The Launch Education Blog

Making Education Relevant

2011-09-10T10:18:00.000-07:00

The 2011-2012 school year has begun.

Have you noticed how different kids' backpacks are these days? And no, I'm not talking about the size or style - I'm talking about what's inside.

When I was in my primary and secondary years of schooling, my back-to-school shopping list contained items like #2 pencils, highlighters, fat pink erasers, a spiral-bound planner, a 2-inch binder, several reams of ruled paper, and maybe some folders and dividers.

All of these things were necessary to keep track of old and new assignments, in-class notes, daily handouts, and the coveted semester syllabus that would only be handed out once: don't lose it!

But things have changed. Kids now have smart phones and computers, electronic text books and digital calendars. Assignments are posted online, and papers can be researched and completed without setting foot in to a library. Students can skype their foreign academic pen-pals in real time instead of waiting weeks for paper mail.

Other parts of the world - different cultures, languages, methods of learning and teaching, ways of thinking and living have become so immediate and accessible that change in every realm (including the contents of a backpack!) now occurs at the speed of light.

The question these days, then, is not "how can we make kids focus and learn in a manner that follows tradition and present society " but "how can we make what we've learned from tradition and history relevant to an ever-changing social and economic educational environment?"

A lecture I attended a few months ago that focused on "educating students with learning challenges" played this animate by Sir Ken Robinson. The goal was to illuminate the concept that it's not that the kids with learning challenges are failing in our system, but more that our system is failing those kids - and more truly, all kids. Check it out!

Football Season, Fandom, and Fall Commitments at School

2011-09-02T15:24:00.000-07:00

Going back to school is hard. You have higher expectations from teachers, parents, and coaches, and the stakes grow each academic year. Coming after the ease of summer, the fall tends to be an intense time.

Complicating these pressures is the incredible excitement of football season. Being a serious football fan is a serious commitment – at least 4 hours on Saturday and/or Sunday and perhaps more.

Growing up a diehard Michigan and Patriots fan, missing a game was just not an option. Unfortunately, neither was missing any homework assignments or sports practice.

Here are my battle tested tips for staying on top of your academic life while still being an awesome fan:

1. Keep your fan focus sharp. Don’t get sucked in by games that don’t REALLY matter to you. Knuckle down and do your homework during the other games – that will allow you to kick back and relax when YOUR team is playing. Doing your homework while your team is playing is like being the dad on his Blackberry at his daughter’s soccer game – be present!

2. Know your schedule. Is your team playing a night game? Early game? Know this so you can plan accordingly. You don’t want to procrastinate on your homework until Sunday afternoon only to realize your team is playing the night game. That leads to either doing your homework during the game, staying up way too late after, or not doing an assignment – all subpar outcomes. Being a good fan is like being a good student – you need to know your due dates.

3. Take advantage of commercial breaks. The NFL loves commercial breaks and so should you. Commercial breaks are a great chance to mute the TV and go through a set of flashcards or vocab words. There are probably 20 four minute commercial breaks during each game – great opportunities to get some quick studying in.

4. Use the TiVo if you have to. Sometimes, missing a game is unavoidable and totally necessary. School and extra-curricular commitments should always take priority in your life. Lucky for you, there is always the TiVo as a lifeline. If you have to go this route, remember to turn off your phone, email, and don’t go to ESPN.com!

Hello, high school!

2011-08-26T13:00:00.000-07:00

High school used to feel so far away, and now, here you are at its forefront. For many of you, going into ninth grade means a lot of big changes -- a new building, new classes, new teachers, new peers and new expectations. I know the transition can be a little scary, so I thought I'd share a few tips to help smoothen the ride.

First, forget those dreadful slushie scenes you saw on Glee, and go in with a positive attitude. In the words of Peter Pan, think happy thoughts about your freshman year, and things will be more likely to go your way.

Crack the books. High school courses are more challenging than those you encountered in middle school, so be prepared to kick the studying up a notch. All of those organizational skills and study habits that your teachers kept pestering you about will come in really handy now that you're an independent high school student.

Get involved. Take advantage of what your new school has to offer by joining a club or a sports team. What better a way to make new friends? And don't be afraid to talk to your peers. Chances are everyone else is just as nervous as you.

Finally, remember to have fun! Although high school can be stressful at times, it can also be a great experience. In this next phase of your academic journey, you'll get to meet new people, try new activities, and you might even learn a thing or two.

Guest Blogger: Karen Berlin Ishii - Teacher and Test Prep Expert

2011-08-19T14:14:00.000-07:00

With this year’s October SAT test date earlier than anticipated, many students and parents are feeling the pressure. Thankfully, Launch Education guest blogger, Karen Berlin Ishii, has provided some full-proof tips on how raise your confidence and scores before October 1st rolls around.

How to prep for the October SAT in less than two months

September and school are looming on the horizon, with the October SATs just beyond. But even if you didn't spend your summer studying, you can still make great gains in your scores. Here's how:

Approach the test with confidence: Your spring SAT scores may be reasonably strong in one or two of the test sections. Great! Colleges will cherry-pick your best scores for each section – Critical Reading, Math and Writing. So focus your studies now on the areas you most need to improve upon. Also, take comfort in the fact that you are nearly a half year older than you were last time you took the test, which often has intangible effects on scores. Many students who studied hard in the spring see their big score improvement in the fall.

Take practice tests: Take full, timed practice tests to build your skills in pacing and identify specific areas to improve on. Take each test in a single sitting, using a pencil and the bubble answer sheets. Turn off cellphones and don't take more than a couple short breaks – make it real! Use the first three tests in the CollegeBoard book of practice tests, if you can, as those are the most recent, real, published SAT tests.

Don't just score, learn more! Review your errors, analyze your pacing. Review the math for the CollegeBoard tests 4-10 at khanacademy.org/sat, review all answers and explanations for tests 1-3 at ShowMeSAT.com, or use a great book of explanations to all the tests, "Tutor Ted's SAT Solutions Manual." When you find question types that you repeatedly have trouble with, look for more of those questions in other drills and then do lots of them, reviewing answers and explanations after each.

Be physically prepared for test day: So, you're mature and prepped. Now the single most important factor affecting your score is your physical and mental condition on test day. Get a good night's sleep all week before your test so you have energy in reserve if you can't sleep well the night before the test. Have everything ready to go the night before: lots of sharpened #2 pencils, test ticket, ID, calculator and fresh batteries. Wake up a few minutes early on test day and do a couple practice questions in each test section to warm up. Eat a good breakfast, then go to your test with an energizing snack, a sweater, and a watch (so you are in control of your own test pacing).

If you've done this homework, you can walk into your test with confidence, and you can be proud of whatever you achieve as you move on to the next tasks in your studies and your college applications.

by Karen Berlin Ishii

Karen Berlin Ishii, a graduate of Brown University, has more than 25 years' experience as a teacher and test prep tutor. Karen teaches students in New York and internationally for the PSAT, SAT, ACT, ISEE, SSAT, SHSAT and GRE, and also offers tutoring in reading and writing skills, math, and college application essay consulting. Learn more about Karen at www.karenberlinishii.com.

Twitter Newsfeeds - Staying Apprised of the World Around You

2011-08-05T11:13:00.000-07:00

Ah, Twitter. That enigmatic piece of 'social media technology' that is on the tip of everyone's tongues these days. Whenever I peruse the web, I am confronted by two opposing narratives: 1) Twitter as invaluable marketing tool, news source, and networking masterpiece; and 2) Twitter as collective trash heap of unintelligible web banter (i.e. 'tweetspeak'). While I think that both aficionados and dissenters make important points, it's often difficult for the layperson (a.k.a. me) to discern practical ways to utilize Twitter.

To help average folks like you and me navigate the complexities of the Twitterverse, Launch intern, Caroline Tan, explores one of Twitter's most basic (and powerful) functions: the newsfeed.

The Skinny on Twitter Newsfeeds

Most of you have heard of Twitter, which is a social networking tool that uses the concept of microblogging. The point of microblogging is to post messages that are short (hence the “micro”) and easy to read. These short posts are amicably called “tweets.”

At first glance, you may think this is just another social networking tool like Facebook and definitely another way to waste time by stalking your friends online. Yes, stalking your friends online is a good way to procrastinate at your desk, but that’s not the only thing Twitter is useful for. Different people use Twitter for various purposes. Some people use Twitter to update others about their lives, a lot of businesses use Twitter to market themselves, and job seekers even use Twitter to look for potential jobs.

What do I use Twitter for, you ask? I personally find Twitter useful for accessing news. Here are a few tips on being up-to-date with the news you are interested in and pointers on how to organize them.

Identify Your Interests

Make a list of what you’re interested in reading about. Maybe it’s sports, politics, tips on getting into top colleges, or even news on Lady Gaga. Now click on the “Who To Follow” tab at the top of your Twitter page and search for feeds to follow by entering those interests in the search box. For example, if you type “education” into the search box, you will get feeds like @usedgov (education information straight from the government), @tedtalks (follow amazing speakers through this feed!) and @USNewsEducation (research on college rankings to help you during the college application process). The list of feeds goes on and on. If you are uncertain of what to add to your list, you can choose to browse by interests or view suggestions that Twitter has generated for you based on who you are already following or who your friends follow.

Create Twitter Lists

If you find that you are following too many users and have a hard time organizing the news you read, then maybe it’s time you started categorizing them into lists. Under the “What’s Happening” text box, there is a tab for “Lists.” Twitter Lists allows you to filter the news you read based on what you feel like reading at a certain point in time. For example, if you only wish to read news pertaining to Lady Gaga, Britney Spears and Beyonce, then you would make a list named “Celebrities” for just them.

If you’re not up to making your own list, consider following someone else’s instead. For example, I follow the Wall Street Journal’s politics list that features 32 different users discussing U.S. politics and policy on Twitter. The WSJ also has lists on various other topics of discussion such as business, investing, and healthcare. You just have to search around to see what cool stuff you can find.

Utilize Twitter Apps

Call them Twitter add-ons, plug-ins or whatever it is you prefer. They are simply websites with built-in scripts that complement Twitter. One of the most popular Twitter apps out there is TweetDeck.

TweetDeck allows you to organize your social media life because it not only allows you to organize your Twitter account into sections like “Direct Messages” or “@Replies,” it allows you to integrate your Facebook, FourSquare, LinkedIn etc. with the application. You have the ability to create or delete columns and name them so you can have total control over your social media experience. Pretty cool, huh?

Guest Blogger: Maxine Ficksman - Editor of 'The Clinical Practice of Educational Therapy'

2011-07-29T11:40:00.000-07:00

Earlier this summer, I had the pleasure of having lunch with Maxine Ficksman - educational therapy guru and creator of EducationalTherapyClinician.com. Maxine is one of the founding members of the Association of Educational Therapists (AET) and continues to be a prolific writer on the topic of educational therapy. In this post, Maxine provides an entrypoint to readers unfamiliar with educational therapy, its practices, and its desired outcomes. Maxine's book, The Clinical Practice of Educational Therapy, is a must-read for families, educators, and therapists who seek to enhance the learning and development of their children.

The Clinical Practice of Educational Therapy

Educational therapy is a burgeoning and transformational profession that bridges the fields of education and psychology. This trans-disciplinary practice considers the treatment alliance between therapist and client as being paramount. Only 30 plus years young, the Association of Educational Therapists (AET), the national professional association, sets the standards for training and practice.

How is the work of an educational therapist different from that of a tutor? Often parents and professionals ask this question. A brief explanation of this significant issue follows this paragraph. For a more complete explanation, see the text edited by Ficksman & Adelizzi, cited below.

Tutors usually work with children who need help with homework and specific academic skills, whereas educational therapists search for the source of the disconnect in learning which often has a social/emotional component that impacts self-esteem. The main goal of a tutor is higher test scores, while the psycho-educational goals of an educational therapist might include:

1. An augmentation of self-esteem by creating opportunities for success and the recognition of one’s unique islands of competency (Brooks & Goldstein, 2004);
2. A self-awareness of resiliency and an elevated level of coping skill when recovering from a disappointment or self-perceived failure;
3. A decrease in anxiety related to academic and social demands;
4. A self-awareness and strengthening of executive functioning skills;
5. An increase of self-advocacy skills;
6. An expansion of autonomy in meeting academic and social demands.
(Ficksman, M., & Adelizzi, J.U. (2010). The Clinical Practice of Educational Therapy: A Teaching Model. New York: Routledge.)

Educational therapists are skilled in contextual analysis, assessment, remediation/intervention, collaboration, and case management in working with clients who have learning and memory difficulties including dyslexia, AD/HD, nonverbal learning disabilities, Tourette, and Asperger Syndrome. Serving as a resource for parents, educational therapists provide consultation to parents regarding enhanced home routines, socialization, prioritized interventions, referrals, as well as appropriate school placement. Additionally, educational therapists are trained to work with adults, in postsecondary settings and in the workplace, who may experience difficulty with academic tasks, executive functioning, social interactions, and compromised self-esteem. ETs work closely with families, school personnel, and allied professionals to enhance the psycho-educational process of the treatment alliance.

In my first sentence above, I described this profession as transformational. This holds true for the educational therapist as well as the clients. Every day, we as educational therapists learn and improve our own self-concepts. The joy and love we give our clients comes back to us in spades. We are truly blessed.

Last week, one of those wonderful moments occurred when I received a note from a former parent informing me that my former student graduated magna cum laude from a prestigious university! We began our work together when he was in the first grade, just after he had a stroke and underwent life-saving surgery. It took most of his elementary years to regain his self-esteem and motivation in order to reach his potential. While his journey was not that of a student with learning disabilities, his struggles required similar approaches, interventions, and supports.

To further clarify the dynamic of educational therapy utilizing fascinating case studies by a diverse group of accomplished educational therapists, I again refer you to The Clinical Practice of Educational Therapy: A Teaching Model.

Maxine Ficksman, MA, BCET, FAET
mbfet@aol.com

Less as More?

2011-07-22T11:44:00.000-07:00

Here at Launch Education, we believe in helping students achieve their potential. While this might sound vague, I think the best way to approach it is to think of it as broad. For example, I am often approached with questions that seek me to predict an outcome: How high will my student's score go with tutoring? When will he become "independent"? When will she "get" Geometry? Which colleges will he get in to?

As you can see, students are working toward their potential in many areas of life - and while I can usually predict with some accuracy a "result," most times I'm wrong - but not in an overestimation - which has led me to answer a lot of questions regarding potential with the preface that I don't want to say anything for certain because I don't want to cap your student's potential.

Indeed, how many times have you surprised yourself with what you are capable of? Often, we can do and go a lot further than we (or someone else) can imagine. In the same facet, children have endless potential. Therefore, I encourage you to guide your student so they can find that potential themselves - in whatever area it may be in, however high it may be.

Below is a fascinating article that discusses children, growth, guidance, independence, and potential. Don't let the title scare you, and don't let the length turn you off. Feel overwhelmed? this might just be the read you need, as the theme is that "less" may actually be better.

How to Land Your Kid in Therapy

Guest Blogger: Alexis Lauricella - Founder of PlayLearnParent.com

2011-07-19T10:51:00.000-07:00

This week's blog is a real treat. Alexis Lauricella - founder of PlayLearnParent.com and Postdoctoral fellow at Northwestern University - shares her insights and research on parent involvement in education. Specifically, she reviews the Family Engagement in Education Act (2011) and suggests ways in which parents can improve their students' academic performance.

The Crucial Role of Parents in Education

It’s pretty clear that the education system as a whole in the United States is struggling to provide youth with an adequate, let alone quality, education. For decades, the US government has enacted policies and programs with the goal of “fixing” our education system by creating new rules and procedures for schools and teachers. Only recently, after decades of continuingly failing schools, a new bill was introduced to the House of Representatives that recognizes the crucial role that families, and particularly parents, have on children’s academic achievement. The goal of the Family Engagement in Education Act of 2011 is to provide incentives for schools and districts to engage parents in children’s education with the hopes of closing the achievement gap. This bill is clearly only in its infancy, but the message is clear: parents and families are crucial factors in the academic success of children.

The teachers and school systems clearly can’t do it all on their own. Government funding and regulation are attempting to “not leave any children behind”, but unfortunately, kids are getting left behind and no one is coming to pick them up. Recent reports from the Annie E. Casey Foundation (Fiester & Smith, 2010) indicate that 67% of all 4th grade students are not proficient readers and these numbers are even higher for African American and Hispanic children. Literacy isn’t the only issue. Students are also performing poorly in Science and Math, especially compared to children in other countries (Fleischman, Hopstock, Pelczar, & Shelley, 2010).

The US school system undoubtedly needs considerable work and there is no quick-fix answer to the problem. But, parents can help, and even when children in are highly competitive, wonderful academic institutions, parents have a responsibility to be involved and help their children academically. No one expects that parental involvement will fix the achievement gap or the failures of our education system as a whole, but their involvement is crucial!

Research demonstrates that parent involvement does help- significantly! When parents are involved in their children’s education, their children perform better academically and socially (Henderson, 1987; Jenyes, 2003). This doesn’t mean that parents have to volunteer at every school function or become the president of the PTA in order for their child to reap the benefits of education. There are thousands of fun, creative, and easy ways to get involved in your children’s educational success. Here are just a few:

Parent-teach Conferences. Parents can take the lead and work directly with their children’s schoolteachers to determine ways that they can enhance their child’s education at home. Parents can take advantage of the one-on-one time that is provided during parent-teacher conferences to determine what concepts will be taught in class that year and how to can expand upon these concepts at home.

Get Creative. The technological advances of the past decade have provided many new ways for children to learn. Take advantage of quality websites that offer educational worksheets or activities related to a particular topic your child is studying at school. Search for videos (either online or at your local library) related to the concepts your child is learning in school; maybe having the information presented in a new way will help your child learn. Take learning outside the classroom by bringing your child to the library to find related books on topics covered in class, to a museum to see a related exhibit, or even to a park where you can find real world examples of the science concepts being taught in class.

Combine subject areas and interests. If your child is learning multiplication tables in school but really loves to write, work with your child to write a story about multiplication problems. Similarly, if your child loves baseball encourage her to keep scores and calculate batting averages while you watch a game or ask her to write a newspaper article about the game you watched together using some of the new vocabulary words from class.

Teachers will educate and work with children at school, but parents need you to help; to expand upon the learning that is occurring in school and help your children prosper and succeed both academically and socially. It would be ideal if teachers and school administrators facilitated and encourage parent involvement with or without incentives provided by the potential Family Involvement in Education of 2011 bill. However, until this bill passes or other action is taken to encourage schools to include and incorporate parents, parents should take the lead and find ways to get involved!

For a list of all works cited, please contact Matt Steiner at matt@launcheducation.com.

Alexis R. Lauricella is a Postdoctoral Fellow working with Dr. Ellen Wartella at Northwestern University. Dr. Lauricella earned her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology and her Master’s in Public Policy from Georgetown University. Her research focuses on young children’s learning from media and parents’ and teachers’ attitudes toward and use of media with young children. Dr. Lauricella is also the founder of www.PlayLearnParent.com, a website that translates relevant child-development research for parents.

What Interested You Most in The Times This Week?

2011-07-08T12:45:00.000-07:00

Was it the article about rising unemployment in the U.S.? The editorial about Derek Jeter’s 3,000^th hit? The photo of Lady Gaga’s daring new outfit? Whatever it was, the New York Times wants to know what got your attention and why.

Every week this month, students (ages 13-25) will have the opportunity to share their thoughts with the world by participating in the Times’ Summer Reading Contest. Here’s how it works…

You see, hear, read, watch something—anything—that interests you in print or online. Articles, essays, editorials, photos, videos, podcasts, etc. are all fair game. You write about how it intrigued, irked or inspired you and submit your response. At the end of each week, the paper publishes its favorite submission(s) in a special post. Added bonus: winners are announced on Twitter and Facebook.

So, students, throw a little real-world, non-fiction onto your summer reading list. This is your chance to read and be read!

Click here to find everything you need to know about participating in the challenge.

An Insider's Perspective: Taking Community College Courses in High School

2011-07-01T16:57:00.000-07:00

Launch Education's intern, Shawn Danino, shares how community college classes enhanced his high school education.

