October 31, 2005
Happy Halloween
Since this week's topic is reading, here are some things you can do on Halloween night to add to the fun and help reading along a bit.
Read aloud a Halloween story. You might try "Corduroy's Best Halloween Ever!" for little ones or "The Witches" by Roald Dahl for the slightly older ones. Roald Dahl is such a popular author, you may find kids wanting to read this on their own.
Have your child read the directions for popping popcorn and making popcorn balls and make them.
You and your child read together the directions for gingerbread and make some. Just a little touch of whipped cream on top of warm gingerbread is delicious.
Together research a great apple cider recipie on the Internet, read how to make it, and make some.
As a family watch a Casper the Friendly Ghost movie or cartoon, find it's history on the Internet http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casper_the_Friendly_Ghost, and read up on how Casper came to be.
Have a boo-ti-ful Halloween.
Posted by Dr Joni at 04:24 PM | Comments (0)
October 30, 2005
For Maximum Reading-Build a Vocabulary
Reading starts with listening to words. Infants and toddlers hear words everyday. They sit on your lap and you tell them stories, play patty cake, and repeat nursery rhymes. You play games and show them pictures in a book, pointing out a monkey or showing them this is a zebra. Then you visit the zoo and show them a real monkey and a zebra. Reading starts by connecting a word to what it means.
As children get older those words they recognize can be heard from in a book read at story time. When they know the words they're hearing, they see a picture in their mind. "The monkey and the zebra are in the zoo. The monkey climbed on the zebra's back."
So...One of the best things you can do to help reading, is build a vocabulary.
With preschoolers, it's easy and fun. They love new words. Firetruck, doggy, bird, puzzle, cookie. They can go on forever-and need to. The more word pictures they have in their heads, the easier it is to translate those pictures into words on the page when they began to read for themselves.
Take walks and name things. Name things in your house. Use picture books or children's magazines and name things. You can say the name and let them say the name. "What's this? Do you remember this one?" Trust me, they will if you stay with it.
The early elementary kiddo, kindergarten through second graders, are also gaining many more words. Although the basic, day to day words are in place, they are beginning to explore anything from dinosaurs to technology. Keep up the vocabulary expansion. Books, magazines, trips to museums, zoos, and planetariums-anything to expand words will help.
Third through fifth graders are beginning to learn larger math, science, and history concepts. Their vocabulary begins to take on a more knowledgeable level. More trips and more books, but this time they are asking different kinds of questions. They want to know why? What makes it work? Answer their questions and when you don't know, look it up.
Middle schoolers are sometimes too cool for new stuff. They'd rather you stayed in the car or at least out of sight of any of their friend, but they are also expanding their worlds. New countries, historical events that shaped their lives, science that will change as they get older are all coming their way. Have some dialogue about what they're learning. What do they think of it? Why? Talk.
High School is often forgotten. You and they think they know everything their going to need to learn about vocabulary. It gets tricky here, but you can still talk about voting, wars, politics, what book they've read, why they liked the movie. Expand their thinking, respect it, and let them tell you what they think. Sometimes it's hard to hear, but they are thinking and using the words they've learned. Continue to help them learn more.
Even as an adult we expand our vocabulary. I just finished my annual County Spelling Bee stint. Fortunately I don't have to spell the anything. I give the words to the fifth grade through high school students in the competition. Every year there are words on the high school list I have to look up in the dictionary. Not only could I not spell some of them, I'm not sure I've ever seen some of the words in print before! I gotta get out more.
It's funny, though, after 11 years of giving spelling words, there are a lot of them I've looked up that I have gone on to use in the next year. Keep building a vocabulary and watch your world grow.
Posted by Dr Joni at 07:01 PM | Comments (0)
October 29, 2005
Read, Read, Read
Okay folks I'm still trying to figure out the intricacies of writing a blog. It's different than writing a weekly column so I may stumble around a bit trying to find the best way to help you and your family with learning activities, but that's my goal. Bear with me please until we get something that works for me and for you.
This week I'm going to pick a topic-reading, and give you a variey of ways to engage your child with reading activities. Next week we'll try another topic. Give me some feedback and let me know if it works for you.
Why pick reading first. Well...
Most parents want to know how their children can do better in school. From preschool to high school, the question is how can they do better? The easiest answer is to have them read more.
