Category: Education

One of the greatest challenges parents and educators face is keeping up the technology.  This is especially true in regards to ensuring online safety as kids access online content.  The rapid changes in technology can leave parents and teachers overwhelmed as kids become more tech-savvy at a younger age every year.

It’s never been more important to keep up with what kids are doing online to ensure their safety. Fortunately, many EdTech tools are available for students to ensure safe search is on as they learn. These resources also allow parents at home keep up with what their kids are doing online, whether they are doing homework, playing games or interacting with their friends.

Hāpara

Hāpara, a Chromebook classroom management software, is essential for seamless learning. Today’s digital tools impact the way students learn, and educational leaders and teachers need tools that will transform the way they teach and improve education.

It’s an easy, flexible way to create a collaborative environment where teachers and students can develop content and projects. Hāpara is also a powerful K12 Chromebook monitoring tool. Educators can focus on their core duties while providing students with a customized learning experience with many safety features.

Hāpara allows teachers to watch student internet activity and shut off tabs when they are not being used for schoolwork. It also enables teachers to create personalized lesson plans, projects, and units of inquiry.

Educators can create these lessons and activities with the free educational software, Google Apps for Education. This allows teachers to monitor and manage student use of the Internet. For students, it means more time for homework. As a result, students feel more comfortable using the program.

Vision 

Netop’s instructional tool Vision is another useful classroom management solution for educators. Teachers love this monitoring platform, due to the visibility, accessibility, and ease this software provides them.

With this tool, teachers can share their own screens as well as lock students’ screens and keyboards. In this digital age with increasingly digital savvy students, it’s a gamechanger to be able to lock tools and block websites when something inappropriate comes up.

With remote learning and technological literacy being so pervasive, having tools that filter, block, and protect students from potentially harmful content is of the utmost importance.

Securly

Securly is a cloud-based student safety software that protects students from harmful online content. The platform provides cloud-based web filtering and monitoring for all devices, providing complete visibility of online activity.

Besides monitoring social media and keystrokes, it allows parents to partner with schools to manage their child’s school devices at home and will also notify parents of cyberbullying and violence.

The company’s technology has been designed to protect children and young from cyberbullying and other dangerous online behaviors.  It also sends notifications when students visit adult websites or inappropriate access content.

The platform also gives teachers a secure line of anonymous communication with parents. The Securly safety software even provides a cloud-based parent portal for monitoring student devices. This school security software can help schools and students stay on task with an education-based approach.

GoGuardian

The GoGuardian software is a free and easy-to-use solution for teachers. It has all the features teachers need to keep track of students’ online activity. The app brings filtering, classroom engagement, and school mental health tools into a single suite.

With a focus on K-12 digital learning, security, and student engagement, this tool helps monitor the online activities of students. The app can also help parents monitor their children’s activities in their classroom.  The app is designed to be compatible with all major browsers and operating systems to be used in various settings.

Conclusion

Taking the time to teach students the basics of internet safety is crucial and will ultimately save them from many potential problems. The more they know, the safer they’ll be while exploring what’s out there. So, before students head into the world of social media and beyond, work with them to teach them how to be safe online.

Mother’s Day is celebrated around the world to honor mothers. It’s a day to thank them for all the wonderful things they do and has been very popular throughout history. Many years ago, before social media and cell phones, home phone lines would get jammed up.  This was because everyone was calling their moms to wish her “Happy Mother’s Day!”

This special day does not take place on the same day in every country.  Unlike Valentine’s Day, which always occurs on February 14th, Mother’s Day is commemorated at different times each year depending on your country.  In the majority of countries worldwide it is celebrated on the second Sunday of May.

Many other places celebrate Mother’s Day in March and a few countries honor their moms in other months.

We’ll explore when this celebration of mom occurs each year for different people, but let’s first learn about the origin of Mother’s Day.

When Did Mother’s Day Begin?

The idea of honoring mothers dates far back in history to ancient Greece, where celebrations were held to honor the mother of the gods.  Back in the infancy of the Christian church, a mother’s festival was held in honor of Mary, the mother of Christ.  This took place on the fourth Sunday of Lent.

Therefore, Mother’s Day in these countries is celebrated in March three weeks before Easter on the fourth Sunday of Lent.  This includes the UK.

The date for the celebration of Mother’s Day in March varies each year because the weekend Easter takes place also varies.  There are a few countries that celebrate Mother’s day in other months of the year, outside of March and May.

The History of Mother’s Day in North America

Mother’s Day began in the United States on May 12, 1907. It’s origin comes from the day Anna Maria Jarvis held a memorial service for her late mother at a church in Grafton, West Virginia. Her mother, Ann Maria Reeves Jarvis, had been known for organizing women’s groups to promote friendship and health.