In my experience as a high school student at a public school in the suburbs of LA (Taft High School), one of the greatest experiences I had was getting to take courses at my local junior college (Pierce Community College). At my school - and many others across the country - there was a list of courses available to enroll at the community college that we would receive credit for and get the equivalent boost of an AP class. The subjects were diverse and interesting, from Business Fundamentals to Sociology, and the instructors were far more passionate and engaging than the majority I had in high school. In fact, my Introductory Sociology instructor is the man I credit with inspiring me to eventually become a Sociology Major at USC.

The experience of being on a college campus in high school was truly invigorating for me. In contrast to the overcrowded chaos that unfolded at my high school, (we had a shooting right outside the school my freshman year and a riot my junior year) going to a junior college offered a more mature, relaxed setting that was more conducive to learning. While many students opt into taking classes during the school year, I think the best time to enroll is over the summer. During the summer, you don’t have to worry about balancing coursework with as many other commitments.

Community colleges sometimes get a bad rap amongst folks aiming for a four-year school, but I think it’s an unfair bias. Honestly, many of the instructors I had at Pierce rivaled my more ‘reputable’ professors at USC. Furthermore, LAUSD actually pays the entirety of tuition for junior college courses taken during high school - so there’s really no excuse to not consider attending!

It gets better. The beauty of junior college courses is that they are often graded as college courses. At my high school, this meant that one extra grade point was added to my GPA. So essentially, an A was weighed as 5.0 GPA points and a B was 4.0. This was incredibly helpful to my cumulative GPA, which was negatively skewed by a couple B’s I had received in my high school classes. This takes off much of the performance-related stress that comes with AP tests and final exams, since there is much more of a cushion.

Without the regimented daily schedules and bells ordering us that we had 5 minutes to get to the other side of the school, going to junior college made me even more excited about going to a four-year university. The work load can be challenging, but taking two or three classes for a few hours a day makes planning to do your homework a lot more manageable.

Moreover, you have the opportunity to choose your classes, which allows you the time to figure out what you’re best at and what subject areas you enjoy most.

It might sound cliché, but it is a rare opportunity to have full autonomy over your schedule and what courses you take. Taking classes at junior colleges can give your application the edge it needs to get into your dream school.

Guest Blogger: David Montesano - Admission Strategist at College Match US

2011-06-17T17:43:00.000-07:00

Last week, our Los Angeles office had the pleasure of meeting with David Montesano, Admissions Strategist and Founder of College Match US (http://www.collegematchus.com/). We were incredibly impressed by David's college admissions know-how and his unique approach to the school selection process.

Here, David shares more of his insight, explaining why it is a good idea to begin the college planning process during sophomore year.

Making the Case for Starting College Planning by Sophomore Year

Planning early for college can save you time and help ensure your student’s college admission success.

As the parent of a high school student, college admission is one of the most significant decisions that you and your child will make. Searching for the right college can be very time intensive. After all, you want to feel comfortable with your student’s choices about college admissions as you help your student transition into the next phase of his life.

Your experience making strategic business decisions has yielded positive results for your company. Don’t leave those skills at work. College admissions planning, beginning sophomore year, can help your student find the best college. Competition for college is at an all time high with 100,000 new students applying each year for college until 2014. The average high school counselor serves 300 students, but your student deserves more attention. Timing is everything. By starting to plan sophomore year you can improve your student’s chances of finding and getting in to the right school for him. Here are things that you can do:

Start early – in college admissions timing is everything. Begin planning for college admission sophomore year with your student to develop his talents and interests. Colleges' admissions representatives want to see leadership and depth in a student’s out-of-class involvement. This doesn’t mean that they have to do a lot of different activities. The best tactic is to focus and start at the beginning of high school. By starting early, your high school sophomore may develop leadership and depth rather than breadth. Colleges form a well-rounded class by choosing individuals with depth in their activities and interests.

Identify your student’s strengths. Is your student a community-builder? An inventor? An entertainer? Nuturing and developing special talents takes insight and understanding about what college admissions officers are looking for. Some want poets, others want dancers or musicians. Working with your student to develop their unique talents should be an organic and natural process. By reviewing the credentials of accepted students you can gain insights into what different colleges are looking for. Keep in mind that for some competitive colleges this may include national and state competitions and prizes such as the Intel Science Competition or playing an instrument in the local junior symphony.

Become knowledgeable about college admissions trends — dance, for example. Among the usual performing arts that students take part in outside of class, dance is now one of the most sought after among college admission offices around the country. For the first time, a number of colleges are reporting dance statistics among accepted students. Pomona and Occidental Colleges in Los Angeles now record the number of accepted students involved in dance among their freshman class profiles (5 % to 8% of freshman classes). Echoing this trend, construction is underway on new dance studios at Vassar College – one that seats 244 people. Additionally, new facilities have been built at Emory University in Atlanta, Hamilton College in NY, University of New Mexico and Tufts University in Boston this year. College Match’s dance team consists of nationally-recognized dance coaches and a choreographer. You may wish to get help from a college admissions consultant familiar with performing arts to guide your student.

Seek advice from qualified experts: finding an SAT/ACT test prep tutor and a college admissions consultant with strong track records of past successes may be like finding a needle in a haystack, but in the end it is worth your time. By working with a SAT tutor you will be able to maximize your student’s scores. High scores by fall of junior year will also qualify your student for National Merit Scholar status—something that is very helpful for college admission. Working with a college consultant as well may also improve your student’s chances of getting into the college of their dreams, but make sure you find someone that can point to past success; College Consultant Reviews is a great place to start. Counselors on this site rated by their clients on the site. Here is our review for example: http://bit.ly/mTZ0en.

Families who start sophomore year and work with a test prep tutor and a college consultant improve their chances of finding the best college fit. Gaining admission may come down to something as simple as the fact that a college needs a cellist or soccer player. For parents of freshman and sophomores, important decisions about college admission loom on the horizon. The good news is that you can relax because there are steps you can take to eliminate stress, save time, and find the best college match for your student.

David Montesano is an admission strategist with College Match US. For a copy of David’s “Ten Strategic College Admission Steps” go to www.collegematchus.com.

Guest Blogger: Betsy Brown Braun - Parenting Expert and Educational Consultant

2011-06-10T19:25:00.000-07:00

This week, we are privileged to post the insights of Betsy Brown Braun, parenting and education guru. Betsy weighs in on the merits and costs of 'toddler tutoring' after the recent introduction of Junior Kumon.

Toddler Tutoring?

They’re getting younger and younger! Now there’s Junior Kumon, a program to teach your two year old academics. Seriously! In a recent New York Times article, Fast-Tracking to Kindergarten, author Kate Zernike highlights the proliferation of the new Kumon (and other) tutoring programs designed to jumpstart toddlers’ academic career.

Are they kidding? Sadly, they are not. And more and more parents are drinking the Kool Aid, believing that this is actually a good idea. The poop at the park is that force feeding your toddler academics before he has even started preschool is the key to getting your child into the “best” preschool, which is the ticket into the “best” elementary school, which will lead to the “best” high school and in turn, the Ivy League. And then what? The best life? If only there were such guarantees.

Child development experts throughout our country are mourning the shrinking role, if not the disappearance of play in early childhood programs as well as in kids’ lives. Most parents associate play with not work (and in their minds not learning). They conjure up images of toys and mud pies and wildly running around. But play is the work and business of childhood. It is precisely how children learn. It is through play of all kinds that children gain the foundational experiences that will enable their meaningful learning of academics later on when it is developmentally appropriate. It is through play that children develop language, pre literacy, thinking skills, mathematical concepts, social skills, self control, self confidence…to name just a few of the direct outcomes. We know, too, that drill and kill (the tutoring that Kumon type programs offer) is not aligned with the young child’s neurological development. The right hemisphere of the brain, which thrives on sensory and emotional input, plays the dominant role in the young child’s learning, later and gradually joined by the left hemisphere and more traditional academic pursuits.

Hearing your child recite letters, regurgitate number facts, and essentially “dance for grandma” (to steal a phrase from A Chorus Line), bursts these parents’ shirt buttons. Here is proof of their child’s so-called advanced learning. He is in the running! But what does it really prove? That your child can memorize? Memorizing is not necessarily learning. And there is absolutely no sound data demonstrating that the performing child remains at the front of the class beyond the kindergarten years or the correlation between early rote learning and later achievement. None.

We weep about what our young children are not developing as they are subjected to early academics, twice weekly visits to the tutor, and nightly homework (twenty minutes for math and reading skills required by Kumon!) But parents don’t know any better. Everyone else is doing it. Welcome to competitive parenting. Whose kid will reach the “top” first?

The drill and kill skills will not give your child any advantage in his life pursuits let alone get your child a job. In fact, it’s the kids in India who will get those jobs! It will rob him of the time needed to explore and discover, to cultivate his social, independent, and personal skills, to learn to think outside the box in ways that will set him apart from the number crunchers in far off lands.
I can promise you that force feeding letter and number recognition to the two or three year old child will neither hurry his learning nor get him into Harvard. It might make you feel like you’re keeping him in the parentng race, but at what cost? Where is David Elkind’s The Hurried Child when we need it?

-Betsy

Betsy Brown Braun, M.A. is a Child Development and Behavior Specialist (infants to teens), a Parent Educator, and Multiple Birth Parenting Specialist. She has taught in both public and private schools, has been a school director, and was the founding director of Wilshire Boulevard Temple’s Early Childhood Center in Los Angeles. Betsy consults with parents privately, runs parenting groups, seminars and workshops for parents, teachers, and other professionals. She is the award winning author of the best selling, Just Tell Me What to Say: Sensible Tips and Scripts for Perplexed Parents and You’re Not the Boss of Me: Brat Proofing your 4 to 12 Year Old Child, both in their fourth printings. Betsy has been featured on the Today Show, The Early Show, Good Morning America Now, Dr. Phil, The Rachael Ray Show, Fox and Friends, has been a guest on NPR and radio stations nationwide, and is a contributor to Parents Magazine, Twins Magazine, Family Circle, Good Housekeeping, and in numerous city specific newspapers and family magazines. Betsy and Ray Braun are the parents of adult triplets.

Staying Smart This Summer

2011-06-03T16:03:00.000-07:00

In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell stresses the importance keeping your mind fit over your summer break. He describes research that shows that students who continue to engage their mind and learn in some capacity over the summer come back to school with way fewer cobwebs than those who don’t. And coming back to school fresh or rusty can prove to make a huge difference on the report card down the road.

There’s just one problem—students work really hard all year and the beauty of summer is that they can take time off. Students don’t want to work hard to keep learning over the summer.

The solution is fun learning. Easy, relaxed, enjoyable learning that doesn’t require too much effort and doesn’t feel at all like work.

Here are some ways to keep learning this summer that I consider “fun.” Check them out and see what appeals to you:

Books: Nearly all reading—fiction or non-fiction—is a great way to engage your brain, learn things, and beef up your vocabulary. But my personal favorite category of book is what I would call “fascinating, user-friendly non-fiction,” and this is one of the best ways to learn. Here are some of my favorites:

All four of Malcolm Gladwell’s books: The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers, and What the Dog Saw. These are addictively fascinating and so fun to read.
Freakonomics by Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner
A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
How the Mind Works by Steven Pinker
Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond

Magazines: Go to the store and browse the magazine rack. Find something that both interests you and is reasonably educational. No matter what interests you, there’s a magazine out there that focuses on it. Make a pledge to read each issue of it this summer.

TV: Like magazines, there is TV that helps your brain and TV that, well, doesn’t. You know the difference. Browse around channels like The History Channel, The Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, and National Geographic, find a new show that looks fascinating to you and get into it this summer.

Personal recommendation: How the Earth Was Made on The History Channel. I’m totally hooked on this show…

Documentaries: Google a list of “best documentaries,” find something that looks interesting to you, and watch it. Simple as that!

The Internet: The Internet can be a phenomenal way to engage your brain and learn new things. One way to start is simply think of something you’d like to understand better. It can be anything from, “What is the history of computers?” to “Why is Alexander the Great so famous?” to “Which countries have the highest populations?” to “How big is the universe?” If you’re in a reading mood, dive into a Wikipedia article about the thing you want to learn. If you’d rather sit back and have someone explain it to you, head to YouTube and you’ll find someone to do just that.

Personal recommendation: Go on YouTube and search for Richard Feynman. I’ve learned a lot about how the world works from watching him explain things on YouTube.

Ted Talks: Ted Talks are short, excellent presentations by really interesting people on all kinds of topics. They’re superbly inspiring and educational. Visit Ted.com and browse around!

"Smart" Games: Get into Scrabble, or Chess, or Sudoku, or crossword puzzles this summer, and it'll help keep you sharp. Or head to Sporcle.com, though I warn you now—it is addictive.

For Dummies Books: I love the For Dummies line of books. They’re easy and fun to read and super user-friendly. Head to the bookstore (or to Dummies.com) and browse through their titles. You might come across one that makes you say, “I’d really love to learn about that” or “I’d love to learn how to do that.”

Not all of these suggestions will appeal to everyone, but the thing they all have in common is that they’re easy, relaxing, and fun.

Have a great summer, and stay sharp!

Math Anxiety?

2011-05-29T12:38:00.000-07:00

Of all the tutor requests I receive on a daily basis, the most common would definitely have to be the "I need a math tutor." In addition, the most widely used explanation for such a need would also have to be the "...because I'm just not good at math" reason, which is referenced as a description far more than I've ever heard for any other academic subject.

Sound familiar? Don't fret, you are not alone. "Math anxiety" has become so prevalent in academia that researchers have gone to work to suss out what is going on and how we, as educators, can help ameliorate the problem. Check it out!

Researchers Probe Math Anxiety

Do Something!

2011-05-20T14:47:00.000-07:00

Right now you’re probably focused on getting through final exams. But summer is around the corner, and if you’re thinking about watching TV every day, think again.

Don’t just sit there. Do something!

Step 1: What’s your thing?

If you don’t already know what gets you fired up, DoSomething.org offers a wealth of information on all sorts of causes from education to the environment, poverty to politics. Read up to figure out how you’d like to get involved.

Step 2: Act now!

Browse for places to volunteer near you. You can search for projects by interest, key words or through the Projects Matchmaker. And if none of the existing projects pique your interest, start your own! DoSomething University provides number of online video tutorials and written guides on how to start, grow and maintain your project or organization. You can even apply with DoSomething.org to get your project funded! Starting a club is a great way to take initiative, and it’ll bulk up your college application. On top of that, you’ll be able to take pride in the fact that you've contributed to a worthy cause, whatever it may be.

Visit DoSomething.org today!

Hola! Ciao! Ni-hao! Dual-Language Immersion Programs in LA

2011-05-13T18:55:00.000-07:00

Learning a foreign language does not come easily for most. I know that my four years of Spanish classes did little to set me up for fluency. I will, however, take most of the blame. I was too shy to speak up in class for fear my amateur Spanish accent would butcher any attempt at the correct pronunciations. This, along with my skepticism of ever being fluent, lead to the decision to stop taking foreign language classes as soon as my high school requirements were met. Needless to say, I will not be having any type of meaningful conversation in Spanish any time soon.

However, when I came across an article in the LA Times this week on the rise of dual-language immersion programs, I was immediately intrigued – and a tad jealous I wasn’t a part of such a program. The dual-language programs are yielding positive results in Glendale Unified Schools. Unlike bilingual education, Dual-language immersion programs offer the opportunity of learning a second language to immigrant students as well as native-born American students. The article highlighted a number of advantages these students will receive as a result of these programs.

Benefits of a Dual Language Programs
--Studies of English-Language Learners suggest that learning to read in a child’s first language boosts reading achievement in the second language
--Early bilingualism has been found to aid memory, problem-solving, decision-making and other brain functions
--Children in dual-language immersion programs usually lag in English skills at first, then tend to surpass their counterparts in English-only classes by fifth and sixth grade

For a list of Dual-Language programs in Los Angeles County, visit the links below.

Glendale Unified School District

Pasadena Unified School District

The California Department of Education

For the full Los Angeles Times article click here.

Applying for an Internship - Pointers from an Employer

2011-05-09T12:39:00.000-07:00

Internships for high school and college students are becoming more and more popular with good reason – they give students a great opportunity to explore their interests and learn real world skills in a safe environment.

The interview and application process is a new experience for most students, and as a veteran hirer of interns, here are my key pointers for all the prospective interns out there:

Cover Letters and Resumes. Employers don’t expect students to have robust resumes or years of experience to reflect on in a cover letter. What they DO expect is that students display professional maturity:

• Spelling, grammar, and formatting should be impeccable – it shows attention to detail and polish. If you have not graduated from college yet, your writing and grammar are most likely much worse than you think they are (seriously). Get someone more experienced to proofread!
• Cover letters should be SPECIFIC to the particular internship and company. Well-articulated enthusiasm for the company and position is impactful, generic personal statements are not.

The Interview. When evaluating interns (particularly younger ones who are not entering their senior year of college), there are a few key factors that employers look for:

• Maturity – candidates show up on time, look presentable, and acknowledge the fact that they are in a professional environment. Bring a pen, a copy of your resume and cover letter, don’t chew gum, etc.
• Enthusiasm – employers want interns that are genuinely excited to work at their company, not interns whose parents are forcing them to do something “productive” for the summer.
• Personality – an intern’s ability to seamlessly blend into the company environment is very important. No one expects an intern to be a polished professional, but they do expect them to be fun, positive, excited to be working, eager to learn, and easy to work with.
• Intelligence – almost by definition, interns come to the job with little prior knowledge or skills. Employers expect interns to be bright, resourceful, and learn quickly at a wide variety of tasks.
• Etiquette – send a thank you note! It shows maturity and that you care about the internship.

This guide certainly does not cover ALL facets of internships, but hopefully it will give students a better idea of what employers are looking for!

Treadmills in the Classroom

2011-04-29T18:37:00.000-07:00

With about eight different internet windows open on my screen and feeling like a computer going into sleep mode, it’s safe to say that I’m struggling in the concentration and energy department. Luckily, my lack of concentration led me to find an article about a school for students with learning disabilities called City Park High School in Saskatoon, Canada where they put treadmills and exercise bikes in their math classroom. Beforehand, over half of the students had ADHD, couldn’t sit still, and struggled to concentrate. However, after 5 months of doing 20 minutes of cardiovascular exercise before doing any math, the students were able to sit and focus. Almost all of the students had jumped a full grade in not only math, but reading and writing as well. Several of the students got off Ritalin and many of the students reported feeling happier, smarter, and much more confident. To read more go to Trusted.MD.

According to Dr. Charles Hillman’s research at the University of Illinois, similar results were found in students without disabilities who showed a 10% increase in their problem solving abilities after spending 30 minutes on a treadmill. "It's good for attention, it's good for how fast individuals process information, and how they perform on cognitive tasks," says Hillman. Meanwhile, students at Naperville Central High School in Chicago who go to PE first thing in the morning and often ride on treadmills in their reading classes have experienced significant reading score increases and math scores up by a factor of 20. To read more about these schools, go to ABC News.

While it is extremely unlikely that all classrooms catch onto the treadmill trend, there are many small adjustments students, parents, tutors and teachers can do in order to reap the benefits of exercise. According to Trusted.MD, it takes at least 20 minutes of sustained activity three times a week to make the difference in behavioral and academic performance.

Students: If playing outside for 20-40 minutes means improving your concentration and your grades, would you do it? Now that spring is here, it is the perfect time to get out and get moving! Also, if you are studying and feel tired or unable to concentrate, take a 5 minute brain break to run around the block or shoot a couple of hoops..just be sure to get back to studying ASAP!

Parents: In most P.E. classes, 80% of the kids are standing around waiting for their turn, or simply trying to avoid participating. Although you may be a firm believer of having your child immediately sit down and do their homework the second they get home from school, you may want to re-consider. According to Trusted.MD, taking 20 to 40 minutes a day for sustained physical activity improves learning and grades in academic subjects as much as actually using that time for the academic subjects themselves. For more information and activity ideas check out ABC News

Tutors/Teachers: Although you probably don’t have treadmills in your classrooms or in students’ living rooms, you can definitely incorporate activity during lessons. I remember learning from a psychology professor that the average person’s attention span is about 2 times their age. For example, a 10 year old can concentrate for 20 minutes. Keeping this in mind, incorporating brain breaks such as jumping jacks or yoga poses every so often can help students re-energize and re-focus rather than struggling to teach an entire lesson without a single break. For brain break ideas read tips from a Naperville Central High School teacher and actual videos of students in action at http://brainbreaks.blogspot.com/

Guest Blogger: Aristotle Circle - National College Admissions Experts

2011-04-22T11:03:00.000-07:00

This week, Launch has the tremendous pleasure of showcasing the college admissions know-how of New York's Aristotle Circle (http://www.aristotlecircle.com/). The folks at Aristotle Circle are a phenomenal resource for all college admissions needs. Today's post provides information for writing an exemplary college application.

