Homework is considered to be part of the natural order of things in school.  But in the past twenty years or so there’s been an increasing amount of criticism about its function and use (see for example, Alfie Kohn’s The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing).  I too believe...Read More

Any time you mandate that kids must do something, ANYTHING, you’ve automatically created a special category for those kiddos who don’t or won’t – and that’s how labels are born.  Before reading was mandatory for kids, there weren’t any reading disabilities.  Before we descended into this ”short attention span culture” of ours, we didn’t have...Read More

New studies have revealed that screen time (TV, video games, Internet etc.) modifies brain structure and cognitive functioning.  In one study where children between the ages of 3 and 5 had their brains scanned, those kids whose screen time exceeded the American Association of Pediatrics (AAP) guidelines had lower levels of white matter integrity in...Read More

I’ve just read an account in the Detroit Free Press, about a program where young kids are being given data-gathering bracelets that keep track of how many words they speak or hear in a given day.  This new technology has emerged out of findings that the number of words a child speaks or hears during...Read More

Millions of children are practicing mindfulness all over the world, and while it’s a very simple process of training the mind to be always in the present moment, without judgement, there’s a lot more to it than meets the eye.  It can be useful if a parent or teacher has some creative ways to explain...Read More