teach herself useful skills. Rather, you (or another good tutor) should guide her toward independence.

Think of it this way: A student who struggles with addition problems is unlikely to automatically understand complex algebraic equations. Rather, he can only come to an understanding of more complicated math by taking smaller steps and receiving structured help. This same approach works for students who are learning to be independent in their thinking and studying.

First, a learner must build skills. We can't work independently without plenty of skills in our "tool box." Help your child build her skills by assigning her small tasks during tutoring sessions, and by monitoring her ability to comprehend and follow directions. You may want to ask her to explain her process to you, so that you know for certain whether she understands what is being asked of her. During this first step toward independence, you certainly can give her the opportunity to make her own choices; just be certain that her options are fairly simple (e.g., the choice to underline a text or to use a highlighter, the choice to work a problem out by hand or use a calculator).

Next, your child can enter the phase of "structured independence." There's more freedom here than in the skill-building stage, but you're still offering plenty of scaffolding and support. One way to make structured independence work is to provide your child with a list of options. For example, you can give him a choice between creating a written description of a science concept or drawing a diagram of that same concept. The choice gives him a taste of independent learning, but the prescribed options provide the structure that is necessary at this stage, when a student is not yet ready to determine his course of study entirely on his own.

After your child seems comfortable with structured independence, she can move from having tasks assigned to her to being the creator of those tasks. If she wants to learn more about the Cold War, for example, she could do an archival search at the library and write a report. Or, she could interview someone who lived during the Cold War and write a newspaper-style article about that person's experience. Once she has completed this activity (or as she works on it), she can turn to her tutor for guidance and feedback. In this way, her work is independent, yet it does not exist in a vacuum — she gains valuable insight from an instructor that helps her revise or refine her work.

Finally, after moving through the three previous stages, your child is prepared for "self-guided independence." In this phase, he selects the area of study that interests him and pursues a project of his own design. (He can, of course, ask for help if he needs it — it's just not required to solicit help at this stage.) Independent study is both intellectually satisfying and confidence-building, and it prepares students to make reasoned decisions in all areas of life.

My iPhone rules: 1) Clean hands 2) Sit on the couch 3) No arguing allowed 4) Aunt Kathy or another adult needs to be in the same room!

I purchased the most protective case I could find, and covered the screen before walking out of the phone store. The extra protection resulted in less worry for me as I shared this useful tool.

Dozens of learning applications (Apps) are available for download from the iTunes store. Many are free. The focus for this article will be on favorite iPhone learning tools and apps for young children as a result of watching my nephew gain independence and learn skills while using this interactive techie toy.

Billy's Dad wanted him to practice some skills that might prepare him for entering kindergarten, so we began with some free and inexpensive apps designed to teach letter recognition, letter sounds, manuscript printing, and number sense.

• Five Little Monkeys
• ABC Pocket Phonics
• First Words Sampler
• iWrite Words Lite
• Letters A to Z

I also thought that it might be fun to get some apps that Billy and I might enjoy together. The goal was more for fun than to focus on academic learning. The fun apps included the following:

• iPopcorn
• Magic Wallet
• ChalkTalk
• Flick Fishing

Before I share my observations and informal assessment of learning, from the perspective of a teacher, please guess what app resulted in more learning?

Billy enjoyed all five learning games as he learned to navigate and independently use use the iPhone. He played all of the preschool learning games over multiple times. He especially enjoyed the challenge of using IWriteWords. I do believe that the time that Billy spent playing all of these learning games have increased his interest and awareness of numbers, letters, sounds and words. This interest did not stop with technology. He looked for opportunities to write letters and words on paper, pieces of wood, and other objects all summer long!

Check back later this week to find out more using iPhone Apps with a young child and my informal assessment/observation of the learning that resulted.

If you need to find a tutor for your child, compare solutions and decide which is best for your family.

There are several ways to plot out a plan of action for your tutoring sessions, but one of the most effective is the "Learning Contract." Promoted by leading differentiated-learning researchers, the Learning Contract provides a clear "road map" for students and teachers (or tutors!) who are striving to meet certain educational goals. The great thing about a Learning Contract is that in can be modified for students at any grade or ability level, and it can be made relevant to any academic subject.

You may want to spend an entire tutoring session creating a Learning Contract with your child. That way, you're spending the requisite amount of time needed to make a workable, solid contract — and you're also subtly reinforcing your child's understanding of this contract's importance. Before you start putting everything in writing, take some time to discuss goals. Depending on what you and your child hope to gain from tutoring sessions, this goal can be broad ("I want to read more fluently") or narrow ("I want to be able to apply the Pythagorean theorem"). In general, broad goals work best for Learning Contracts — particularly when you want the contract to remain applicable over weeks or even months of tutoring.

Once you and your child work together to determine the Learning Contract's goal, you can begin outlining the details of the contract. In general, the most effective plans focus both on "content" and on "skills." For example, if your child's contract is science-based, the "content" portion of the agreement may include learning about balancing chemical equations. The "skills" portion, on the other hand, might include hands-on, lab-style practice so that she knows how to use tools like graduated cylinders. Or, the "content" of a history-related contract might be "Understand the main causes of the American Civil War," while the "skills" portion outlines the need to "differentiate between primary and secondary documents."

With the desired skill-goals and content-goals determined, your child's contract can begin to address specifics. In other words: What are the most realistic and beneficial ways in which your child can achieve his goals? Be as specific as possible. For example, your science learner may write that she wants to be able to balance chemical equations — without using her book for help — within three weeks' time. You and she can outline the ways in which this goal can be achieved (e.g., through practice problems, by using models, etc.). Or, your history learner might want to use the public library to find five primary and five secondary documents by the end of the month. The most attainable goals are those with time pegs. Help your child to set deadlines and to understand the importance of meeting those deadlines — a valuable skill both for the learning contract in particular and for her academic career in general.

If you're interested in hiring a tutor who can help your child achieve his Learning Contract goals, take a look at the many experts featured here. These tutors can help you and your child design a contract, and they can also help implement it every step of the way.

Try to incorporate fun and whimsy into at least one of your weekly tutoring sessions. While you certainly should spend ample time reviewing concepts that your child needs for academic success, out-of-the-box activities can work wonders in maintaining your child's interest and engagement. And, you'll find that teaching tools exist in seemingly unlikely places! Here are some simple ways to make language-learning fun.

Break out the Mad Libs. This fill-in-the-blank game was a staple of family car trips for decades. But in addition to being entertaining, Mad Libs can also provide great practice with parts of speech, particularly for the second- to fourth-grade set. Playing Mad Libs requires kids to know what nouns, verbs, adjectives, and even adverbs are (and, as a bonus, there's no reason why they can't use an adverb like "squishily").

Sit down with Scrabble. Just as our bodies need exercise to stay agile and healthy, our brains need frequent workouts, too. Older students can put their brains through the paces by playing Scrabble. This classic game helps not only with vocabulary and word formation, but also with strategic thinking.

Boggle your minds. Sort of like an inverted Scrabble (or a three-D crossword puzzle), Boggle requires players to know plenty of words — and the longer those words are, the more points a player gets. Boggle gives students the opportunity to show off their vocabulary skills, think strategically, and accomplish a task within a given amount of time (handy practice for the timed tests they're sure to encounter in the classroom).

Chances are, you have some (or all) of these classic games in your home at this moment. If not, they're available at very affordable prices through sites like Amazon. (You can find Mad Libs here, Scrabble here, and Boggle here.) Games make tutoring sessions something to look forward to — and there's the invaluable added benefit of boosted language acquisition!

For more information on language learning, please visit http://www.tutorsanywhere.com.