7 Tips for Touting Your Accomplishments on the College Application:

As you plan to apply to college, it’s important that you summarize your accomplishments in an enticing and precise way. We advocate a “brag sheet,” it’s essentially a resume for your 4 years of college. Unlike a resume you do not need to list the activities in chronological order, instead you focus on putting the most significant experiences first. Contact us for a sample Brag Sheet. Here are our tips to keep in mind as you prepare your college application.

Take notes or keep a journal: One of the best ways to chronicle your achievements throughout high school is to keep a journal or notes on the extracurricular activities you undertake. Record the practice details such as organization names, honors spent, competitions and advisor’s names and contact information. In addition, reflect on what you have learned from being a member of clubs, teams or nonprofit organizations. This will help you keep track of the dates and times as well as give you a sense of all the skills you’ve learned from your experiences.

Start big: Towards the end of your junior year, take inventory of everything you’ve been a part of over the last three years. Include after school clubs, summer programs, sports teams, lessons, part-time jobs, volunteer work and classes that you’ve done particularly well on. By starting broad with your list you’ll be able to step back and look for a pattern in the activities you’ve belonged to and then select the most impressive or most meaningful activities to highlight.

Get feedback: Share your brag sheet with a trusted advisor, relative or college counselor and get his or her feedback. You want to ask someone who may not be familiar with all the experiences you’ve listed on your brag sheet in order to ensure that you’ve provided solid descriptions of your achievements that are easy to understand. In addition to checking for typos, you want to make sure the brag sheet portrays your character, strengths and interests.

Be original: Your experience is unique to you and it tells the story of who you are. Don’t fall into a trap believing that there are a “right” number of activities or a “specific” type of activity college admissions officers will like. Pursue the activities that interest you and use your brag sheet to demonstrate the passion and skills for these activities.

Build a web presence: Many students find that building a blog, web site, Flickr album, YouTube channel or other digital outlet provides a place to display their achievements. Think about a way to use the web to display your talents, this is especially important if the activities you refer to are better portrayed through digital media. Include these links with your brag sheet.

Quantify your achievements: Be sure to include numbers, specific dates and awards on your brag sheet. If you hold a leadership role, include the number of people you oversaw. If you play a sport, include your key stats. Consider including the achievements of any club you were a part of (number of members, amount of money raised, attendees at specific events, etc.) Specific numbers emphasize the breadth of what you have done and demonstrate an attention for detail.

Get personal: College admissions guidance counselors are looking for a way to get to know candidates beyond test scores and grades. Using your brag sheet to portray your commitment to one skill, activity or cause helps tell the story of your personality.

Aristotle Circle (http://www.aristotlecircle.com/) matches parents and students to experts with current insight and inside knowledge of admissions. Aristotle Circle experts are the top admissions professionals, guidance counselors, school administrators, financial aid advisors and child development experts in their fields. Aristotle Circle’s mission is to take the stress and frustration out of the process by giving you a clear path through school admissions.

The 'Usefulness' of College and Emerging Adulthood

2011-04-15T14:47:00.000-07:00

While brainstorming the topic of this week’s blog post, inspiration struck when my colleague, Lisa Helmers, discovered her SAT essay prompt from 2005. Here is the prompt preceded by a quote by Philip D. Jordan, author of The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge.

I cannot comprehend those who emphasize or recognize only what is useful. I am concerned that learning for learning's sake is no longer considered desirable, that everything we do and think must be directed toward the solution of a practical problem. More and more we seem to try to teach how to make a good living and not how to live a good life.

Assignment: Do people put too much emphasis on learning practical skills? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.

After reading the prompt, I began to reflect on the merits of the liberal arts education I received as an undergraduate at the University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC). Certainly, the psychology and philosophy courses I had taken provided me with delicious food for thought. I was exploring concepts and theories that dramatically changed my perception of the world. It was all very exciting!

Looking back, I now wonder if these courses in the social sciences would qualify as “useful" or "useless" knowledge. I also wonder if the “usefulness” of knowledge is the best criterion for defining the value of a college education. For me, college was a four-year lesson in building autonomy, resilience, and self-concept. While learning about Aristotelian Ethics, I was also being schooled in the obligations of adulthood: finding a place to live, managing my finances, and building social networks. College provided a protected space for me to mature and try my hand at life’s inevitable challenges. It turns out that my experience is a fairly common occurrence in the Western world; in fact, Jeffrey Arnett, Professor of Psychology at Clark University, has coined the term “Emerging Adulthood” to describe the time period (often during college) in which adolescents practice adult roles as they transition to adulthood in their twenties. In retrospect, I definitely see myself as the poster child for Emerging Adulthood.

But in today’s age of economic hardship, could Emerging Adulthood become a relic of the (privileged) past? According to journalist and education blogger extraordinaire, Dana Goldstein, the rising price of college paired with the tremendous debt of student loans makes a university education less accessible and less desirable. In 2003,the average accumulated debt for four-year college students was a whopping $24,000. But here lies the timeworn predicament: Do we risk the financial burden of a college education in order to broaden our intellectual horizons, “grow up,” and enter the job market with a B.A.; or, do we attempt to build a career early, find an entry level position, and allow the uncertainties of the job market to mature us?

I am clearly biased toward the benefits of a college education and the privilege of Emerging Adulthood…but my voice is losing its potency beside the arguments of the opposition. Professor X, the anonymous author of In the Basement of the Ivory Tower: Confessions of an Accidental Academic, is an adjunct professor at a prominent community college in his area. He believes that college has become an intolerable expense for underprivileged groups who are solely seeking employment. For example, X wonders, what is the usefulness of a college-level anthropology course to a student who would want nothing more than a salaried administrative assistant position? X’s teacher-student experience is defined by a mutual sense of estrangement and confusion. Teacher and learner stare at each other incredulously, "Is this all really necessary?"

So where do you stand? What was your experience of college and why or why not has it ‘paid off?’ Was the knowledge you learned ‘useful?’ Knowing what you do now, would you advise students, families, and schools to reconsider their approach to higher education? Whaddya think?

Dealing with Admission Decisions

2011-04-08T18:36:00.000-07:00

The season for acceptance, waitlist, and rejection is upon us.

It’s a funny feeling dealing with admission notifications. I remember when I was in high school and waiting to hear back from the list of colleges I had applied to –and even though all of my classmates were in the same position (waiting) I remember feeling once the letters (yes, I am old) started to roll in, like I had to deal with my feelings of excitement/devastation/uncertainty “all by myself.”

However, social media has expanded multi-fold since I was in 12th grade, and since then I have watched the number of people sharing their experience with admissions decisions go from mere school-hall-gossip to day-by-play blogs entries that detail every rejection, waitlist, and acceptance notification.

Recently, I have particularly moved by the New York Times’ series that follows six high school students as they blog about their journey through this pivotal time in their lives:

Cherry Creek High: Six Seniors Blog About Their College Quest

Although I am years removed from this particular waiting game, it seems like the more we share our experiences and thoughts, the more we feel like we are not alone: and based on reader response, it becomes more and more apparent that one student’s rejection is another’s acceptance – and that it all works out in the end. Hang in there!

SAT Subject Test Workshops - April 2011

2011-04-05T12:43:00.000-07:00

Launch Education Group will be hosting instructional workshops that will help students prepare for the most popular SAT Subject Tests: US History, Literature, Biology, and Chemistry.

Click on the image above to obtain details about workshop dates, times, and activities.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Keeping Current

2011-04-01T17:15:00.000-07:00

When I was in school back in the 90's (don't laugh, you'll be old too someday), I tried to keep up with current events. But not really. I mean, I knew they were something I was supposed to try to keep up with, and I did have some sense of what was going on in the world, but it felt like more of a chore than anything.

Then, in 2000, I went to college, and between the crazy Bush-Gore presidential election, 9/11, and the Iraq War, I found myself becoming genuinely interested in current events. Further, a lot of the friends I made in college were interested in current events, and we'd talk about them a lot. So I got into it.

And here's the thing about following current events—when you first start following, it may feel a little forced, but after a little time, the world starts to become really fascinating.

It's all about context.

Picture you start watching a new TV show, like Glee or Lost or Mad Men or American Idol, sometime in the middle of the third season of the show. Watching the very first episode, you'd be like, "Okay, this is kind of interesting I guess, but I don't really know what's going on and I'm not sure who the characters are." The next episode you watch will be a bit better—you'll have a handle on some of the key plot lines and you'll remember characters from the first episode. By your fifth episode, you're totally hooked. You know all the characters, all the key plot lines, and you can't believe you have to wait another week before the next episode.

It becomes addictive when you get it. When you understand the context.

So though following what's happening in the world will feel a bit like a chore at first—though you won't know many of the characters or key plot lines—if you just stick with it, the world will quickly become a "must watch" for you.

Now, notice that nowhere above did I refer to following current events as "reading the news" or "watching the news." That's old-fashioned talk.

Today, you can keep up with the world in all kinds of ways. So you can figure out what works best for you and your life, whether it's reading printed materials, reading on your computer or phone or iPad, listening on your iPod or on the radio, or watching on TV. I'll list some of them for you below, but first, a quick note about objective vs. subjective:

When you follow the world, you'll do so in two major categories, objective (straight news) and subjective (people expressing their opinions). Both are important—the objective part is telling you, "Here's what is happening" and the subjective part is all kinds of people telling you, "Here's what I think is important about what's happening, why I think it is happening, what I think it means, what I think should have happened, and what I think should happen in the future." You want to take in enough of the objective stuff that you know what's going on, but I find that the subjective, opinion stuff is more interesting and fun to follow (and you can learn a lot of the objective news from the opinion stuff). And if you can, try to take in opinions from all sides of the political spectrum, even when you don't agree with them. Getting a balanced opinion load is important for your overall understanding.

Okay, onto the list—

Reading:

News sites like CNN.com, NYTimes.com, WallStreetJournal.com, and about 200,000 others. Almost all news sites also have a tab labeled "Opinion" where you can find their subjective stuff.
Any major newspaper.
Magazines. Check out Time or Newsweek for a user-friendly, nicely-packaged blend of news and opinion, or The Economist for something a bit more advanced.
Opinion websites. These are sites that scour the web for the best opinion pieces from the day and post them in one place. Check out Real Clear Politics (slightly right-leaning), The Drudge Report (right-leaning), and The Raw Story (left-leaning).
Apps. Most major publications (and all the above-mentioned) have great phone / iPad apps.

Listening:

Podcasts. These are a personal favorite—a way for me to hand-pick my favorite things to listen to and have them neatly lined up on my iPod so I can listen during my commute, while waiting in line, while folding laundry, cooking, or whatever. Check out our previous post on podcasts for some great suggestions.
The radio. Mainly NPR, which is a fantastic source for news. NPR also has a great website, a great app, and dozens of excellent podcasts.

Watching:

In addition to the news you'll find on the major networks (CBS, ABC, NBC, FOX), check out CNN, MSNBC (left-leaning), and FoxNews (right-leaning) for entertaining (and often highly biased) news and opinion coverage.
The Daily Show and The Colbert Report (both left-leaning) on Comedy Central are hilarious and actually pretty informative as well.
Meet the Press, on NBC every Sunday, is an excellent way to keep up. In one hour, they cover the most major stories and always have prominent guests on to share their opinions or debate each other.

It may seem daunting, but just start somewhere! You'll be happy you did.

Food for Thought

2011-03-25T15:29:00.000-07:00

This may sound trite, but it’s true: eating the right foods can help you do better in school.

Here’s why. All the functions of the brain are biochemical processes with some electricity thrown into the mix. In a nutshell, brain cells communicate with each other and the rest of the body by releasing these wonderfully fashioned chemicals called neurotransmitters. The neurotransmitters trigger a frenetic exchange of electrical messages between cells, and voilà—brain function. It’s what enables you to think, analyze, solve problems, remember, and… the list goes on.

But none of this could happen without the right ammo—the nutrients in the food you eat.

Ever wondered why you have an easier time remembering things that happened when you were emotionally or intellectually stimulated? It’s because your brain cells are best at building new connections when they are excited. And the delicious neurotransmitter that makes this happen, acetylcholine, can’t be produced without certain precursors. Try eating eggs, liver, soybeans, cabbage and wheat germ (to name a few), and you should have an easier time remembering those pesky formulas and definitions.

Two other key neurotransmitters are dopamine and serotonin. These make you feel happy and help you focus! Dopamine keeps you driven and motivated, and serotonin works to stabilize your mood. These forces combined can improve concentration and help you get through even the toughest assignments. To ensure a steady supply of these feel-good messengers, look to slow-release, protein-rich foods like meat and dairy products.

And while we’re on the topic of brain-powering foods, consider incorporating omega-3 fatty acids into your diet. These help build and maintain the fatty sheath that insulates the nerve fibers in your brain. Messages couldn’t flow freely between brain cells without it. So the more of these fats you get by eating fish (especially wild salmon) and nuts, the better and faster your brain will operate!

School Admissions Timeline – What To Do Next

2011-03-18T17:35:00.000-07:00

School Placement Consultant Sandy Eiges of LA School Scout offers up some tips on how to stop the waiting and get proactive in March!

School Admissions Timeline – What To Do Next

People usually think of March as that “waiting” time of year in school admissions. But much as March can be an interim period between the dead of winter and the birth of new things in spring, where much can go on beneath the surface, so it is in the world of schools.

If you are waiting for answers from colleges, waiting to hear about financial aid packages, waiting to find out if you got into private schools, waiting to find out if your magnet points will get you into the school of your dreams (you won’t find out until April), or waiting to see if you got in off a waitlist for preschool, my sympathies – this is a tension-fraught time. Read on – for everyone wanting to know what you can do right now, there are lots of things to take care of in March. Here are some pointers:

1. For private school applicants, DK-12 – make sure that you’ve let your first choice private school know that you would, in fact, enroll your child were you to be offered a space. Do that now!

2. For public school – tour, tour, tour! Many, if not most, public schools offer an open house or Kindergarten orientation or tour. Check out your neighborhood public school, but feel free to take a look at other options. School tours are listed on my free tour calendar at www.LAschoolscout.com. Don’t count on getting into a private school, or your backup magnet or charter school – you need to have options. Go see what they might be.

3. For charter schools – many charter applications are due in March, and some schools are still offering tours. These applications cost nothing, and you can apply to as many charters as you like. This year, you can even apply to as many of the Palisades Charter Complex schools as you like – there’s no longer the restriction of applying to only one of those schools.

4. For magnet schools – some new magnets schools are, unbelievably, still taking magnet applications! Even if you’ve missed the boat on magnet deadlines, go to http://echoices.lausd.netto take another look at the magnet school options, and the list of new schools. Some of the new schools are still taking applications, and will be until fully enrolled. See below for the latest information on Mark Twain Middle School Global Language Magnet, in Venice.

5. For college – Spring break is a great time for high school sophomores and juniors to visit colleges and take campus tours. This way, come summer, a final list of schools to apply to can be created. Even if families can’t afford expensive east coast college trips, a California trip can easily and affordably be designed to include various UC and CSU campuses, along with private colleges such as Stanford, USC, Loyola Marymount, Occidental, etc. Need help putting together a plan? Check out college.

6. For preschool – make your list, check it twice, and start getting out on as many preschool tours as you can, as soon as you can. In many parts of town there are waiting lists for preschool, and, incredibly, there are even waitlists to get on a tour – no, this is not a myth perpetrated by school admissions consultants!

For those of you hoping that the whole preschool, elementary, middle, high school and college application process will just take care of itself – good luck with that! But for those of you trying to be proactive, March is a great time to start planning for September 2012 and 2013 admissions.

Sandy Eiges holds a Masters in Social Work, and has worked in and around education her entire professional career, including, most recently, as the charter school developer and interim principal of YouthBuild Charter School of California, a high school diploma program for out of school/out of work youth, located in Watts, East Los Angeles and El Monte. She has served on the compensatory education committee and local school leadership council for Mark Twain Middle School, in Venice/Mar Vista. Sandy founded L.A. School Scout LLC to provide families with comprehensive information on all of their educational choices, and help families make informed and thoughtful choices about the schools that will best suit their children. For the past five years Sandy has been an educational consultant for parents looking for preschool, elementary schools, middle and high schools, whether public, private or parochial.

You can contact Sandy directly at sandy@LAschoolscout.com; or by visiting her on her website at www.LAschoolscout.com.

The Future of Textbooks

2011-03-11T12:23:00.000-08:00

The iPad is undoubtedly cool. And one of the coolest parts of the iPad is its potential to revolutionize textbooks.

Inkling, a San Francisco-based software company, is leading this transformation and bringing textbooks into the digital age. Rather than simply loading textbooks onto an iPad as a PDF, Inkling is completely changing the way that students interact with their textbooks by integrating text, video, 3D images, and collaborative note taking all in one place: an ipad app.

Check out this quick video to see Inkling in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yX4i9K6upqU

There are many positive impacts that digitizing textbooks will have on education and the world:

Saving trees - no more huge books!
Easy content updating by the publisher - no more need to buy version 7 because they made four minor changes to version 6
Portability - it is so much easier to carry around ONE iPad than 5 textbooks

However, the most exciting part of the textbook transformation is that it is going to make learning COOL, ENGAGING and EXCITING. Instead of forcing students to turn back the clock 30 years by reading paper textbooks, Inkling and the iPad will allow students to learn in a modern and dynamic fashion that is consistent with level of technological interaction they are used to in their day-to-day lives. Kudos to Inkling and the iPad!

How to Avoid the Domino Effect

2011-03-04T18:31:00.000-08:00

It’s all happened to us…that ONE bad thing that leads to a domino effect of negative events. Unfortunately, that ONE thing happened to me this morning. Determined to park in the closest spot at work, I disregarded the fact that only a Smart Car could appropriately fit into the tiny space. Needless to say, the piercing sound of a rusty, metal pole scrapping against the side of my grandma’s car was that ONE thing that made me decide today is a BAD day. It also led me to commit the common mistake of blaming my actions on something else…in this case, the massive Range Rover who took up all the space next to me.

As a student, the ONE bad thing that occurs might be missing a big test because you overslept or forgetting your 20 page essay. If you aren’t careful, these things can lead to a series of events that can result in more than just a bad day. Let’s take the classic case that we’ve all experienced: getting your essay back with red marks galore and a big fat “D”. In this example, and nearly any other you face in life, follow these steps to AVOID the domino effect:

1. Take a deep breath: Even if you do break down in tears, take the time to take a deep breath and calm yourself down. Try not to let your emotions lead you to actions that will cause more damage such as blurting out a choice word that lands you in detention.

2. Avoid the blame game: No matter how much easier it is to blame your teacher (ie “She didn’t explain the essay well enough” or “He just doesn’t like me”) avoid it at all costs. Realize that your teacher is on your side and use his/her comments as a tool to do better next time.

3. Take ownership: Rather than blame your teacher, ask them how you can improve the next time or possibly re-do the paper for a better grade. Even the “meanest” teacher appreciates effort, and you’d be surprised how it can affect your grade in a positive way.

4. Think BIG picture: In the end, one poor grade does not mean you’re a failure. What’s more important is to focus on the immediate steps you can take so that you don’t continue to fall in the same patterns.

5. Start out fresh: Try your best to not let your feelings carry to the next class period or the rest of your day. This could lead to earning more bad grades. Forgive yourself and remember that you can redeem yourself next time.

6. Create a POSITIVE effect: Regardless of what happened, it happened. In order to turn it into something positive, use it as a way to avoid it from happening again or better yet, create a POSITIVE domino effect. For example, although I wanted to fall into the “BAD day” attitude and blamed the Range Rover, I took the above steps and created a positive effect (hopefully) by writing this blog.

Note: If you look at each of these tips, you’ll realize that it’s all about your ATTITUDE and mentality!

The SAT Essay: Shocking Secrets Revealed!

2011-02-25T18:42:00.000-08:00

For second-semester high school juniors, SAT season is in full-thrust. With the March 12th test date only a few weeks away, many students are engaged in feverish cram sessions with tutors or test prep classes. Perhaps one of the most bewildering features of the upcoming test is the Essay. Students wonder anxiously, “How can I possibly write anything half-decent in twenty five minutes without ANY preparation?” As a seasoned SAT Verbal instructor, I can say with certainty that there are definitive methods for writing an excellent essay. Test-takers, do not despair!