Exactly a year later in 1908, the first formal Mother’s Day church services were held at the same church.  There was a much larger attendance of a ceremony in Philadelphia. Carnations were distributed to mothers and their sons and daughters.

West Virginia, the state where Anna Jarvis planted the seed for a regular Mother’s Day celebration, officially made Mother’s Day an official holiday.

In the months that followed, Anna Jarvis began promoting the idea that everyone should commemorate Mother’s Day.  This was done through a letter writing campaign that she organized.

Anna also founded the Mother’s Day International Association and trademarked the phrases “second Sunday in May” and “Mother’s Day.”  Anna is quoted as saying that she wanted Mother’s Day to be a very private acknowledgment of all the mother does for the family.

In 1914 Mother’s Day became a national holiday in the United States.

The Popularity of Mother’s Day

Mother’s Day throughout history has grown to become one of the most universally popular holidays and celebrations of the year.  It even had a hand in inspiring the celebration of Father’s Day. Perhaps it’s because no one can deny how important our mother’s are to each of us and to our families.  Mom’s stand behind their kids with unconditional love and support.  Mom will do anything to help and protect us.

Hopefully what we’ve learned will be a reminder for everyone in the world to never take our moms for granted, no matter what day it is.

Share this history of Mother’s Day with other students

Good study habits start in early childhood. Children who learn to cut out distractions and focus their attention will develop a strong study “muscle” that serves them well in high school and college. As a parent, you can set your children up for success by catering to their physical needs and developing consistent routines.

Utilizing the best that online tutoring and Ed-Tech have to offer are important steps to ensuring your child has the tools they need to build good study habits throughout their entire educational journey.

Physical Needs for Study Habits

Young children don’t yet understand the connection between their physical well-being and their ability to learn and focus on mental tasks. As a parent, you can make it easier for young children to adopt healthy study habits by taking care of their physical needs.

Start by ensuring that your child gets enough sleep. Young children need 10-12 hours of sleep to develop properly and to ensure that they can focus on their studies. So, set a regular bedtime for your child and keep them on the same sleep schedule throughout the whole week.

Your child also needs to eat healthy foods and drink plenty of water throughout the day. Eating poorly can cause mental fatigue, and breakfasts or lunches high in carbs or sugar can cause afternoon slumps due to spikes in energy levels. Instead of sugary snacks and cereal, provide your child with a diet rich in fruits, vegetables, grains, and a variety of proteins.

Ensuring that you cater to your child’s physical needs alleviates many of the challenges associated with studying, and helps you create a consistent routine that they will stick to.

Creating a Routine

Children do best when they know what to expect, and a daily schedule that involves learning will strengthen their study habits.

A good study routine should be consistent. Choose a regular time of day to study with your child and always study in the same place. For example, if your child is at a kindergarten or Pre-K during the day, you should choose a study time in the late afternoon and settle down somewhere with plenty of space like a kitchen table.

You can figure out the best time to study based on your child’s mood and energy levels. If you notice that they’re tuckered out after kindergarten or Pre-K, give them some time to rest and take care of their physical needs by feeding them and giving them plenty of water. Don’t leave it too late, though, as kids may start to lose focus as the evening draws on.

Managing Study Stress

Studying can cause real stress in children. Some children find kindergarten and Pre-K extremely taxing and have a hard time keeping up with their peers in the classroom. If you notice that your child is extremely stressed due to schoolwork, it may be worth seeing a pediatrician who can help identify learning difficulties and suggest solutions.

You can also help manage study-related stress by creating a low-stakes environment and encouraging your child with positive feedback. This is particularly important if your child is a little behind other kids, as academic setbacks can cause stress levels to rise and make children seize up when studying.

Remember that not all learning has to occur at a desk. Sometimes exercise and activity can become a part of your child’s routine and help them develop good study habits. Consider taking the study session outside to illustrate ideas from geography classes and kinesiology. This will help build a positive association between studying and happiness and help relax children who are excessively stressed due to schoolwork.

Online Tutoring

As a parent, you are probably busy with your own work and outside responsibilities. This makes it difficult to preside over every study session your child has. Additionally, as your child grows older, you may not have answers to all the questions involved in their school work.

It’s perfectly acceptable to outsource your child’s study time and opt for online tutoring sessions. Online tutoring at home puts your child in touch with brilliant educators from all over the world and provides an innovative and interactive learning experience for children of all ages.

