Friday, July 13, 2007

Making Learning Fun For Your Children

by: Chuck Lunsford

As parents we all want our children to grow up to be well educated. But sometimes your kids may not want to jump up and go do their homework or they get frustrated when school becomes, confusing, tedious or boring. Fortunately there are a lot of ways that you can make learning fun for your children. Have a game for everything Just as a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down a dash of fun can turn chores and homework into games. Have the mindset that anything can be turned into a game and you may be surprised at how creative you can become. If you have a negative attitude about homework and use it as a threatening thing or something that you must do when you misbehave, of course your children are going to avoid it. Instead, switch the tables and have homework be the reward. You can help to teach the metric system by making a map where specific metric directions are to be followed in order to find the ‘treasure.’ Reinforce geography or social studies by having dinners that reflect the types of foods eaten by people living in different parts of the world. The most ordinary games and sports can be altered to create games that your kids won’t be able to resist.

Blur the line between home and school

Make sure that during school is not the only time that your kids have fun learning things. You should be teaching your kids at home as well as entrusting their education to teachers while they are at school. In the beginning you may have to sneak learning opportunities into your child’s favorite games but over time, setting aside time to learn and experiment will become more habitual and your children will begin to think more analytically about their studies at school and the world around them. You do not have to make learning feel like homework. It should be a fun thing, an activity that your kids look forward to. In the following paragraphs you will read about resources that are available to you to help you with your creative learning ideas.

Have a positive attitude and use outside sources

You do not have to be a scientist to teach your kids about science or a mathematician to teach your children their times tables. What is most important is that you have a positive attitude about learning. When you show excitement about learning it is likely that your children will follow your example. Children are highly impressionable and will sense your energy level and be prone to mimic it. Here are some examples of things that you can do at home and find online to help you and your family to stay excited about learning.

* Monitor the growth of a plant. Does talking to it make it grow faster? How long did it take to bloom?
* Record the changes of the moon and learn why and how it looks different every night.
* Measure your child’s growth over time and learn about how the body changes, repairs itself, etc.
* Cook or bake and talk about how molecules react to hot and cold.
* Take a look at your appliances and talk about how they work.
* Look online for excellent science project ideas as well as help preparing for a science fair.


Article Source: www.articlecity.com

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