In order to obtain a high score on the essay, it is important to first understand how the essay fits into the context of the exam and how it is approached by CollegeBoard graders.

The Facts:

The SAT Essay is a fraction (about 1/3) of the overall Writing score - the bulk of the score is determined by a student’s performance on the two Grammar Multiple Choice sections. Nevertheless, the essay can be a terrific area for students to rack up points, particularly for those who are not “grammatically inclined.”
The Essay is always the first section of the exam and lasts 25 minutes.
The Essay is evaluated on a scale from 2 to 12. Two essay graders are assigned to review each essay and select a score from 1 to 6 based on their “holistic impression” of the writing. In other words, essay graders are more concerned with the overall content, organization, and cogency of the writer’s argument than minor mistakes in grammar, mechanics, or spelling. As a caveat, an accumulation of these mistakes can hinder a score if they obscure the clarity of the argument.
The Essay prompt is not revealed until students sit down and take the exam; however, the prompt is broad enough to allow students to develop well-supported arguments within the allotted time.
For an in-depth look at the scoring rubric used by the CollegeBoard, click here.

The Method

Take a stand! Perhaps one of the greatest mistakes students make when writing the Essay is refusing to take a definitive stance on the prompt. Although advanced English students are typically rewarded for writing arguments that synthesize opposing viewpoints, this is NOT the case on the SAT. Students should save themselves the hassle of thinking too far outside the box and pick the side of the prompt that they feel most comfortable writing about. A well-defined argument forms the crux of a high scoring essay.
Include two or three strong supporting examples! Another key to an exceptional score lies in the writer’s ability to pick relevant, specific supporting examples and expound. A common trap that students fall into is choosing supporting examples that sound “academic” that they actually know very little about. Although the plot and character development of Jane Eyre might be more palatable to an academe than, say, the events on the latest installment of “The Bachelor,” both of these things may provide grade-A fodder for a high-scoring SAT Essay. As long as the supporting example is detailed and well-linked to the argument, the source of the example is inconsequential.
Create an Idea Bank! The number one complaint volleyed at the SAT Essay is the unknown-nature of the question; nonetheless, there are things a student CAN do to prepare himself before the tumult of exam day. With my past students, the best way to improve an essay score was to come up with an Idea Bank of potential supporting examples. As I mentioned earlier, the best supporting examples do not need to be drawn from scholarly sources. Many of my previous students who scored 11’s or 12’s on their essays had written about their favorite movies, books, television shows, or tabloid magazines (I am particularly reminded of a student who connected the proliferation of internet-based social media to the fall of Britney Spears. Brilliant!). The purpose of an Idea Bank is to devise five or six well-researched supporting examples that can be instantly recalled and connected to various essay prompts. Even the most glaringly “un-academic” sources (e.g. Jersey Shore, Twilight, SpongeBob) can be parsed for sophisticated themes (e.g. the perils of excess, the volatility of romantic love, the bliss of total ignorance). On test day, it is the student’s job to determine which examples in his Idea Bank can be manipulated to address the concerns of the prompt.
Make it up! As a last resort, it’s better to improvise supporting evidence than to omit it entirely. Be creative and come up with a believable personal anecdote or an “imaginary” novel. Graders do not have the time to fact-check your essay. I was once fooled by one of my students who had written a fascinating account of her pilgrimage to the South American pyramids. Said pilgrimage NEVER happened, but the tale perfectly aligned with the prompt and her developing argument. I gave her a high-five.

And there you have it. Although daunting, the SAT Essay is totally beatable AND can be prepared for in advance. Test-takers should feel empowered to write about what they know rather than what might “sound good” to essay graders. Craft an Idea Bank and practice connecting supporting evidence to a variety of potential essay questions prior to exam day.

In Just Five Minutes...

2011-02-20T11:49:00.000-08:00

When I was in high school, there were a few daily duties I had to complete everyday that I described as the “bane of my existence.”

In no particular order, here are the two I can recall as the “most annoying”:

1. Cleaning out my swim bag – including hanging up my towel, cap, and swim suit, replenishing the power bar pocket, and tossing my running shorts in the hamper

2. Studying Latin vocabulary flashcards (50 every week)

As an adult, this list has not changed much. Two of my least favorite chores are:

1. Doing laundry

2. Cleaning the kitchen (including vacuuming, unloading the dishwasher, and wiping off the stove top)

It’s funny how certain hatreds do not change much – thankfully, relatively early on I made a discovery that changed my approach to such despised responsibilities so that now, they don’t seem so painful anymore.

Maybe the adaption was organic, but when I was sixteen my dedication to cleaning out my swim bag every night and studying flashcards was sporadic and distracted by procrastination. I rarely did these things consistently (daily), and I often found myself cramming all 50 vocabulary flashcards in to one Sunday night study marathon study session or left with only damp dirty towels since I hadn’t done a wash in days.

Let’s be honest: nobody likes to study flashcards for two hours straight. So, somewhere along the line I tried something different: one day, I studied 25 cards on Saturday and 25 on Sunday.

And then I had an idea: what if I broke down my list of 50 vocabulary words in two groups of ten and studied a set of ten for five minutes every day?

Hence, the birth of what I like to call “the just-for-five-minutes-a-day” tactic for tackling “icky” jobs. Have a kitchen that needs to be cleaned? Give it a whirl for five minutes, everyday. I promise – you will be pleasantly surprised at not only how much you can accomplish in five minutes – but also, how you’ve just turned a seemingly daunting hour-long job in to a manageable and relatively stress-less accomplishment.

This isn’t to say you won’t spend the same amount of time doing the laundry or studying, per se – but it will lighten the anticipated dread to a level that makes any task seem absolutely manageable – and you won’t be left towel-less in a dirty kitchen.

When You Just Can't Concentrate

2011-02-15T13:54:00.000-08:00

As I recall, getting through high school was no easy feat. Like many of you, I struggled to find time in the day for classes, homework, extra-curricular activities, a social life, and sleep. I battled fatigue, constant distractions, and the ever-present urge to procrastinate. On some days, I was victorious. I would turn off the TV, silence my phone, and sit in my orderly workspace, energized and motivated to tackle my work. But even then, I found that setting the stage for productivity wasn’t always enough. Despite my determination to complete the task at hand, my mind would sometimes wander.

What will I have for dinner? I can’t believe he said that! That was a good movie. My mom will be so upset when she finds out. Maybe I shouldn’t go this weekend…

There was always something to think about, and the fact of the matter is there always will be. Staying focused on work can be challenging at any age—in high school and beyond. So, over the years, I’ve picked up a few strategies to help me stay on track. And if you’ve ever had a hard time concentrating, you’ll find them useful too.

Task lists: Write down everything you need to accomplish, and break large projects down into smaller, more manageable tasks. If you happen to lose focus, your task list—a sort of visual plan—will remind you of exactly what you should be working on. And the best part of making lists is the satisfaction you get every time you cross off an item.

Time boxing: This can be a very effective time-management tool. Instead of working on a task through completion, commit to working on it for a set amount of time. The idea behind time boxing a particular task is that you are excluding other tasks and unrelated thoughts from your radar during that window of time.

Breaks: Taking scheduled breaks is an important part of maintaining your concentration. A 15-minute break after an hour of studying, for example, can help keep your mind fresh and focused. Try to get a change of scenery during your break. Go outside, do stretches, walk the dog, etc. Exercise is a great way to clear your head of clutter and can even help you absorb what you’ve just studied.

Music: Sometimes noise is the best way to drown out other noise or unwanted thoughts. Be careful when listening to music while you work, though, as some types can be distracting. I recommend listening to something instrumental or even the sounds of nature, which should help relax you and aid concentration.

Launch Education Group Hires Two Associate Directors!

2011-02-09T15:25:00.000-08:00

We are very excited to announce the addition of Matt Steiner and Erin Tanaka to the Launch Education team! Matt and Erin will be joining the Los Angeles office as full time Associate Directors. Their impressive academic backgrounds and professional experiences make them a great fit for our growing company. Learn more about Matt and Erin by reading their full bios below!

Matt Steiner, M.A., Associate Director (Los Angeles)

Matt earned his M.A. in the Social Sciences from the University of Chicago. Prior to his graduate studies, Matt was the head of classroom programs at Ivy West, LLC, a Los Angeles-based standardized test prep company. As a result of his extensive experience in the test preparation industry, Matt has become one of the most knowledgeable and empathetic experts in the field.

Matt received his B.A. in Psychology from the University of California, Santa Cruz, where he was awarded College Honors and Honors in the major. He has a penchant for interdisciplinary learning and can be found dabbling in books and journal articles pertaining to Psychology, Philosophy and Anthropology.

When off the clock, Matt spends some of his time scouring Los Angeles County for delicious new eateries. In between meals, he enjoys healthy doses of television and exercise - Bravo reality television shows are his greatest vice - and spontaneous trips to the Griffith Park Observatory. Eventually, Matt hopes to visit foreign lands - especially Barcelona, Tokyo, and Rome - and become “worldly” (i.e. well-versed in international cuisine).

Erin Tanaka, M.Ed., Associate Director (Los Angeles)

Erin earned her M.Ed. and multiple subject teaching credential from UCLA. Prior to graduate school, Erin received her B.A. from the University of California, Irvine where she graduated cum laude, majoring in Psychology and Social Behavior and in History, and minoring in Educational Studies.

Following graduation from UCLA, she was a founding teacher at John Liechty Middle School in downtown Los Angeles, where she taught English, History and Advisory to 6th through 8th grade students. A highly dedicated teacher, Erin founded the school’s first leadership group, co-advised the first spirit team and completed the Los Angeles marathon with several of her students. She also has extensive one-on-one tutoring experience, privately working with students in Los Angeles, New York and Buenos Aires.

As a Santa Monica resident, Erin loves running along the beach, dancing with friends, practicing photography with her DSLR camera, indulging her inner foodie, and of course planning her next travel destination with friends.

Getting Good at Email

2011-01-28T09:12:00.000-08:00

This email thing has really caught on. Whether or not it’s a regular part of your life now, it will become so at the latest when you begin college. And for something people spend so much time doing, most people are pretty bad at email.

“How can someone be bad at email?” you ask.

Let’s imagine someone who’s bad at making a bowl of cereal. So this person puts a bowl on the counter and takes out a box of cereal. They open the box and take one Cheerio and put it in the bowl. Then a second Cheerio. Then a third. 15 minutes later, they’re ready for the milk. They open the milk carton and carefully pour it into a teaspoon and then dump the teaspoon into the bowl. Then a second teaspoon, and then a third and fourth. Finally, 30 minutes after getting started, they’re ready to eat! (Thank goodness they didn’t want to add in any sugar.)

Now, if you were watching this person make a bowl of cereal, what would you say?

You’d go crazy. You’d want to pull your hair out. “Why would anyone ever be that incredibly inefficient?!” you’d think.

Well that’s me when I watch most people use email. Getting quick and efficient at using email can help you stay organized and save you a ton of time. Here are some tips to help you pour the email cereal:

Get on Gmail
In my experience (and I used Yahoo for four years), Gmail is far and away the best. If you use Yahoo, or AOL, or Hotmail, or whatever—give Gmail a try. Sign up for a free account, and if you agree that it’s superior to whatever you’ve been using, send one email to your contacts and tell them that you have a new email address, and just like that, you’re switched.

Keyboard Shortcuts
Once you’re on Gmail, go straight into Settings and turn “Keyboard Shortcuts” on. Then, once you refresh the page, you’ll be ready to use them. Start by pressing Shift + / to bring up a list of all the keyboard shortcuts Gmail offers (or check them out here). Beyond the obvious time-savers like C to compose a new message, R to reply, F to forward, etc., there are dozens more, all of which are useful. Also, to send a message, simply press Tab to highlight the Send key, and then Enter to send your message. Trust me—once you get used to these, you will never go back to clicking around Gmail with your mouse.

Archiving
In Gmail, there are two ways to maintain your inbox: 1) The old fashion way—let your messages pile up into the thousands, creating a never-ending inbox, or 2) The modern way—"archive" emails you’re done with, keeping your inbox clean and only containing messages you still need to read or answer. I can say with absolute conviction that the modern way is superior. The key is that archived messages haven’t gone anywhere—they’re sitting in the “All Mail” folder on the left, and you can either go to that folder or use the search feature to find an archived message at any time. Just type the name of someone on that email and maybe a word from the email or another recipient, and the archived message will be right in front of you again. Meanwhile, your inbox is clean and only contains messages you need to attend to, allowing your inbox to serve as your email “to-do” list.

You can bring in your own systems on top of this—you can “keep as new” messages you need to deal with more urgently, or tag them with a star, etc. Whatever works best for you.

(When I go through my emails, I simply press either k or ]. k leaves the message in my inbox and moves one to the next one, ] archives the message and moves to the next one. For me, it’s one or the other, unless it’s r to reply to the message.)

Labels
Labels can help you stay organized. Rather than putting an email in a “folder,” Gmail lets you tag emails with one or more labels that you create. Then when you click that label on the left side of the screen, every message you’ve tagged with that label is sitting there. For example, I created a label called “Flights” in my Gmail. When I book a flight online, I receive an email with the flight details. Since I know I’m going to need that email in a couple months—but I don’t want it to stay in my inbox that whole time and create clutter—I slap the “Flights” label on it (keyboard shortcut: when I’m in the message I press L to bring up the "choose a label" field and then type the first couple letters of “FLIGHTS” and press Enter and voila). Then, a couple months later when I need the email, I just go to the flights label and there it is.

Filters
If you’re a beginner, worry about the above items for now—but for the more advanced user, filters are the way to tell Gmail what you want it to do with messages. For example, if I get a weekly newsletter that I might want to read here and there, but I don’t want to be bothered with it popping into my inbox each week—I can create a filter that tells Gmail: “When a message comes in from the sender of this newsletter, apply a “newsletter” label to it and archive it before it even reaches my inbox.” So now I’ll never see another one of these newsletters in my inbox, but when I click on the “newsletter” label on the left, all of the newsletters will be sitting there. Cool, right? You can create filters in Settings.

Labs
Finally, once you get good at Gmail, head to Settings and go to the Labs tab. There you will find over a hundred little cool features that you may or may not want to activate in your Gmail. One of my favorites is “Undo Send,” which allows me to take back a sent message for 10 seconds after sending it—comes in surprisingly handy. Check them out.

Themes
While you’re in Settings, head to the Themes tab and make your Gmail page more interesting. My favorite is Tea House, which allows you to check out the daily life of a delightful little fox who lives at the bottom of your screen.

Good luck! This stuff may take some getting used to, but you’ll thank me one day. For more on Gmail, check out the Gmail blog.

Raise Your Hand: So 2011

2011-01-21T21:30:00.000-08:00

I have no qualms asking questions, so it probably doesn't surprise you that I am also an avid fan of Wikipedia, the dictionary, and the classic "Google search."

Unlike most, one of my favorite arenas for asking questions is in the restaurant. Since it's not so typical to preface an order with "I have a question..." some might say I've got quite a lot of moxie to "raise my hand."

However, I find that I learn some of the most interesting things from the simple act of asking. The other day, I got my notion confirmed by a pastry chef that Boston Cream Pie is indeed not a pie, per se, but a sponge cake. Who knew!

Subsequently, a majority of my adult friends would probably be surprised to know that as a child, I was not the kid who easily raised my hand in class . Looking back, I believe I was afraid to ask a question because I was embarrassed and thought everyone else would think I was stupid. I have the sense (probably due to the uncomfortable looks I get when I inquire about the method to make, say, bacon foam)- that I am/was not alone in this assumption.

Recently, I read Aristotle’s quote “the more you know, the more you know you don’t know” – and it made me wonder: all those years I kept my hand at my side for fear of being called “dumb” – maybe, just maybe - I was wrong?

Being an adult, I took my quandary to the streets and asked a few of my teacher friends for their perspective on the classroom dynamic as it pertains to hand-raising.

A pal who is a 7th grade math teacher says that he has never had a “dumb” question come from a student raising their hand in class. In fact, “the types of problems that students ask the most questions about out loud are usually the ones every student in that class ends up acing on the exam.”

Coincidence? Hardly.

Taking the matter to an 11th grade English teacher, I was informed that her daily lesson plan includes a 5 minute “question and answer” block right before the end of class. Initially, she had her students vote on how they wanted to use the time: to do homework, to study for other classes, or to “clarify” what they had gone over that day via peer-generated questions.

Impressively, each of her six periods voted to use the time to ask her questions as a group – instead of through personal email or individually, after class. She claims that group "Q & A" allows everyone to benefit from her answers – and not-so-surprisingly, the classes that ask the most questions per day tend to have the highest class average on exams and essays in comparison to the classes that use the time for study or other homework.

It would appear that Aristotle was on to something. So, if you pledge to do anything this semester, promise to seek an answer when you are curious, and if you are feeling bold – ask a question out loud for the rest of us.

Senioritis

2011-01-14T17:03:00.000-08:00

Symptoms: These include laziness, excessive apathy, chronic tardiness, occasional absences, and an overwhelming urge to slack off.

Causes: The onset of senioritis can happen as soon as you send off your college applications. But symptoms often don’t become apparent until that big envelope arrives in the mail and the suspense of the college application process is over. With your acceptance letter in hand, it seems your hard work as a high school student is done. So you begin to let loose, and before you know it, you’re in a slump. Hello, senioritis!

Complications: Ignoring the symptoms can have serious consequences. College acceptances are often contingent on a student’s continued academic success, and a drop in grades due to senioritis won’t be overlooked by the admissions officers reviewing your year-end transcript. Every year, colleges rescind their offers of admission to those who haven’t maintained their grades or have fallen short in some other way. (Final grades were cited by 69% of colleges that revoked admission offers in 2007; disciplinary problems accounted for 25%, says the National Association for College Admission Counseling.) Additional complications associated with senioritis include being put on academic probation and receiving less financial assistance in college.

The Cure: If you thought I was going to say graduation, think again. You’ll need to combat senioritis long before then to avoid jeopardizing your future. My advice: nip it in the bud. If you feel your motivation waning, just remind yourself of how close you are to the finish line. You’ve been running this high school marathon for years, and now is not the time to slow down. So fight the temptations brought on by senioritis, and keep your eye on the prize. Before you know it, you’ll be done with high school, and only then will the race truly be over.

A Tutor's Guide: How to Get the Most Out of Your Session

2011-01-07T11:34:00.000-08:00

Feel Good about Yourself

By deciding to have a tutoring session, you've already taken a conscious step toward self-improvement. So feel good about yourself. Confidence doesn't guarantee success, but it always helps.

Visualize Your Goals

Think carefully about what you want to achieve and how you want to achieve it. Write down your goals, tell your friends, and hold yourself accountable. Don't be afraid to aim high, but remember that major triumphs are built on small victories.

Come Prepared

Organization is critical. No one’s perfect, but starting homework without a plan is like walking into a rainstorm without an umbrella. Work with your tutor to keep track of all assignments and establish a clear, step-by-step plan to get them done.

Communicate

The key to any successful relationship is communication. Make sure you share your goals with your tutor, and know that every tutoring session is a safe environment to share concerns and ask for help.

Thank you Alex M. (one of our fabulous L.A. tutors!) for contributing this week’s blog post!

7 iPhone Apps to Make You a Better Student

2010-12-17T12:28:00.000-08:00

There’s no denying that, for many of us, the iPhone has turned into a highly entertaining and virtually indispensable gadget. There are even a number of very useful educational tools designed to help you become a more efficient student. But with hundreds of thousands of applications out there, finding the ones that are right for you can seem overwhelming. Here are a few that I’ve found to be pretty nifty.

Evernote (Free)

Use this app to remember anything and everything that happens in class. Evernote allows you to create text, photo and audio notes, all of which can be synchronized to your computer and accessed later. You can organize, tag, and search through notes—even the text within snapshots is searchable!

