Summer is officially here, and many parents–after homeschooling their kids for the last three months–are wondering whether they should keep schooling their kids to make up for a potential ”summer slide” or just let them enjoy the summer.  I come down strongly on the side of enjoying summer, but that doesn’t mean learning need not...Read More

We are so conditioned to regard the child as ”less than” adults (e.g. less tall, less intelligent, less emotionally stable etc.), that we miss something that I believe is essential to understanding not only childhood, but life itself.  Yes, children lack many of the essentials for independent living in the world – that is only...Read More

During the past three months, millions of parents have had to become ”experts” in teaching and learning, familiarizing themselves with school subjects, study skills, instructional objectives, distance learning, and a lot more.  However, there’s one teaching component that is central to learning that often gets left out of the mix:  helping a child or teen’s...Read More

Six-year-old Timothy likes to stand up and walk around while eating his dinner.  He plays basketball or hockey while watching TV.  When reading with his mother, he moves the book up and down, swings his legs back and forth, and makes it hard for her to focus on the words that they’re reading together. Nine-year-old Caleb...Read More

After this pandemic is over with (or at least sufficiently in the background of American life to warrant little comment), plan to go into a classroom and ask yourself, does this classroom have life?” That’s the key test of whether there’s any real learning going on. There could be fake learning going on, to be...Read More