Online tutoring is a worthwhile supplement to your child’s study routine, but it isn’t without challenges. You’ll need to check in on children who are taking tutoring classes online to ensure that they aren’t surfing the web, and you must find a reputable, skilled tutor that you trust to deliver consistently high-quality study sessions for your child.

Conclusion

Many children do not learn good study habits until later in their school career. This makes it difficult to implement a productive study routine and can be detrimental to children’s academic careers. Instead, build good study habits in early childhood by providing a consistent daily routine of learning and homework. Instilling proper study techniques now will serve students well when the move up to secondary school.

You can make studying easier by feeding young children a healthy, balanced diet to promote well-being and focus. If you’re too busy to study with your child, take advantage of reputable online tutors who know how to deliver an interactive learning experience.

About the Author
Katie Brenneman is a passionate writer specializing in education, mental health, family lifestyle and online safety. When she isn’t writing, you can find her with her nose buried in a book or hiking with her dog, Charlie. You can follow her on Twitter.

Read how students with dyslexia have excellent memory skills and how parents can help them in other areas.

Writing is an artwork that craves creative minds and passion from the heart. Writing is also a key to improving communication and confidence levels at all stages. Perhaps that is why parents desire to make it a priority to help our children learn writing skills and ensure they gain the aptitude to shine like a pro.

Writing has so many valuable benefits throughout life. It’s a powerful tool of communication, as well as an empowering internal tool those those who use journalism to work out their thoughts. Of course, the educational benefits for excelling in school can’t be ignored, such as writing an essay.

According to research, most children are pretty bad at writing, while others are born with natural talent.  In either case, if you are anxious about your child’s growth in this area and want to help your children learn the art of writing, here are some tips to consider.

Top Tips To Improve Your Children’s Writing

It is a reality that today’s children have become sharp-minded and brilliant in our current fast-paced environment.  There are many things they can learn to do without your assistance. But this should never be taken for granted when it comes to boosting your children’s writing skills. There is too much at stake to ensure they have the academic skills to truly succeed.

Schedule a reading session

According to research, reading is the key to better communication, logical thinking, decision-making skills, socializing, and writing. When someone reads, their mind connects with an aura in their head, and they get open to the world of information. Not just this, reading can also entice one to get to know about different writing styles. So, try to schedule a reading session for your children so they can learn the world through manually written words. You can arrange a series of books according to their grade level. Also, ask them to read aloud to perceive the words better.

Help them explore new topics of their choice.

Yet another best tip to consider when planning to improve your child’s writing skills is to help them explore new topics. Many people become spoon feeders that revolve around a particular thing and cannot think or function out of the box. One reason can be their focus that is only putting a flash in one direction. You should note that it is human nature that when you give a daily dose of the same thing to your mind, your mind will make a habit of it, and you cannot think or perceive beyond that. So, ask or put effort into helping your children explore different topics to become versatile in writing.

Ask them to rewrite

Writing skills always start from rewriting. It is the process that refers to reading or understanding a topic or content and jotting it down in your words. For instance, you have read a topic on using anti plagiarism tools. After reading and understanding the whole thing, you have to sit back and pen those things in your words. You can do this by changing the structure and word usage by keeping the same meaning. You can ask children to do rewriting to improve their writing skills.

Talk about the ideas they have in their mind.

Yet another extraordinary thing to consider to boost your children’s writing skills is making a conversation about their ideas. After the reading session, you can take a session of this to discuss what they think about the topic, how they felt about the story or character while reading, and other related things. You can also ask them questions about all the productive and adorable things they might have stuck in their minds. In this way, you can make their minds open and sharp.

Make a strict rule for avoiding plagiarism.

Plagiarism is a thing that can ruin your children’ writing skills. If they develop a propensity to plagiarizing other work, they can never attain a good writing level. So, it would be good to make a strict rule for plagiarism occurrence. This is especially true when researching other writings for school or even when writing for fun.  Ask them to use a plagiarism checker free. Also, ensure them that you will use the plagiarism detector aid to keep a check on them, too.

Let them go for spell and grammar checks.

What’s more, slang when your children make grammar mistakes? Of course, they are already educated in their schools about this. But the completion of it while writing is not possible at the initial stages. To help your children avoid mistakes and boost their writing skills, ask them to use grammar checking tools and apps. You can ask them to drop their written text in the grammar checker and run it to pull out mistakes. Most of these grammar checking aids show the errors because you can replace them with suggestions. When your children do this, they can better learn what mistakes they make and how to avoid them.

End Words

As we try to give you a detailed guide on how you can help your children improve their writing, you should instill in them that writing is a basic thing they should learn.  It can be easy if they learn the art of writing and how to enjoy the process.