Dictionary.com (Free/$3.99 for No-ads version)

There’s no need to lug around a big, heavy dictionary when this app gives you access to nearly one million definitions and over 90 thousand synonyms and antonyms. It also offers audio pronunciation, word origin, example sentences, and—you guessed it—Dictionary.com’s Word of the Day.

myHomework (Free)

This app offers an easy way to track your homework, projects, and tests. Assignments are color-coded by due date in a simple, notebook-like design. Past and upcoming deadlines will be numbered on your application icon, so you’ll be sure not to miss any.

iStudiezPro ($2.99)

This highly-efficient and colorful app helps you organize every aspect of school life. You can input and manage all the details of your classes and activities, including schedule, location, and instructor information. iStudiezPro also enables you to track assignments and tests and can even calculate your GPA for past and current semesters. And you can count on the integrated alarms to remind you of your tasks, classes and events.

The Chemical Touch ($0.99/Lite Edition is free)

This app is a goldmine for chemistry students. The touch-sensitive periodic table gives lets you explore the properties of the elements, such as atomic mass, density, melting and boiling points, etc. It even provides information about standard amino acids and nucleobases. And if you find yourself thirsty for knowledge still, The Chemical Touch’s internet button links directly to the Wikipedia page of the selected element, amino acid, or nucleobase.

FREE Spanish Tutor (Free)

Download this app if you’re looking for a fun way to practice your language skills and pick up new words and phrases. It offers a number of interactive study tools like flash cards, multiple choice and fill-in quizzes, and a puzzle game. FREE Spanish Tutor even has an audio feature so you can learn how to pronounce words like a native speaker! This app is also available in French, Italian and German.

Graphing Calculator ($1.99)

If you ever misplace your TI-83, this app will come in as a handy back-up. It’s a user-friendly scientific calculator that supports most commonly-used functions and allows you to graph multiple equations on the same screen. And one of the advantages of using a graphing calculator on your iPhone is that you can take screenshots and email them to yourself for reference.

Making the Most of Your Winter Break

2010-12-10T14:17:00.000-08:00

After the tortures of final exams, many students cannot wait to turn off their brains and “veg out” in front of the television all vacation long. Although a break from the daily routine of school and homework can be extremely necessary, the break does not have to be completely unproductive.

Parenthood.com ran a podcast series, Straight Talk About School, featuring Judy Molland, long time teacher and an award winning educational writer. This particular podcast offers up some tips on how to stay checked in during school vacations. Whether it is the 3 months of summer vacation, or the 3 weeks of the winter break, there are fun ways to make the best out of the time away from school.

Take a couple minutes to listen to this short podcast for fun and constructive ways to fill your days off.

How to Keep Learning Alive During School Vacation

Nailing Your Final Exams

2010-12-03T14:45:00.000-08:00

The Christmas songs are playing. Everywhere. It’s that time of year.

While for most people, these songs are the sound of holiday spirit, for us at Launch Education Group, Christmas songs are the sound of upcoming final exams.

Festive, huh?

Now don’t look so sad—even though it’s not quite “the most wonderful time of the year” for students, finals don’t have to be that bad, as long as you approach them with the right mindset and the right strategies. Here are some tips to keep in mind as finals get near:

Pace yourself. Studying for final exams takes a lot of time! It’s a huge mistake to wait until the day before a final to begin studying. Get started as early as two weeks before the exams, and don’t plan on having much of a social life the weekend before exams.

Pay close attention to any final exam review sheet or topic list your teacher gives out. This will help you know exactly what you should and should not spend time studying, and you can use it as your study checklist. You should also absolutely go to any and all review sessions held by your teacher.

Use previous tests, quizzes, and other assignments to your advantage. Especially in math, science, and foreign language classes, if you know how to do every problem on every previous test or quiz, you’re likely to do very well on your final exam. When you go through old tests and quizzes, take special note of any low scores you received, and plan to spend extra time studying those topics.

Get ready to memorize. Memorization is generally a key component of successful final exam studying. Since everyone’s best strategies for memorization are different, think about what has and has not worked for you in the past when memorizing, and pick your techniques accoringly.

Find the right balance of solo versus group studying. Some people actually learn a lot when studying with friends. Others learn much better on their own. Again, think about what has really worked for you in the past. Just because it’s more fun to study with friends does not necessarily mean it’s a smart choice for you.

Remember, final exams count for a lot and they can make or break your report card. You’ve put in countless hours of hard work this semester—don’t let your effort drop now! Rather, this is the time to sprint to the finish. Nothing is better than relaxing at the end of the semester knowing you gave finals your all.

Crosswords Galore

2010-11-19T15:25:00.000-08:00

In a recent attempt to catch up on the latest news headlines, I found myself hopping from webpage to webpage reading all sorts of interesting articles. About a dozen clicks later, I landed on an article about the vast and hybrid nature of the English language. That’s when I stumbled upon what ended up occupying me for the next several hours: crossword puzzles. I started with one about ‘borrowed’ words in the English language and then went on to discover a plethora of others —all for students and all about different educational topics. It turns out that the New York Times' Learning Network has crossword puzzles on everything from Shakespeare to genetics to the stock market.

Crosswords are a great way to review a topic you’ve studied in school or learn something new. And in my book, anything that combines learning and fun is time well-spent. Check out the Student Crossword Archive, find the one (or many) that piques your interest, and start solving!

The College Admission Essay

2010-11-16T11:42:00.000-08:00

Writing has never been my greatest academic strength. While I've been able to get by, I've always felt like I've never been able to get my words to really jump off the page like those of some of my peers.

So when it came time to draft my college admissions essay, I was absolutely stumped and had no idea how to make myself "shine" while being "humble" at the same time.

Fortunately for you, Jeannie Borin has compiled some key college essay writing tips as well as some basic do’s and don’ts to simplify this delicate feat.

The College Admissions Essay
By Jeannie Borin M.Ed., College Connections

The Common Application is now online and it’s ready for you to register. Visit www.commonapp.org. As of June 17th, 49 more colleges were added and this website now houses 392 colleges. Remember that some of the colleges on your list may not be on the Common Application. When this is the case, visit those college websites to complete their individual applications.

There are two required essays on the Common Application – one short and one long. Both of these essays provide you with limited space to express yourself. In addition to this, most colleges have supplements and many include more essays.

Here are tips to writing an excellent college admissions essay

1) Make yourself shine within your own story- It’s important that you don’t repeat what has already been stated on your activity resume, but you should highlight your accomplishments in your essay- weave them into your story. Reveal your personality and perhaps your future goals in your writing.

2) Be humble but don’t be modest- Don’t underestimate yourself in any way and be proud and secure in who you are. Sincerely describe your most impressive accomplishments but don’t overdo it.

3) Be confident in your statements– It’s important to write as though you deserve gaining acceptance. Present yourself as unique with specific skills and passion.

4) Use personal stories- You really own your essay in this way and no one can tell YOUR story, this is what makes you unique

5) Write descriptively – Engage the reader and be specific about your experience. If writing a memorable story about a ride in the car and what you saw, have that reader sitting there with you. A good story is priceless and you will catch attention in this way. Use powerful imagery and personal anecdotes whenever you can. Leave readers with a lasting impression and it will serve you well come decision time!

DO’S & DON’TS in college essay writing

DO

Use personal detail- show, don’t tell
Be concise
Vary sentence structure and use transitions
Use active voice verbs
Answer the question and follow directions
Seek a few opinions
Stay focused as you have a limited word count
Revise, revise, revise and proofread

DON’T

Write chronologically- it can be boring
Thesaurus “ize”- don’t write what you think admission officers want to hear or use language that is not your own
State a point of view without backing it up with details and examples
Repeat what is listed on your activity resume
Use slang

Your character is the hardest thing for admission officers to measure. The essay is your chance to reveal who you are- your passions, values, authenticity and sincerity. Be yourself!

The Path to NCAA Academic Eligibility

2010-11-05T15:52:00.000-07:00

There is a great deal of hard work and dedication that goes into being a student-athlete at the collegiate level. What most people don’t realize is that this hard work starts long before the athlete first steps foot onto campus. In order to become eligible for NCAA Division I and II athletics, the prospective student-athlete must pay as much attention to their school work as they do their sport. Below is a general guideline of how to start planning and preparing for NCAA eligibility during your high school years.

Please note that these guidelines ONLY cover the requirements for gaining NCAA Academic eligibility and does not touch on the numerous NCAA recruiting rules and regulations.

Freshman and Sophomores

Start planning now!
Work hard to get the best grades possible
Make sure that you are taking classes that are NCAA core courses. You can access your high school’s list of NCAA courses at http://eligibilitycenter.org/
Don’t fall behind early on! Use summer school classes to catch up if necessary

Juniors

Complete registration at the NCAA Eligibility Center (formerly known as the NCAA Clearinghouse) at the beginning of your junior year
Register to take the SAT, ACT, or both. Enter code “9999” as a score recipient to send your scores directly to the Eligibility Center
Check to make sure you are still on track with the NCAA courses
After completing your junior year, ask your school counselor to send your official transcript to the Eligibility Center
Check with a school counselor before registering for Senior classes to make sure you complete all core courses by graduation

Seniors

Take the SAT and/or ACT again if necessary
Check once again to make sure you are completing all necessary NCAA courses for eligibility
Request final amateurism certification on or after April 1st
Graduate on time (in eight-semesters)
After graduation, ask your high school counselor to send your final transcript to the Eligibility Center with proof of graduation

With a little planning and the hard-work to make it possible, you can set your dreams of playing collegiate athletics in motion.

For a complete list of the NCAA rules and regulations download a copy of the 2010-2011 Guide for the College-Bound Student-Athlete.

All You Need To Know About The ISEE In Five Minutes

2010-10-29T12:16:00.000-07:00

Are you and your child applying to private middle school or high school for fall 2011 admissions? Do you find yourself staring bewilderingly at the application request for your student’s recent ISEE scores?

Sure, you may have questions – but you are not alone: every year about 45,000 kids take the ISEE, which means your questions have been considered, asked, and answered before. Short on time? Look no further – in just a few minutes you will understand the basics of the ISEE.

1. The ISEE sounds familiar. Has my child taken it before?

Unless you have applied to private school in the past, your child has not taken the ISEE. However, it is likely that you have heard of the company that makes the ISEE – the ERB. The ERB is responsible for the CTP (“ERBs”), an exam administered every year in private school to test student performance against “advanced” grade standards. The ISEE is based on similar expectations.

2. I went to the ERB website to register my child for the ISEE, and it asked me what grade we are applying for. Why?

There are three levels of the ISEE: the Lower Level, the Middle Level, and the Upper Level. The level your student will take depends on the grade your student is in. However, the ERB has clustered certain grades: students in 4th or 5th grade take the Lower Level exam, those in 6th or 7th take the Middle Level exam, and students 8th grade or above applying for any grade in high school take the Upper Level exam.

3. Does this mean that my 8th grader is taking the same test as a 9th grader? That’s not fair!

Correct. But your 8th grader’s performance will only be calculated and scored in comparison to that of fellow 8th graders.

4. How are the tests scored?

There are five sections on the ISEE: Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, Reading Comprehension, Mathematics Achievement and an Essay. Each student’s raw score (per section) is calculated based upon the number of questions answered correctly (there is no penalty for an incorrect answer). Each raw score is then converted to a scaled score between 760 and 940 (according to the “three year rolling norm pool” for that section) and then converted in to a percentile (ranking) that appears in the form of a stanine (a number from 1- 9).

5. I’m confused. What is considered a “good score”?

Since scores are evaluated in various terms of “comparison,” we encourage students to simply do their best to achieve their potential. Each school accepts a range of stanine scores, but most admissions counselors I’ve asked want everyone to remember that ISEE scores aren’t the only factor considered in the admission decision – schools are building classes, and they emphasize that test scores are just one of dozens of factors they look at when considering a student for their school.

6. My child is nervous about the exam. What can I do?

As with any new experience, familiarity breeds confidence. We recommend having your child take practice tests so that he or she will know what to expect on test day – everything from how much time is allotted for each section to when they can take bathroom breaks.

Since the ISEE is standardized, with studying and review, students can become familiar with the types of topics the test will cover, improve their knowledge base, and practice efficient test-taking strategies (like ways to derive the correct answer choice without taking the time to “solve” the question). The more comfortable students feel with the task at hand, the more they will feel like they can put their best foot forward.

Unfortunately, the ERB has only published one real ISEE from each level, which makes the “test-day” experience difficult to match. That said, since rehearsing what will happen on test day is a key component to any student’s preparation, Launch Education Group has created two practice exams based on the published ISEE exams from the ERB to provide more opportunity for practice. Princeton Review and Kaplan also offer practice exams, although they have not been updated for the new ISEE format.

7. When is the test? Can my child take it more than once?

Testing this year starts December 4th. Most schools recommend taking the ISEE as soon as possible, but there are test dates offered throughout the early spring. Check with the schools on your application list to make sure the test date you have selected is within the deadline. Students can only take the ISEE once every six months. Therefore, plan accordingly!

For registration and more information, visit the ERB website.

Good luck!

NYC: A Sea of Schools

2010-10-22T16:30:00.000-07:00

Enrolling your child in a private school in New York City is no easy feat. There are over 900 privately run schools in the city, some of which are among the most competitive independent schools in the nation. From researching the schools to registering for standardized tests to submitting applications, the process can be overwhelming. I’m no expert, but something tells me that the key to staying above water is staying informed.

The first step is narrowing your search. Learn as much as you can about the schools you are considering, and decide which ones could be a good match for your family. Talk to friends, do research online, attend workshops, visit and request information from schools—do what you need to do in order to finalize the list of schools to which your child will be applying.

Next, register your child for any standardized tests he/she will need to take. Most middle and high schools require the ISEE (check the school's website or admission material). The sooner your child starts preparing for this test, the better. But don’t get bogged down trying to figure out what score is needed to get admitted here or there as this information is often hard to come by.

At some point, you’ll find yourself neck deep in test prep, applications, interviews, shadow days, and a number of other things on your admissions checklist. As you muddle through, remember to keep one eye on the present and one eye on the looming deadlines. Most applications, including essays, test scores, recommendations, and transcripts are due in January or February. For some, this is the hardest part; for others, it’s the uncertainty that surfaces right after.

Will my child get accepted? Waitlisted? Rejected? The truth is, once the application is out of your hands, so is the school’s decision. My advice: focus on the part you can control. There are a ton of available resources to make this otherwise taxing application process manageable—and hopefully, worthwhile!

Here are a few good place to start:

The National Association of Independent Schools

The Independent School Admission Association of Greater New York

The Parents League of New York

Behind “Beyond the Brochure”

2010-10-15T15:04:00.000-07:00

Sallie and I recently had the pleasure of meeting Christina Simon, the co-author of “Beyond the Brochure: An Insider’s Guide to Private Elementary Schools in Los Angeles”. “Beyond the Brochure” is an excellent resource for any Los Angeles parents planning to send their child to private elementary school.

The direct, matter-of-fact style gives the reader the true “inside scoop” from actual LA private school mothers who have been through the process several times.

Christina also authors an excellent and very popular blog about the private school admissions process and the life of an LA private school parent in general (beyondthebrochure.blogspot.com).

It was wonderful to meet Christina in person. She is extremely bright and down-to-earth, and it only reinforced our belief that she has a great voice to share with the LA private school community! Check out her book and blog for more insights.

Knowing the Score

2010-10-08T09:36:00.000-07:00

Imagine you’re a quarterback. There are two minutes left in the game and your team has the ball. The pressure’s on for you to drive your team down the field. But there’s just one thing…

You don’t know what the score is.

Maybe you’re up by three (in which case the right move would be to kill time and try to run down the clock). Maybe you’re down by three (in which case you’d want to carefully drive down the field to at least get into field goal range). Maybe you’re down by ten (in which case the only option would be to try to make a quick drive for a touchdown and then get the ball back again).

But since you don’t know the score, how do you proceed? You have a problem, right?

Naturally, every quarterback would be well aware of the score at all times in order to be effective.

But if knowing your current grade is just as important for a student trying to get the best grade possible (and it is), then why are so many students clueless about where they stand in their classes most of the time?

Like a quarterback, a student who knows the "score" at all times has a huge advantage over one who doesn't.

Just say your goal in history is to get an A-. This means your average needs to be above that magic “90” line when the semester or year ends. Most schools and teachers round off to the nearest whole number, so for most students, the true magic number to get in the A range is an 89.5.

89.5 (or 79.5) is a very important number to get in your head, and in order to have the best chance of achieving it, you, like the quarterback, must know:

A) each class’s grade breakdown, and

B) your current average in each area of the breakdown

So back to that history class. Let’s imagine this is the grade breakdown:

Papers: 30%

Tests: 30%

Quizzes: 15%

Homework: 15%

Participation: 10%

In order to figure out your grade at any point in time, you need to know your current averages in each area. You’ll often be able to find these numbers just by looking at what’s been handed back to you so far, and if not, you can always ask your teacher.

Once you have these numbers, all you have to do is multiply each by its weight percentage and divide by 100. So let’s say that your breakdown with a month left in the semester is as follows:

Papers: Two handed back (B and A-) = about an 88 average

Tests: Three handed back for an 86 average

Quizzes: Eight handed back for an 88 average

Homework: Doing well here—98 average

Participation: You’re pretty active in class and the teacher likes you—let’s estimate a 90

You would do the following calculation—

(88 x 30) + (86 x 30) + (88 x 15) + (98 x 15) + (90 x 10)

And then divide by 100 to find your current average at 89.1. This is a crucial piece of information! Now, like the quarterback, you can plan accordingly. You’re close—but you’re in danger of falling short of the A range, so you really need to nail that last paper and the final exam.

Give it a try for your classes. You’ll be surprised how helping knowing the score can be.

Making The Academic Journey Part of Everyday Life

2010-10-03T14:17:00.000-07:00

I find myself reading and talking a lot about “how busy kids are these days,” but it has come increasingly apparent how much busier their parents are – and how little support they receive in respect to managing their kid's academic futures.

In the same breath, I also hear a lot of parents say that “it just seems like everything is happening younger and younger” – like students taking the SAT in 9th grade when most used to only take it in 11th -which makes keeping up with academic trends and timelines seem hard to plan, let alone accomplish.

However, there are easy ways to keep up with academic planning that will enable you to seamlessly incorporate steps toward your student's academic future in to your everyday routine – so while it may seem that “everything happens so quickly,” at least you will be prepared and already half-way there!

Steps To Achieve Higher Education Goals
By Jeannie Borin M.Ed., College Connections

In addition to the challenging academic workload most teens are faced with, many students are simultaneously working, engaged in extracurricular activities and want social time. Compile this busy lifestyle with the time and energy it takes to prepare and apply to colleges.

Step One: Guidance

Applying to college is no easy task. Examine a college application and you will see the various elements required. Universities require more information from students now than ever before to make distinctions and admission decisions. Applications are often difficult if not impossible for students to complete without the proper support and direction.

Most colleges suggest support and counseling, but from whom and how?

Well meaning high school counselors are often spread too thin and many families do not know the current application requirements, options, statistics or what university admissions officers want to see. If universities are requiring numerous components to the college application process, students are entitled to know what to do. Before even beginning the college process, families should learn exactly what is involved and make sure their children have the proper guidance.

Step Two: Stay Current

There are factors in the admission process that change from year to year. What are the different ways to apply? Early Decision, Early Action, Restrictive First Choice Early Action, and Rolling Admissions... What do these terms mean? What is the best strategy? Harvard, Princeton and the University of Virginia along with other select universities have eliminated their Early Admission Plans. How do students and their families become aware of such news? A few ways include:

1. The National Association of College Admissions Counselors (NACAC) will have current college news and updates. Visit www.nacacnet.org

2. Contacting university admission officers as well as carefully reviewing college websites will provide current brochures and admission information for free

Step Three: Testing

Each year, students face additional concerns regarding the standardized testing process. Families we work with are constantly unsure about what tests to take (ACT and/or SAT I), what colleges require SAT II Subject Exams, when they are given and where and how to register to take them. The testing requirements change as some universities require certain tests and some do not or simply recommend them.

Step Four: The Essay

Since over 800 universities in the United States are test optional, often greater emphasis is placed on the college essay. What are these university admission officers looking for in the student essay?

Although many universities do give a “topic of your choice” there are also those questions that are specific. For example, an essay question may quote legendary philosophers and tell the applicant to decipher the content and connect it on a personal level. To write intelligently anywhere from 100 to 600 words (depending on the institution) is yet an additional skill. Essays should be in story format, creative and wonderfully intriguing. However, students generally do not learn to write first person essays in high school, which makes the process more challenging. Many colleges require three to four essays; some long and some short – but nevertheless all different.