So much of what we learn in school is through reading-read the History assignment for the test next week, read over your spelling words and use them in a sentence, read a newspaper article for current events, read the following math word problems and solve them.
You may wonder what the big deal is. Why would we want to spend time reading when TV and computer games are so much fun. Well, sure they are. I like them too, but look at the amount of reading you do even if you do like watching TV. Most adults read the newspaper and maybe a magazine or two. These days I'm reading ads about patio installations and when I decide to do it myself, I'm going to have to read the directions. That TV you like to watch-ever try to add a new DVD to it? Those directions are like Greek. Mom, how about the new recipie you want to try out on the neighbors who are coming to dinner next weekend? I haven't mentioned all the stuff we read at work or the ballot measures I need to read a vote on next week. And I don't know about you, but I'd like to curl up somewhere in the midst of this rain we're having and enjoy the latest Tom Clancy or Harry Potter book.
We read all the time and your children will need to read too. So this week we'll talk about reading.
Posted by Dr Joni at 05:56 PM | Comments (0)
October 26, 2005
Visit to Bellevue
No, just to clarify, I didn't say visit to Bellview as in Mental Hospital. I said Bellevue, as in a wonderful little school district in Santa Rosa, California. http://student.santarosa.edu/~dchosa/bellevue.html
I was in Sonoma County recently for a meeting. I'm known for visiting schools when I go to an area so I can find out what someone else is doing. I was very clear as I visited several schools that I wanted to "steal ideas," find out and share what great things they were doing, and particularly focus on what they were doing at their school with and for parents.
At Bellevue I met with Paula Sutherland, the Director of Curriculum, and there was certainly no lack of enthusiasm on her part as she talked about their Afterschool program, the evening programs they run for parents new to this country, and the many connections they have with other partners to help provided learning opportunities in their area.
What I was most interested in was their support for first time families to the United States. Their area seems to be a starting place for many immigrant families. The school, according the data from the California Department of Education, has 221 Hispanic students, 72 Caucasion students, and 17 Asian students. It makes sense to talk about the needs of the community being the needs of non-English speakers and what to do about helping them learn English as well as the subjects taught in school.
The school did a very wise thing. They sat down with the parents and asked, "What do you need from your schools?"
The parents said they needed help learning English. They wanted to help their children be successful in school and to do that they needed to learn the language. Bellevue responded in a big way.
They set up classes at night for parents to learn English and other skills necessary to live in this country. According to Paula, four nights a week the parking lots are full to overflowing. There is even a bus to bring parents to class. Their preschool program runs at night in conjunction with class time, so little ones can come to school too.
I wasn't there to see their evening programs, but I did visit their Afterschool tutorials where one on one tutors from the 
local community college and Americore helped students with their studies. I like what I saw. More than that, I liked what I felt. It was a warm, friendly, safe place for children and their families.
Many of us in California are in school communities where there are a lot of English learners. We're always trying to find ways to provide the assistance needed to make this transition a succeess for everyone involved.
Thanks for the great visit to both Paula and Bellevue School. Keep up the great work.
Posted by Dr Joni at 01:53 PM | Comments (0)
October 23, 2005
Welcome to Dr. Joni's EdSuccess Weblog
“Mom,” said my son Christopher when I told him I would be writing a blog in place of my Dr. Joni column, “interact with your readers, don’t try to teach them stuff.”
He’s right you know. Learning is about interacting. Kids are interacting with books, writing, math problem solving, and science experiments in school and out. We think we’re teaching when we lecture and give assignments at school or lecture and have them take out the trash at home, but we only know children are learning when they actually use what they’ve taken in. Christopher is right and this blog is about kids and adults interacting with learning. So…..
If you’re a parent, grandparent, educator, community member, business leader, Cub scout den mother, or legislator interested in education, learning, parenting, teaching, and/or schools you’re in the right place. I’m here and want you to be here to talk about what works for children in the process of learning. Mostly we’ll talk about what works. Sometimes we’ll talk about what doesn’t work, but when we do I want us to do more than gripe. I want to look for solutions to what isn’t working so there’s a direction for fixing it.
If you've read my column before, welcome back. If you're new, a special welcome. If you're interested in learning we'll both gain from this weblog. Feedback is optional, but I'd like to know what's working in your school and your family, so the option is there.
Talk to you soon, Dr. Joni. 
Posted by Dr Joni at 08:57 AM | Comments (0)