Step Five: Recommendations

The amount of recommendation letters necessary vary per college. Here are a few of the questions I get from students and parents: “How many do I need?” “What information should be included?” “Who should I give them to?” “Should I submit my recommendations with the rest of the application?” “Should I waive the right to see them?” The answer is that universities have different methods of how they want their applicants to submit recommendations.

Step Six: The Brag Sheet

The “Brag Sheet” is essentially a list of extracurricular activities, honors and awards received in high school. Students need to know the best way to state and present their activities. In most cases, applicants are given approximately seven short lines to list years of experience and accomplishments. They are entitled to know how to maximize this space.

Step Seven: Financial Planning

Most families approach college years for their children without having given much thought to how they will finance their children’s college education. Funding college education for your children will probably represent the second largest out of pocket expense that a family will incur in their lifetime

Author Bio:
Jeannie Borin, M. Ed, is Founder and President of the independent educational and college consulting firm College Connections.

Man's best friend and child's learning tool?

2010-09-24T23:12:00.000-07:00

We all know that dogs are warm, fuzzy, lovable creatures. But did you know that they can actually help improve your child’s reading skills?

One of the biggest challenges kids face in learning to read is a lack of confidence. Children who struggle with reading often become self-conscious about their abilities, embarrassed of making mistakes, and generally uncomfortable reading out loud in front of others. Their insecurity prevents them from doing the one thing that will make them better readers—practice, practice, practice!

This is where the dog comes in. It may seem silly to you, but reading to a dog can be just what your child needs—a comforting, furry friend who will always listen and never judge. In this non-threatening environment, your child can read freely and confidently. In fact, the presence of a dog has been proven to diminish the signs of anxiety (elevated heart rate and blood pressure, for example) that can appear when a child reads aloud to a peer or adult. Who knew?

And here’s more food for thought. A study conducted this year by researchers at the University of California, Davis confirmed that children who read to a canine companion really do perform better. Young students who read out loud to dogs improved their reading skills by 12 percent over the course of a 10-week program, while children in the same program who didn't read to dogs showed no improvement. Other studies have revealed that a young student's reading scores can advance significantly—two to four grade levels—by reading to a dog for just 20 minutes a week throughout the school year. And the leaders of R.E.A.D. (Reading Education Assistance Dogs) recommend doing just that—set aside 20 minutes each week for your child to read to a dog.

If you don’t have a dog, you can visit www.therapyanimals.org to find a R.E.A.D. program near you. Otherwise, encourage your child read to whatever pet he/she does have. The key is reading to an audience who will offer unconditional respect and attention. Reading to Fluffy the hamster, Bubbles the goldfish, or Winston the tortoise might just work!

How to Review College Websites

2010-09-17T16:40:00.000-07:00

Around this time of year, about eight years ago, my mother and older brother began the daunting task of investigating colleges of potential interest. They decided the local Barnes and Noble was the place to start - and after a solid hour, they arrived home with close to ten pounds of college guides - Petersons, Fiske, Newsweek - I'm pretty sure they had every single one available in the four, extra-large bags.

Over the next few weeks, I watched as they spent several hours thumbing through each book - comparing schools, considering the different angles each guide offered. By the end they had a better understanding of his options, a solid list of schools that he would keep an eye on, and stacks of extremely-used guides.

Three years later I began the same process - but mine did not necessitate even ONE book...

Thanks to the internet, I accomplished what took my brother weeks in just 2 days. Absolutely free, to boot - plus, not only does every single college in the US have an informational website - but these websites often have links to student reviews, as well.

The process continues to become much more efficient and balanced with each passing year - however, in order to get the most out of each website, you should follow a few best tips from a local pro, Jeannie Borin:

How to Review College Websites

So you can’t visit all the colleges where you choose to apply. The internet is a great source to do lots of homework on colleges. Visit college websites and it’s easy to be drawn into the fantastic graphics, sunny weather and smiling students. In addition to providing information on their schools, appealing to students via glorious websites is an objective colleges have to lure students into applying.

Here are some tips:

Take notes when gazing at college websites. Keep track of things that impress you and where you see yourself as a good match for that college. A typical essay question colleges ask students is why they are a good fit for their college.
Read the college’s mission statement. This information is generally found on the college’s “about” page. Philosophically, one can learn a tremendous amount by this statement.
Read the campus newspaper. Students write current stories on hot topics, posting opinions and discussing relevant issues about that college. One can learn about “the pulse” of a campus this way.
Visit student run campus websites. Look at campus events.
Check out the academic programs. It’s a good idea to look at any core requirements the first two years. For example, if a college wants you to take lots of science classes and that’s not your thing – that may not be the college for you.

Most importantly, know yourself! What do you like and dislike? What are your strengths and weaknesses? In what kind of an environment are you most comfortable? Is this college affordable? Can this college help fulfill your career goals?

Generally admission offices will welcome phone calls. You can speak with an admissions representative and counselor to get any specific questions answered. However, it is important to visit college websites first as many of your questions will be answered on their websites.

*Thanks to Jeannie Borin, founder and president of College Connections, for her contribution again this week!

Effective College Visits

2010-09-10T17:17:00.000-07:00

Back in the day, a majority of my college visits went something like this:

My Mother: We should go on a tour of the campus...don't forget to ask questions!
Me: Yuck. Can we go get coffee at the bookstore?
My Mother: You should talk to the students and get a feel for the school!
Me: I just want to go swimming
My Mother: Campus tour!
Me: Lunch?

In the end, I spent most of my college visits sulking around as my mother approached random students and interviewed them on the spot. Occasionally, I would sneak off and visit the campus gym and check it out - but looking back, there were a lot of questions I should have asked others - and myself.

Jeannie Borin, founder and president of College Connections, offers the below checklist as a way to efficiently and effectively structure your college visits so that you leave with valuable information.

How To Make The Most of Your Campus Visits

As you visit different colleges, it is easy to get overwhelmed by the many buildings, programs and informational tours. Preparing a preplanned checklist of what you want to see and do while on campus is advantageous. Each year my staff and I tour a myriad of universities across the country. Here are some things we look for at each college we visit:

Admission Criteria

Requirements and What to Include with the Application
When to Apply
GPA & Test Scores (if required)
Scholarships Offered
Student Support/Counseling Center

Academics

Professor Availability
Popular Programs
Average Size of Class
Possible Internships Available
Study Abroad Opportunities
Available Technology
Library Facilities and Resources

Campus Life

Greek – Fraternities/Sororities
Weekend Activities
Special Campus Events
How Many Students Live on Campus? Commute?
Sporting Events
Dining Facilities
Party Scene
Campus Setting
Located of College (Urban vs. Rural)
Surrounding Community (College Town)

Look Of The College

Dorms and Nearby Housing
Lecture Halls & Classrooms
Clean, Easy Access, Transportation
Libraries
Security & Safety, Campus Police Availability
Current Building Projects
How Well Are Current Facilities Maintained?
Recreation Center
Additional Suggestions
Take a campus informational tour
Set up an interview with an admission officer
Audit a course
Speak with a professor or representative at the department in your field of interest
If you are pursuing athletics, talk to a coach in your sport
If possible, stay overnight in a dorm with a friend or relative
Pick up the campus newspaper
Spend time in the Student Union and eat in the cafeteria
Speak to students and ask questions
Find the center of campus and be an observer
Take a look at the college bookstore
Ask a student what he/she likes and dislikes about the college
Tour the community surrounding the campus
Ask yourself if you could feel at home at this college
Take lots of notes and pictures
Enjoy yourself!

Ultimately, the most important thing is finding the right match for you. Your comfort level and ability to intertwine with students and faculty will help you know what you want come decision time.

*Special thanks to Jeannie Borin, founder and president of college connections, for her contribution this week!

Academic New Year's Resolution: Attainable and Maintainable Goals

2010-09-03T12:17:00.000-07:00

We are all familiar with the resolutions made on January 1st. Ambitiously, we make plans to improve in various areas: exercise consistently, read more, complain less, recycle, etc.

Unfortunately, by February, after two months steadfast commitment, we feel like it is “too much” and start making exceptions, excuses, and decide that maybe it really is true that weekends don’t count.

In the world of education, September is the mark of another kind of new year – the academic school year. As I can recall, this was an exciting time that always felt full of potential. A new year meant new classes, new teachers, and a new opportunity to start off “fresh” with academic organization, sports, and extra-curricular activities.

Like most, I would always start off the year strong. Each class was organized into separate binders, I had highlighters and a planner, and I would meticulously track every assignment and exam date. I would commit to clubs during lunch and lifeguarding during the weekend, and anything else was crammed in between school and the 25 hours of swim practice during the week.

Then, late October would happen. Much like the attack of February on the commitment to New Year’s Resolutions, I would find myself skipping club meetings, scheduling work more sporadically, and stacking returned tests, papers, and other assignments in to teetering piles on my desk. While I never completely abandoned my efforts, by the end of high school I noticed one thing: no matter the number of promises I made or the strength of my intent, I always ended up only seriously committed to two or three goals come June.

Now, for my advice to students…

Students, as you start this new school year, take a few minutes to consider the upcoming year. Do you have goals for this year? Are they attainable AND maintainable, or have you set yourself up to compromise quality of commitment for quantity of activities? Remember, success is built by integrating on-going actions and dedication over a long period, not by attaining goals for a short lived spurt of time. (Also, colleges care WAY more about the depth of a student’s activities then their breadth).

Smells like school

2010-08-27T11:04:00.000-07:00

As the weather changes and back-to-school ads creep up everywhere, the anticipation builds. Those seemingly endless days of summer are, well, coming to an end, and the onset of a new school year beckons. But back to school doesn’t have to mean back to old habits. A new school year marks a new beginning, a fresh start. So consider the slate wiped clean of last year’s mishaps, and start the year off right.

Here’s how.

Get organized. This means different things to different people, but the key is adopting a system (and maintaining it) that works for you. Try to find an efficient way to file school materials you’re currently using and to archive those that you’re done with but may need to refer to later. And use a calendar—be it on paper, on a whiteboard, or on the computer—in order to keep up with deadlines and better manage your time.

Get to bed at a reasonable hour. Staying up until 2:00am is all good and fun in the summertime, but you’ll regret when you wake up to a pop quiz in your first-period algebra class. Your academic performance greatly depends on how much snooze time you get, so be sure to set up a healthy sleep schedule (8-9 hours a night), and stick to it.

Get to work. This is the one time of the school year that you’re not behind on assignments and you don’t have any catching up to do. So take advantage, and keep it that way! If you get a homework assignment, do it. Don’t shove it at the bottom of your locker or use it to line your birdcage. We all know schoolwork can pile up quickly, and putting it off is a sure-fire way to end up overwhelmed and stressed out.

Get acquainted with your teachers. Introduce yourself, sit in front, ask questions—do what you can to show that you have a positive attitude toward school. Your teachers are the ones reading your papers, evaluating your homework, and grading your tests, and—let’s face it—they’re biased. Making a good impression on them paves the way to higher grades.

Get involved in school activities. If you’ve ever thought about pursuing an extracurricular interest, now’s the time to do it. Find out what clubs/teams/groups your school has to offer, sign up for try-outs, and give it a go! These activities are a great way to express yourself, and colleges love seeing them on your application.

Here’s to a successful 2010-2011 school year!

How To Learn SAT Vocabulary

2010-08-21T11:11:00.000-07:00

Mastering and memorizing hundreds of vocabulary words can oftentimes be a daunting and tedious task. However, have no fear- the days of flipping through hundreds of flashcards are long gone. Easily accessible and available in a variety of mediums, the number of resources ready for students these days is so dynamic that no excuse prevails for eschewing vocab preparation.

Vocabulary Cartoons
This book comes equipped with mnemonic devices designed for learning new words. It makes vocabulary fun by providing definitions, links, illustrations, and humorous sentences for hundreds of SAT words.
Price: $12.95

SAT Vocab for Dummies
This groundbreaking guide is packed with tips, tricks, stories, and jokes that will help build your vocabulary. It organizes vocab into easy-to-remember categories, lists numerous antonyms and synonyms, and focuses on those words that pop up over and over again on the SAT.
Price: $16.99

SAT Vocab Novels
Visit Amazon.com for a variety of novels that come with SAT vocabulary words identified and defined within. For example, the classic novel, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde comes with 279 highlighted SAT words within the pages of the intriguing mystery.
Price: $5.00 - $15.00

SAT Vocab Challenge Vol. 1 (For your iPhone)
This iPhone app will help you master 250 vocab words by testing your knowledge of each word’s positive or negative connotation, synonyms, antonyms, and definition.
Price: $4.99

SAT Word of the Day
Increase your vocabulary by receiving the word of the day sent straight to your phone. Reach a step further and challenge yourself to use this word in casual conversation sometime throughout the day!
Price: Free, Standard text messaging rates apply.

SAT Words Shower Curtain
Improve your vocabulary and hygiene at the same time! Use your 15 minutes of daily shower time to master plenty of definitions.
Price: $28.00

Procrastination And How To Defeat It

2010-08-13T07:43:00.000-07:00

Procrastination is something that we all deal with. For example, I spent the last half hour procrastinating from writing this post by reading the description on all the food products in my apartment. I have a hard time believing that Snyders Pretzels were born from "an Old World recipe."

The point is, procrastination is an issue that plagues all of us at one time or another, and in order to best overcome it, it's important to first understand it.

In every student's head live two conflicting forces that don't like each other: the Rational Young Adult (RYA) and the Bratty Little Kid (BLK). And they're always fighting. Think of it like the old angel and devil on your shoulders. On one shoulder is the Rational Young Adult—he (or she) knows what you have to do, and knows that it'll be a lot more fun later if you just get your stuff done now. The RYA is logical, and the thing is—he's usually right. You see, the RYA isn't some joyless old hag trying to steal Christmas—he's true to his name: he's rational.

On your other shoulder is the Bratty Little Kid. The BLK doesn't really care what happens, as long as it's the exact opposite of what the RYA wants to do. He's resistant by nature, and even though the RYA part of you knows you'll have a lot more fun later that night if you just get your work done now, the BLK wants to resist.

So, back to procrastination—when you're procrastinating, the Bratty Little Kid is winning the battle. When you're being productive, the Rational Young Adult is prevailing.

Here are five ways to help the RYA win the fight (and trust me, he's the one you should be rooting for):

1) Start small. People always tell you to shoot for the sky. Well when it comes to homework, don't. If you set too lofty a goal, it's too daunting to start working toward it. Say you have a three-page paper to write—tell yourself you're going to write half a page and then do something fun. Then after 15 minutes, you have to write another half a page, and then you can take another break, etc. This way, you're giving the BLK some time and then the RYA some time. If you can't beat the BLK, accommodate him.

2) Get the easiest things done first. They'll tell you to do the exact opposite, but they're wrong. You have to do the hardest things at some point. What's easier—starting the hardest, ickiest part of the homework when you've done nothing and the whole night of work is ahead of you? Or starting the hardest stuff once everything else is done and you know it's the last hump to get over before you're free?

3) Talk to yourself. In general, when in doubt, it's a good idea to talk to yourself like a crazy person. So when you're procrastinating, say out loud, "This isn't that hard. I'll be much happier later if I just do this now. I have to do this at some point no matter what, so I might as well get it out of the way, rather than spend the day with it hanging over my head." If it doesn't work, say it again…and again. Until you'd rather do anything other than say it, even homework.

4) Give yourself a light at the end of the tunnel. It's a lot more fun to work if there's a good reward at the end. If you start work too late, the only thing that's happening after you finish is sleep. Well, that's no good. So start earlier, and plan to watch a favorite TV show, or go to a movie, or hang out with a friend, or play with stickers or whatever kids these days do for fun—after you finish.

5) Just start. The hardest part is the first word. Or problem. Or page. Or whatever. Starting kills the morale of the BLK. Just take a deep breath, and get the very beginning out of the way. The rest will follow.

Podcasts - A Beacon of Nerdy Awesomeness

2010-08-06T18:53:00.000-07:00

With no “disrespect” to the iPhone and Facebook, the podcast is quite possibly the greatest tech invention of the 21st century.

What is a podcast? It’s a downloadable audio snippet ranging from two minutes to an hour, on any topic from nature to talk shows to audio versions of TV shows – basically, anything that you might want to listen to, there is a podcast that caters to your interests. The podcast subscription is free, and you listen to it on your iPod, iphone, or other portable device.

Why are podcasts beyond awesome? Instead of spending idle time (e.g. driving, walking, working out, doing chores) listening to music and learning nothing, you can listen to a podcast and absorb immense amounts of information. It’s like having your favorite teacher or professor at your beck and call and getting them to tell you incredibly interesting stuff on the topic of your choice.

Productivity! By my calculation, I spend 1.5 hours a day doing idle tasks (commuting, running errands, etc). I listen to podcasts the entire time – so, by my calculation I will listen to 500 hours of podcasts every year. This learning time is the equivalent of about THREE MONTHS of full-time lecture in school. So, assuming I listen to “productive” podcasts (e.g. not sports related), by the end of each year it will be like I took off three months from work just to catch up on current events and learn more about my areas of interest. This delights me, and only with the practicality of podcasts would I be able to achieve this added productivity.

How Does This Apply To Students? Students’ lives are packed to the brim with school work and extra-curricular activities, which makes it extremely difficult for them to keep up with the ever-changing world around them. The biggest road block for young people becoming engaged with current events is: a) it takes time, and b) they feel like they have no idea what is going on, so they have no clue how to go about finding out more about something they don’t know much about.

Podcasts easily tackle both issues by giving students a really easy way to stay up to date with current events without having to sacrifice free-time (because they listen to them when they are otherwise doing nothing) AND they are easily obtained and updated by a quick iPod or phone sync. The ease and convenience of podcasts makes it easier to start keeping up with the world and stay caught up!

Interested in podcasts? Here are some links to help you get started:

Download iTunes: http://www.apple.com/itunes/

Download Awesomely Nerdy Podcasts (here are some of my favorites):

Front Page – Basically 8 minutes every day of some guy reading you the front page of the NY Times. If you only listen to this, you will at least have a basic idea of current events.

The Economist – Discussion of random articles from The Economist – also includes “The Week Ahead” which gives a great 12 minute overview of world events for the week.

ESPN: PTI – A daily audio version of the acclaimed ESPN show – surprisingly little is lost without the visual. A great treat for the end of the day commute home.

NBC Meet the Press – The weekly audio version of the show where republicans say what republicans are supposed to say and democrats say what democrats are supposed to say. This one isn’t so much fun as “necessary torture so you know what is going on in Washington.”

NPR: It’s All Politics – Two extremely silly and amusing men give a great rapid fire breakdown of the week’s political news in about 20 minutes.

NPR: Intelligence Squared – Oxford style debate by really smart people on really interesting topics. Is Russia Friend or Foe? – good question, I’d love to know.

60 Minutes - The weekly audio version of the show - just generally cool, easy to absorb, and interesting.

TEDTalks – Incredibly smart people talking about interesting stuff.

Porque? Pourquoi? Warum?

2010-07-30T19:38:00.000-07:00

Why? Why should you spend your time learning a foreign language when you already speak English? And everyone speaks English, right?

Wrong. According to the CIA World Fact Book, only 5.6 % of the world's total population speaks English as a primary language. That number doubles when people who speak English as a second or third language are counted. This means that well over four fifths of the world's population does not speak English!

Well that was reason enough for me to learn another language… or three. I picked up Hebrew at home, French at school, and even dabbled in some Spanish. But if the idea of connecting with people around the globe doesn't pique your interest, do read on.

Former U.S. Secretary of Education, Richard Riley, once said, “We have strong evidence today that studying a foreign language has a ripple effect, helping to improve student performance in other subjects.” Did you know that the study of another language can improve your understanding of your native language? Stronger vocabulary skills and higher reading achievement in English as well as enhanced listening and memorization skills have all been associated with extended foreign language study. In fact, several studies have revealed that with each additional year of foreign language instruction, a student’s scores on college entrance exams such as the SAT or ACT improve incrementally.

This might explain why colleges look so favorably upon, and often require, the study of a foreign language for admission. Surely, my language abilities boosted my college application, but I didn’t realize just how valuable they were until I got in. My knowledge of languages gave me options: I was able to choose from a larger pool of majors and study abroad in countries in which a lot of my peers could not. I chose to spend a semester in Paris, where I blended in with the locals, regularly devoured Nutella crepes, and learned all about a culture that I might never have encountered if it weren’t for all those years I spent learning French.

My eye-opening time abroad sparked a passion for travel and all things international, and speaking several languages made my newfound hobby more feasible and more fun. Language barriers can be frustrating at best, but when you know the native tongue, you have the comfort of being able to navigate all sorts of situations. Thanks to my language skills, I successfully ordered meals in Barcelona, negotiated lower prices in Tel Aviv, and somehow explained to a pharmacist in Rome that I needed drops for an eye infection (and yes, it healed just fine).

But the benefits didn’t end overseas. Having graduated from college without a clue about what I wanted to do professionally, I dove into the workforce and began exploring my options. Tutoring and translating gigs eventually turned into job offers from a research company, a law firm, several financial corporations, and even an entertainment group—all international businesses and all competing in the global marketplace. Whatever your career goals may be, speaking another language will increase your employability by giving you an edge over your monolingual competitors.

As you can see, the study of foreign languages has advantages that go well beyond the school setting in which it starts. So while that Spanish, French or German class may feel like a burden now, it can open all kinds of doors down the line. I’m not saying that learning another language is easy—I’m just saying it’s worth it!

Summer Fun with the Documentary

2010-07-16T16:46:00.000-07:00

Summer vacation is one of the most anticipated times of the year and can provide kids with a much needed break from the classroom. Sunny days filled with friends, vacations, and beach time can be a great way to rejuvenate any child for the next school year. Along with the traditional summer doings, there are also a number of fun and educational activities that children can take part in which may help fight the summer “brain drain.” Viewing a documentary film may be the perfect way to keep your kids entertained while introducing them to something new. The films listed below can inspire and educate kids of all ages and may even provide a necessary break from watching the Twilight series for the 5th time this month.

Spellbound (2002) – This documentary follows 8 competitors from the 1999 National Spelling Bee. It shows the hard work and dedication that these kids put in to pursuing their dreams of doing their best and being the best. Apart from motivating kids, this documentary will expand your vocabulary and teach you how to spell some extremely difficult words!

Paper Clips (2004) – This heart-warming and inspirational documentary tells the story of middle school students from the rural community of Whitwell, Tennessee. What began as a lesson in tolerance, turned into a project that consisted of collecting 6 million paper clips as a way to commemorate the 6 million Jewish people who were killed during the Holocaust. This film has the power to show how even the smallest groups have the ability to make a difference.

March of the Penguins (2005) – This film depicts the yearly journey of the Empire Penguins of Antarctica. The harsh climate provides a treacherous backdrop for the penguin’s journey, which is captured like never before. This educational film is entertaining to watch and will leave you in awe of these fascinating animals!

In the Shadow of the Moon (2007) – A documentary film about NASA’s moon missions and the astronauts who were a part of the historic events. Great interviews with the astronauts, coupled with archival footage, helps to bring these momentous journeys to life.

Quantum Hoops (2007) – A story about the Caltech men’s basketball team and their record breaking losing streak. They may not be the most athletic or best basketball players at the collegiate level, but they may be the smartest. Their continued dedication to their studies on top of their tedious basketball schedule is something to be commended. The will and determination these men have to come out victorious provides an inspirational message for all ages.

Discovery Channel’s Life (2010) – This series of documentaries captures some of the most spectacular wonders of the world. Incredible footage depicts plants, mammals, fish, birds, and more in their natural habitats. Oprah is the film’s narrator and provides a plethora of insightful information on the topics illustrated on screen. These documentaries will not only “wow” but also educate.

Race to Nowhere (coming soon) - Keep a look out for this documentary that will be released this fall. The film takes an in depth and honest look at the pressures faced by American schoolchildren and the consequences that occur when students and educators are pushed to the brink.

Happy viewing!

A Penny For Your Thoughts

2010-07-09T10:30:00.001-07:00

Imagine a penny. It’s an everyday object that we’ve seen countless times in our lives. If I asked you to draw it, could you? Most people would say yes, but take a look at the picture below and see if you can find the real penny…

Did you find it? If you think so (and you didn’t cheat!), how sure are you that you’ve picked the right one? How, after years of interactions with pennies, is it possible that we still don’t know what a penny looks like? (The answer is A - and yes, I had to pull one out of my piggy bank to be sure.)

Here’s another scenario. How many times have you gone to class to take a test feeling pretty confident, only to receive a grade lower than you thought you deserved? I know it’s happened to me a few times. I thought I understood the material because when I studied, it sounded familiar and made sense, yet my score didn’t reflect my “knowledge.” In both of these examples, we see the same mistake being made. People are just not good at knowing how much they know.

So, how can we avoid these common misjudgments of our learning?

First, we have to know why they happen. Most often, we misjudge how much we know because we don’t realize that attention plays a huge role in learning. Even though we see pennies all the time, it doesn’t mean we ever really look closely and pay them enough attention to be able to select the correct one from a line-up. Similarly, if we just passively review information while studying, we are not focusing enough attention on the task and end up with a surprisingly low grade.

In order to remember valuable information and perform better on tests, we have to monitor our learning better. Studying is difficult because it requires attention, so you have to actively focus on what you want to learn. Instead of simply re-reading information to try and learn it, try testing yourself. Just the act of generating the answer yourself will help you retain it better. Another way to understand the material better is to teach. If you can explain it to someone else, and they can understand it too, then you know that you understand it really well.

Another thing that trips us up when studying is that if we think that something is easy to understand or process, we assume that we know it and that we will remember it. However, the nature of learning and memory isn’t that simple. The level at which we process information is one of the main things that affects how we learn and remember. If you only memorize facts, you are processing the information at a shallow level, but if you understand the meaning and implications of that information, you are processing it at a much deeper level which in turn helps you remember it better. By making associations between the things you want to remember, you are giving them deeper meaning. If you can actively learn and relate material to your life or try to make a story out of facts, you are guaranteed to remember information a lot better.

I’m not saying you should go study a penny, but as you can see it’s too easy to “not learn” something you see every day. If you really want to remember something or understand it completely, the key is to monitor your attention level and focus on active learning. Good luck studying!

*This week's blog was contributed by Launch's intern Alicia Bullock!

Poor Handwriting and Disorganized?

2010-07-01T11:55:00.000-07:00

Executive functions (EF) and their connection with learning and behavior have been researched extensively in recent years. In 2010, Rosenblum et. al. explored the relationship between organizational abilities, a component of EF, and handwriting performance, a required academic task. This study investigated handwriting and organizational abilities in children with dysgrphia compared to proficient handwriters.

Handwriting is a required academic task, and it is important to academic performance because illegible handwriting can lead to lower marks on handwritten assignments. Since 10-34% of children have poor handwriting and are identified as dysgraphic, the researchers wanted to learn more about the relationship between dysgraphia and organizational abilities.

The researchers used a performance-based measure and two questionnaires to assess handwriting performance and organizational abilities in 58 males aged 7-8 years recruited from the 1st and 2nd grades in regular public schools in northern Israel. All of the students were native Israelis, and Hebrew was their primary language. The researchers found that children with dysgraphia performed lower on measures of handwriting performance, organizational ability, and time management than students who were proficient at handwriting. The researchers also noted that while other studies claim motor functions are the underlying mechanism affecting handwriting performance, this study shows that organizational ability, a component of executive functions, is a factor in handwriting performance.

This study has implications for tutors who work with students with dysgraphia at all ages. Since this study demonstrated a correlation between an academic task, handwriting, and a component of EF, organization, it seems reasonable to conclude that students with dysgraphia should be taught executive function strategies to help them plan their ideas before writing. Students should also be given a computer to type their work to reduce motor demands and increase the readability of their written work. By teaching students executive function skills and decreasing motor demands and illegibility, I think overall student performance would improve on matters involving the production of written language.

Reference:

Rosenblum, S., Aloni, T., & Josman, N. (2010). Relationships between handwriting performance and organizational abilities among children with and without dysgraphia: A preliminary study. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 31 (2), 502-509.

How - To: Brew A Reading Habit

2010-06-24T17:14:00.000-07:00

As a ten year old girl with a mild obsession with sugary breakfast cereal, my mother opted to let me try a new flavor or brand every few weeks in hopes that I would “get it out of my system." To this day (and to my amusement), I can still recall fads from the past like Blueberry Morning, Rice Krispy Treat Cereal, Cracklin’ Oat Bran, and Count Chocula. And while my mornings for the good part of year each tasted different, there was one thing that remained the same: Peet’s Coffee.

Don’t cry out, it’s not like I took in the bitter brew at the young age when my bones were tender to the possible ramifications of caffeine (stunted development, etc.) The only thing I knew of coffee was the warm yet sharp scent of my fresh beans being ground every morning and the monotone whir of the ancient grinder splicing each bean into a fine ground espresso.

After years of smelling coffee in the morning, it became part of my life. Now, I am as notorious with my morning cup of coffee as I was as that little girl eating sweet cereal every morning. And while I cannot imagine life without coffee (well, I can, but I’d rather not), I’ve also realized the type of impact that a consistent, omnipresent environment can have on the shaping of one’s values and priorities.

As adamant as my mother was about letting me get my interest in sugar cereals out of my system (it pseudo-worked), she was even more invested in making sure that my brother and I were life-long readers. To the extent that she read to us every single night until we could read ourselves, lugged us back and forth to the local library and bookstore, modeled reading the newspaper every day, and filled each bookshelf in the house with National Geographic, novels, and short stories that were of our interests - boggles my mind.

But it worked. Today, my brother and I are obsessed with reading. We read books until the spines split and peel, we scour the news every morning and generally would not be happy without always having a book ready to read on the night stand.

While making reading a part of your family life may seem like a lot of work, think of it as a coffee habit, or the formation of any other habit. Remember to make the topic appealing, easily accessible, and inescapable. How else do you think I became a die-hard fan for some of the most pungent coffee in all the land? It’s in my blood. And, like reading, because it was made part of my life for as long as I can recall - it’s there. For life.

Do What You Love - Every Day After School

2010-06-18T15:44:00.000-07:00

In life, you have work, and you have play. Yes, at any stage in the human experience, your time is divided between things you have to do and things you want to do. Part-time we are prisoners, and part-time we are free.

It's simple. Right?

Well, not quite.

First of all, if it were that simple, this blog post would be over—and what kind of blog post would that be?

No, if we are going to simplify life into categories, we will need to clear room for a third category, somewhere in between work and play—something I call “Passionate Pursuits.”

Work, whether you’re an adult (your job) or a student (your classes and homework), takes a lot of time—typically somewhere between 40 and 60 hours a week.

But if people are awake for about 16 hours a day, that leaves…carry the 4…50-70 remaining hours.

So even the really busy people have about 50 free hours each week outside of their work.

Now, we mustn’t disregard play. Play is the time you spend with your friends and family, the time you listen to music, go hiking, play pickup basketball, watch TV, play video games, go to parties, eat candy, and whatever the devil else Americans do with their free time.

But 50-70 hours of play? Not necessary. You can have a rich social and leisure life and still have some solid hours left over. Right?

In my humble opinion, these key hours are best spent undertaking “passionate pursuits”—activities you care about and take seriously outside of your work. At the minimum, a passionate pursuit is a hobby; at the maximum, it’s a part-time career.

In the adult world, some people are great at dedicating time to one or more passionate pursuits—others are less so.

But in the student world, passionate pursuits are called “extra-curricular activities,” and you need to have them in your life and take them seriously. Why? Because they are critical to the college admissions process. Colleges want to accept interesting, passionate, involved students, and the best way for them to judge this is by looking at how each student uses those key hours outside of work and play.

At this point, you’re thinking, “So extra-curriculars are important. I already…knew…that.”

Right. But I want to change the way you think about extra-curriculars.

Rather than think, “What does my school offer?” and pick something, try asking yourself, “What do I love to do?” and “What would I love to get good at?” and “What’s important to me?” and then figure out how to work those things into your life as your extra-curricular activities—because those are your passionate pursuits. And if you’re not passionate about your extra-curricular activities, you won’t have as much fun doing them, you won’t excel as much doing them, and colleges will not see you for the passionate person you are.

Sounds simple, but students approach this the wrong way all the time. Some people really love playing sports, so sports are a perfect passionate pursuit for them. Others don’t love it as much, but think, “Well, I’m pretty good at this sport, and that’s what everyone else is doing, and that’s what you’re supposed to do in high school, right?” Some people love running for class office and governing their class. Others think, “This isn’t very fun, but it’ll definitely help me get into college.” Some feel passionate about a cause in their community and they want to get involved and help. Others think, “community service looks good on a college resume.”

If you don’t love your extra-curricular activities, you’re doing the wrong extra-curricular activities.

So get creative. Think about what you really love or what you would really love to try, and then do the following:

1) Figure out if this activity is already offered at your school
2) If not, start a club. There’s no way you’re the only one interested in it.

Your life will be a lot more fun and rewarding, and it’ll be a breeze to tell your real story to colleges because you will have lived it.

Life and Music

2010-06-11T13:12:00.000-07:00

I’ve always been told: “If you do well in school, you’ll get into a good college. If you graduate from college, you’ll get a good job. If you work hard at your job, you’ll move up and make a big difference or big money or both.” So here I am, on the path that so many of us are on, with my eye on the prize: this undefined thing that people call success. But the closer I get and the older I get, the more I realize that my life is not about this destination—whatever it may be—it’s about the journey.

I was recently reminded of this when I stumbled upon this video called “Life and Music,” in which renowned philosopher Alan Watts compares the pursuit of happiness to a musical composition.

So boys and girls, as you make your way through school, or any other part of your life-long musical production, make the best of it—listen to the music, and sing and dance along the way!

What is Reading?

2010-06-05T13:20:00.000-07:00

As I was getting out of the pool after teaching one of my 2-year-old swimmers to swim last weekend, his mom said, "What if he has a hard time learning to read like my husband and I did?"

The reality is, he might struggle to read since his parents struggled. Research shows that he has a 50% greater chance of having dyslexia if either of his parents had dyslexia, and he isn't alone. Since 92% of students with learning disabilities have reading problems, it’s important to come up with a workable definition of reading so that we know what it is and how to teach it.

What is Reading?
Reading has been defined differently throughout history. In the 19th century, the focus was on oral fluency and accuracy. In the early 20th century, the focus shifted toward reading for meaning and comprehension. Given the transitional definition throughout history, we see that reading is difficult to define. In my opinion, reading is made up of a variety of tasks that are influenced by social context, the reader’s purpose, and background knowledge, and that the definition of reading lies somewhere on the continuum of decoding and comprehension.

What Causes Reading Difficulties?
We don’t know. Similar to many diseases, we don’t know what causes the problem, but we know how to treat it. Research shows that students with reading difficulties respond best to specific and intensive reading instruction. If you know a student who is not responding to reading instruction, it’s time to question the quality of instruction and consider working with someone trained in reading interventions such as an educational therapist, reading specialist, or special education teacher.

What Skills Are Involved in Reading?
Efficient readers have usually mastered the following skills:

Phonological awareness
Word identification
Fluency
Comprehension
Vocabulary

Reading assessments help us figure out which skills are deficit in a struggling reader. Once we can identify the deficit skills, we teach them! Teaching reading isn't easy, but the combination of the right specialist and the right research based intervention will lead to success for almost all struggling readers.

Now that we have defined reading, looked at the skills involved in reading, and addressed the purpose of reading assessments and interventions, we have a more solid foundation from which to approach struggling readers.

Happy Reading!

Almost Summer

2010-05-28T19:07:00.000-07:00

Even though I am far from being of the “in school” age, I can still sense the joy and anticipation that waft through the air as kids from around the city get ready to finish school and be unleashed into summer.

Growing up, some of my favorite memories were from the warm summertime months. My parents were both working full-time, so my brother and I were encouraged to fill our days with whatever activity we wanted – so as long as whatever we chose had nothing to do with the television.

Over the years, I spent weeks backpacking with youth groups, biking, rock climbing, attending to East Bay School of the Arts (an art, sport, music, drama, and circus camp), swimming, participating in the library book club, traveling, tutoring, and babysitting. Every summer I got to do a different combination of activities that I wouldn’t otherwise get to explore during the school year – which I certainly enjoyed, but whose true value I didn’t get to fully appreciate until many years later.

Now, as an adult who (like my parents) works full-time, I look back at the summer activities of my youth and would like to thank my mom and dad for allowing me to “try out” my budding interests and pursue whichever ones I found particularly enjoyable. These days, those experiences seem not so much about the actual activity, but more about discovering my strengths, weaknesses, passions, and eclectic knack for certain things (I’m great at juggling, who would have known?)

Certainly, self-awareness often grows with age and maturity. But confidence in one’s sense of self, I’ve come to believe (and while derived from many factors) is largely dependent on experiencing and mastering new things, and learning that no matter what it is (woodcarving or hiking twenty miles with sixty pounds on your back), you will undoubtedly survive – and even more so – find yourself having become a stronger version of yourself because of it.

So parents, as you witness your kids bursting forth from the school exit bubbling with energy for the summer, remember that just because school is out, it doesn’t mean that the best time to learn is over for the year. In fact, it might have just begun…

3 Tips to Collegiate Success

2010-05-19T12:59:00.000-07:00

I did it! I made it through the all nighters, countless pages of reading, wordy essays, and finally graduated from college! In case my word wasn’t enough, I have provided visual confirmation in order to solidify my credibility. Yes, that is me, beaming with joy and basking in my 30 seconds of graduation fame on the big screen.

As a recent college graduate, I feel it is my duty to pass on some personal words of wisdom. The following are my 3 tips to collegiate success:

Go to Class

Upon entering college, I had the preconceived notions that class was optional, that no one truly checked up on you, and that if you did the reading on your own and showed up for the tests, you would have no problem succeeding. Thankfully, I had many wise people at my university advise me that this was not the case. Whether it’s a class of 400 or a class of 20, showing up matters. At LMU every class caps enrollment at 28 students...meaning attendance sign-in sheets and a lot of room for participation...sort of like high school. I soon realized that by coming to class on time, paying attention, and actively participating, I was setting myself up to succeed in college.

Sit in the Front

With the highly anticipated end of grade school seating charts, it may seem like the last place anyone would choose to sit is in the front of the classroom. However, little do most college students know, the front rows are prime classroom real estate. Not only does being close to the professor help you focus and concentrate, it also helps the professor connect with you. One of my professors told me that students tend to blur together beyond the second row, creating forgettable, faceless individuals, and being forgettable in college is no way to excel. So, stand out from the crowd, sit up front, and enjoy the high achievement that follows!!!

Introduce yourself to the Professor

The relationships you form with your professors in college are some of the most important and beneficial tools you can use to succeed. On the first day of every class, I walked up to introduce myself, extended my hand, and stated my name along with a well thought out question or comment that would make me a little more memorable than my peers. This showed my professors that I was excited about their class and the semester to come. What teacher doesn’t want to hear that from a student? Beyond the early introduction, I maintained these relationships by visiting professors during their allotted office hours to go over assignments, upcoming tests, class materials, or simply just to check in. Forming a solid relationship with a college professor is the gift that keeps on giving. For example, you will not only encounter a number of professors multiple times throughout your time in school, but you will also most likely be reaching out to these professors as you continue to develop professionally.

At our recent Speaker Series, Tim Urban reinforced these methods for success.

It is easy to see how these tips are applicable at nearly every level of the educational process. Therefore, I encourage all students to heed this advice and use it to take full advantage of their time in school because these truly are some of the best years of your life!!

From Z’s to A’s

2010-05-14T15:46:00.000-07:00

There I was, sitting in class, front row center, pretending to listen to my teacher’s analysis of a Marcel Proust passage. Every minute that passed felt like an hour, and with every blink, it became harder to reopen my eyes. I could hear my teacher speaking, but eventually the sounds became indistinguishable. I stared at her, fighting the desire to shut my fluttering eyelids, until her image was just a blur. I wanted nothing more than to lay my heavy head on the desk and sleep. I was a typical sleep-deprived teenager.

A common misconception is that kids require less sleep as they get older. In truth, as they move through their teenage years and undergo a number of physiological changes, adolescents require an increasing amount of sleep. Unfortunately, most of them aren’t getting the nine recommended hours and end up as I did—struggling to stay awake. A study conducted at the University of Minnesota’s Center for Applied Research and Educational Improvement revealed that 20% of all high school students fall asleep in school. And that’s not the worst of it. Sleep-deprived teens are prone to a laundry list of mental and physical symptoms that can have a serious impact on their academic performance. Sleep debt can lead to memory deficits, delayed responses, and a decreased ability to concentrate and be creative, not to mention irritability, anxiety and even depression. Yikes! High school is hard enough without having to deal with all of this. Solution: more sleep.

I know it’s not easy to adjust your sleep schedule, especially when you’re juggling school, homework, extracurricular activities, and a social life, but getting enough snooze time is essential to keeping your academic performance at its peak. You can’t get A’s if you don’t get your Z’s!

Here are a few suggestions from the experts on how to get the most of your slumber

Maintain a consistent sleep schedule. Unfortunately, sleeping in on weekends does not allow you to fully recover from the sleep debt you’ve acquired throughout the week.

Adopt a relaxing routine to unwind from the activities of your day. Try meditating or taking a hot bath.

Avoid stimulants at bedtime that can delay the onset of sleep like violent or scary movies/books.

Steer clear of caffeine in the afternoon and evening.

Exercise regularly. This will energize you during the day and help you sleep at night.

Stressed Out?

2010-05-07T13:50:00.000-07:00

I recently received a call from a friend who was extremely overwhelmed – with life. Despite her yoga practice, nutritious eating, supportive friends, and general success, she was drowning because she had too much to do. Her body ached, she couldn’t sleep, and all she wanted to do was cry. She was unmotivated and frustrated by her inability to prioritize.

My friend is an M.D. / Ph.D. student who happens to be one of the most brilliant people I’ve ever known. She has the tools she needs to succeed, and despite her superior intelligence, things have not come easy for her in life. She has fought for her success every step of the way, and she has built a village of supporters along her path. She is amazing, and I’m not the only person who knows this. It was shocking to hear her sound so defeated. Then it hit me…if she doesn’t know how to prioritize, she wouldn’t have gotten this far … so what’s going on?

Sometimes, when we have too much to do, our responsibilities overwhelm our resources, and we feel paralyzed. The threshold for stress varies from person to person, and even the most capable and functional person can hit a wall. For many of us, stress can overtake our bodies and manifest as bodily aches, pains, and eventually illness. In college, I would get sick immediately after my final exams. It eventually became a routine – the moment my body was able to relax, I would get ill with a cold. Stress can weaken us physically, mentally, and emotionally. Everyone experiences stress – whether as a student, parent, employee, child, friend, etc. – so the question becomes how to deal with it when it’s so overwhelming that we feel helpless.

The following strategies can help you manage your stress:

Gain Perspective
Have you ever heard someone say, “Don’t worry, no CEO is asked what his/her grades were in high school?” This statement is offered from a wise person who is trying to help you gain perspective; however, the sage might not be going about it in the right manner. While it’s true that you won’t wear your grades on your lapel like a scarlet letter someday, it doesn’t take away the fact that your grades may currently feel like the most important thing on your mind. This is where VALIDATION and REFLECTION come into place. First, you need to accept that feeling stressed out is completely normal and valid, and that we all go through it. Then, reflect on how you have gotten yourself through similar situations in the past and ask yourself:

1. What is the worst case scenario if I don’t do as well as I expect on this (exam, presentation, etc)?

2. How did I do last year? If the outcome was negative, is there anything I could have done differently so that a similar outcome doesn’t happen again this year?

When all else fails, take the time to participate in an activity that reminds you of the things that are most important to you in your life. For me, it’s my health, happiness, family, and friends. I feel that volunteering at a local shelter, food pantry, or even a dog pound gives me a good dose of reality and perspective whenever I need to be reminded that what I’m feeling is temporary and that regardless of my performance on a stressful task, I should feel thankful that I have a roof over my head.

Set Goals
If you want to achieve something, start by writing it down. Write down the things you want to accomplish in the short and long-term. Writing down goals helps turn subjective ideas into objective realities that you can schedule and accomplish with a plan. Large goals can be broken down into smaller parts, such as: Goal: get an A in Biology. Steps to achieve this goal: find out what I have in the class right now and prepare for my final exam. Steps to prepare for final exam: organize notebook, ask teacher for study guide, schedule study group with peers, etc.

Create a Schedule
Once you have listed your goals and the steps you will take to achieve them, you should estimate how long each task will take and set deadlines.

For example, when I have a list of things I need to do, I did the following:

1. Estimate how long each task will take (ex. Grocery shopping – 1 hour, gym – 1.5 hours, read book for book club – 2 hours, clean house – 2 hours, etc.)

2. Schedule these tasks in your calendar and work backwards (ex. I know I want to be done with everything by 3 p.m. today, therefore I’ll clean house from 1-3 p.m., read from 11-1 p.m., go to the gym from 9:30-11 a.m., and go grocery shopping at 8:00 a.m.!)

From 3 p.m. on I would schedule “Free Time.” It’s important to schedule free time if you want to be highly effective, otherwise, you may feel guilty for sitting around. When people feel like they always have something they should be doing, they don’t let themselves relax. When people have scheduled the things they need to do, they can experience freedom in between their scheduled tasks. I look forward to every time block on my calendar that says, “Relax, Dinner with Friend, Free Time, etc.!”

Be Accountable
After my friend agreed to create a schedule, I told her that I’m happy if she wants to share it with me by inviting me to see her Google calendar. I find that when I’m accountable to others, I’m more likely to do what I said I was going to do. For example, if I have gotten into the routine of meeting a friend at the gym every Wednesday at 10:00 a.m., then I’m likely to show up. However, if I don’t schedule to meet a friend, I’m able to rationalize my way out of my desire to exercise since the only person I need to notify of my cancellation is me! Tell others about your plans and ask them to help you stick to your schedule.

Believe in Yourself & Ask for Help When You Need It!
Even an M.D./Ph.D student needs to ask for help sometimes. Whether you need someone to remind you of your capabilities or help you come up with a study routine, don’t feel embarrassed to reach out. My role in educational services is to help students learn to manage their time so that they can perform in school to the best of their abilities. Whether you need the support of a professional or just a friend, know that there is always someone who is just a phone call away to help you prioritize and succeed.

It Takes an E-Village?

2010-04-30T16:35:00.000-07:00

The other day, I found myself in the kitchen debating the best method for frosting a cake. Having rummaged through my entire collection of cookbooks and having yet to find the answer I was looking for, I took my search to the internet. Two minutes later, I was face-to-face with hundreds of articles ranging from the best tools to use to frost to cake to the highest rating frosting recipes.

I sat back. Oh, how things have changed in the past twenty years! Information that was once only accessible by book, magazine or word of mouth is now instantly available all in one place, within a few minutes. Instead of having to take the time to call all my friends, my mother, and the local bakery in search of assistance, I was able to access an entire community’s worth of knowledge with just a few taps on my keyboard.

Such successes, I like to share. So when I told my mother about the cake frosting advice I received from all across the country, she decided to take the opportunity to remind me that unlimited access to copious amounts of information wasn't always such a breeze:

Many years ago, right before I turned three (and about a month before my brother was born) my mother decided that it was time that I was weaned off my baby bottles. This, she emphasizes, is not an easy feat – but she figured it had to be done.
The other mothers in her “group” said it was easy. Just take them away! Offer solace, and move on.

The first morning she tried the quick-and-painless band-aid method, I cried. And cried. And refused to eat or drink all day. Pregnant and tired, my mom relinquished my bottle and called her friend.

“It’s not working,” she fretted. “Do you have any suggestions?” Said friend recommended offering one of my comfort toys in exchange for the bottle. You know, quickly snatch said bottle and replace my empty hands with my bear, Grungie.

The next morning, as quickly as an eight-month (plus) pregnant woman could manage, my mom casually offered me my bear and a sippy-cup full of juice. I shook my head. I refused both items. Then I cried.

Exasperated, my mom called my grandmother, who shook her head and said she couldn’t remember what she did.

The next afternoon, as I was happily sucking away on my bottle and watching sesame street, I saw an advertisement for Care Bears. Yes, recall those? One in particular caught my eye – the one with the sun on his belly and small red plastic heart on the pad of his foot.

I wanted him. I pointed, stood, and even did a little dance.

The following day, my mother had a plan. She went to the toy store and bought the bear with a little red plastic heart on his foot. That afternoon, we stood in the kitchen. It was snack time. As I reached for my bottle, my mom intercepted my grab and whipped out the bear, then offered the sippy-cup.

Silence filled the room. It was our first (of many, my mother reminds me again) stand-offs. I looked at her. And the bear. Then, back to my bottle.

My mother likes to claim we stood, wordless, for about three minutes. That’s all it took, she says, for me to completely forget my bottle – that bear, a few stressed calls to a friend and grandma, and three days of trial and error.

Happily, she will admit that parenting (well, she calls the studying and advice gathering “research”) is much easier today. Unlike her experience in the 1980’s when she had to call people for advice, parents now can just go online to experience the cyber version of utilizing a village to raise a child. Instead of spending three days and two phone calls, if I was two years old today, all my mom would have to do is google “how to wean a child from a bottle” – or, if she wanted to post her question to a parenting blog or communal forum – all she would need to do is ask “how should I wean my daughter off of her bottle?” and surely, she would receive dozens of replies.

Recently, I found this website: Peachhead Families

PeachHead is a site dedicated to connecting Los Angeles families. Want to know what to do with your high school student during the summer? Ask here. Want to post an inquiry for a nanny? You can do that, here, too. Or, in need of some parental comic relief? Read kid-tips, short stories, and other tales from parents across the city via PeachHead.

See? You’re just a few search words from having all the info you need to raise your kids. Now, if only there was a website that would actually tackle potty-training in-person…

So, You Got Into College – What Now?

2010-04-22T16:33:00.000-07:00

Getting into college seems like the end game for students. After thirteen years of school, you finally “get in” somewhere, and it’s all over right? You did all the hard work, went through the stressful college application process, and now you are set for life and it’s easy from here…right? right???

Wrong. College is not the end, it is the beginning.

No matter if you got into your dream school or if you were forced to go to your safety school, what you do in college will matter just as much as the name on your diploma. Getting into college is just another door in life that opens, but it is up to you step through it and make the most of it. To that end, I have two main suggestions:

1) Get good grades in college. There is a huge misconception that your grades in college don’t matter. They do. Excellent grades can get you into the Honors’ program at your school, allow you to transfer to a better school, get you into a more impressive grad school, or land you a more exciting job when you graduate. The best part is that it is a lot easier to get good grades in college then it was in high school. If you show up to class, do the reading, and put in honest effort, good grades will come a lot more easily than they did in high school (because a lot of people in college don’t do these three things).

2) Get involved. College is an amazing opportunity to try out different extracurricular activities without the high school burden of having to look impressive for your college application. It is a great way to meet people, learn new things, and explore the person that you want to be for the rest of your life. Don’t be afraid to step out of your comfort zone and join a new club or try a new activity.

Getting into college is a wonderful thing - make the most out of it!

Pavlov and the Workspace

2010-04-16T14:46:00.000-07:00

Remember Pavlov and his dogs? Well, here’s a little refresher. Every day at feeding time, the dogs would hear a bell, smell meat, and salivate. After only a few repetitions, the dogs began to salivate in response to the bell alone, without the presence of meat. The dogs had become conditioned and were now associating the sound of the bell with their food.

Believe it or not, this same sort of conditioning happens to all of us in our daily lives. Repetitive actions lead your brain to associate certain activities with the environment in which they happen. If, every day after school, you sit at the same desk to do your homework, your brain will begin to associate studying with the desk. We all know how hard it can be to shift into study mode, especially after a long day. So, make it easier on yourself by designating a workspace that you can use regularly.

But, where?

Not in a place that your brain already associates with another activity. Separation is the key to maximizing productivity. Trying to get work done in your bed, for example, is never a good idea. Your brain automatically switches into sleep mode when you get into bed, which explains why you might doze off while reading here. On the flip side, if you are somehow able to overcome your tiredness and condition yourself to work in bed, you are likely to run into some trouble falling asleep as your brain now links the bed with being mentally active. Likewise, your brain associates the kitchen and dining area with food and eating. You’ll find that getting work done in these areas can also be tough. Don’t be surprised if your focus is interrupted by hunger. Alas, snacking is a fabulous way to procrastinate and a detriment to your productivity. Conclusion: your workspace, be it an entire room or merely a desk, should be reserved solely for homework, studying, or other such activities that require a high level of concentration.

A few more tips to creating a more productive workspace…

Make sure it’s well-lit. Your brain interprets light as an indication that it should be awake and active. Setting up your workspace near a window is great because you can take advantage of the natural light and fresh air (and, we all know how much the brain loves oxygen!).

Get rid of clutter. A tutor once said: “An organized desk equals an organized brain.” So true! Remove any items that don’t relate to what you’re currently working on. This will help you stay focused and on track.

Minimize distractions. Be sure to face away from any movement that might catch your eye (e.g. people walking by or the television screen). Also, log out of your email account and silence all rings, beeps, and buzzes (just temporarily!). These brief interruptions can add up quickly and really impede productivity.

Now that you know how to set up your ideal workspace, you’re ready to hit the books!

Make the Most of Your Time in School!

2010-04-09T15:59:00.000-07:00

I woke up at 8 a.m. to the joy of a cup of coffee, and then I started working on an assignment for school. It's now 4:32 p.m., and with the exception of this blog and an email here or there, I have done nothing but homework. Even though it's a gorgeous day outside my window, I'm trapped inside because I'M A STUDENT and I have HOMEWORK.

For some students, school is a rigid environment full of stupid rules, boring lectures, and grades that won’t mean a thing someday. The busy work detracts from the time students could be spending doing things they enjoy. In some regard, students are like prisoners who are eager to get out and participate in the REAL WORLD, and I say this as someone who is experientially qualified to make such a comparison!

You see, I used to work as an advocate for prisoners’ rights. One day in maximum security prison, I was meeting with a young man to learn more about the medical neglect he was suffering at the hands of prison officials, and he said something to me I will never forget. “Ms. Feinstein, I’m scared.” I responded, “I know you are scared, I would be scared too if I were going to lose my eye because of an incompetent medical team, but I promise you that I’m doing everything I can with our attorneys and a physician to make sure you get the treatment you need.” He responded, “No, not about that ma'am. I’m scared about the future. This is my second time in prison, and now that I know what it’s like OUT THERE, I’m scared. My first time in prison, I was counting down the days until the end of my sentence. But then, when I was released into the real world, I realized that I had no idea how to survive out there. You see, in here, it’s easy, I mean it’s hard as hell, it’s painful, it’s dehumanizing, but it all makes sense. Out there, it’s extremely confusing.”

When we are so eager to get out, we often fail to pay attention to the valuable lessons we are learning within. And despite the senioritis mentality, the world outside the classroom can be a bit more challenging to master than popular perception would lead us to believe. In the real world, lessons have to be sought from the minutia of everyday life, garnered from interactions with and observations of other people, and acquired through enduring the consequences of your own actions and decisions. The rewards are often presented on two-week intervals, and rarely are they a direct result of individual behavior. In addition, freedom, while exciting, can also be scary and overwhelming. If you don’t believe me, just read Lois Lowry’s The Giver, in which we learn that freedom requires us to make choices, and that living in the real world requires us to give up a life that is simple, predictable, and manageable.

In my opinion, school and prison should be the breeding grounds from which we are released as confident and capable adults into the world who can survive, thrive, cooperate, and contribute to universal well-being; but this process won't happen if we don't take an active role in our own growth and development. As students, our goal should be to achieve our full potential as people, to make the most of every educational moment, and to gain the tools we need to survive in the real world. In order to accomplish this, we need to learn how to make good decisions, discover our passions, explore how we learn best, and take any opportunity we have to learn from others’ mistakes. Although at times it's hard to keep these things in perspective, it's important to remember that even when we see no immediate purpose for something we are learning, it is generally beneficial to us in some way. For starters, had I paid better attention in geometry class, I'd probably be more efficient at packing a suitcase or the trunk of a car!

What Moves You?

2010-04-02T17:08:00.000-07:00

It’s hard to imagine how forbidding an outdoor pool looks on a December morning when it has been raining all night and the wind is whipping the water up and over the deck. Now, try to place yourself there in a slightly damp swim suit from your workout the night before – arms and legs bare, standing with your toes curled over the edge, staring down at the frigid 5 am water.

There was a time in my high school swimming career when I managed to fit in four hours of swimming, an hour of weights and running, six hours of school, and a lunch-hour lifeguarding job – in order to get everything done, I had to do things like swim at 5 am. My parents quipped that they had a part-part-time daughter. The fact that I regularly left the house at 4:30 am and returned past 9 pm meant I rarely ate dinner with my family, hardly slept, and considering that swimming was a year-round sport – I often got called motivated during the summer, fall, and spring – and just plain crazy during the winter.

Nonetheless, every December I would get the same question. I’d swim for hours before dawn and arrive at school a little tired, weathered, and damp. Snuggling deep into down jackets, my friends would joke that there must be gold at the bottom of the pool. At least, that’s what it would take to get them to even consider my morning routine. What is The Secret, then, they would ask. The Motivation – where does it come from?

For the longest time, I never really knew how to answer. I knew that my health, my school work, my job and my sport were important to me, and I also knew that I have always wanted to do everything that I needed to do, so I could be as good as I could be. But for some reason, that didn’t really sound like much of The Answer that people were so curious to hear.

Years later, I think I’ve finally got it. Last week, I had the opportunity to hear Richard Lavoie speak about motivation in respect to education. Surrounded by teachers, parents, and other intrigued professionals, I eagerly sat through his stories and presentation just waiting to hear The Answer. How do you motivate kids to do well in school? Bribe them? Reward them? Punish them? Praise them? Well, maybe. The sneaky thing is though, while it’s The Answer, it’s not necessarily Your Answer.

According to Richard Lavoie, each person has a motivational profile that is comprised of varying levels of importance of the following eight categories:

Status
Inquisitiveness
Affiliation
Power
Aggression
Autonomy
Achievement
Gregariousness

For better or for worse, individual profiles tend to be different. In a classroom of 20 students, while one motivational technique (like the idea of “winning” a spelling bee) might work for one student, it’s quite likely that it has little convincing power on the rest of the group. While this might sound daunting to any teacher trying to manage and “move” an entire class, the great thing is that most people identify strongly with at least one of the eight categories above. This means that most students in a group will be encouraged to learn their spelling words – a technique that highlights one of eight motivators.

The tricky part, I think, comes in the identification of your own Answer. Looking back at my life in high school and my current situation as a professional adult, it has become clear to me that Autonomy is a hugely dominant on my list. Give me a project to do on my own? I’m thrilled. In high school, it was clear that I would do anything so long as it included me being independent. Clearly, the measure of Autonomy in my motivational profile can only truly be measured by its ability to get me into a bathing suit and into the 78 degree water at 5 am during a December storm.

While I apologize for not being able to reveal The Answer to universal motivation, the redeeming value is the reminder that we are all different. We may be one of a kind, but without someone curious enough to devise a way to travel in space, bold enough to become president, or social enough to create the NFL - life would be boring. After all, someone has to get into the pool at 5 am – and trust me – there isn’t always gold at the bottom.

Speaker Event: The Path from High School to College

2010-03-23T13:15:00.000-07:00

Thursday night, our first speakers series event went off with great success! Our distinguished panelists provided thoughtful insight to the daunting task of applying to college and all the mayhem that goes along with it. The panel included:

Our very own Tim Urban, co-founder of Launch Education Group;
Alexandra Rhodes, college counselor and founder of Rhodes Educational Consulting;
Baillie Gerstein, college counselor and founder of Admission Accomplished; and
Billy Wheelan, President and founder of Sentia LLC., a New York based admissions consulting and test prep company.

Between the four of them, their years of experience and varying expertise provided for a well-rounded and informative discussion.

Throughout the discussion, I frequently found myself thinking about how valuable the information would have been to me as a high school senior, when I too lost sleep over the college admissions process like many of the students in our audience. I was so impressed by the wisdom and advice from last night, and since I can’t rewind the clock with any real success, I decided to divulge a couple quick highlights in this blog.

1. Pick the School that is right for YOU!!!

In response to the topic of choosing which schools to apply to, Alexandra Rhodes gave a brilliant response. She advised that the task should not be to search for the perfect list of schools but rather to search for the perfect type of school. She also suggests that it is not enough to simply plug in information to online search engines - you must go visit a variety of schools in order to really get a feel for them. In my own experience, growing up close to Arizona State University, I saw first hand what went into the student life at a large state school. Although the thrill of having a Pac-10 football team to cheer for seemed essential, I soon realized after stepping foot on Loyola Marymount University’s campus that a small school was a better choice for me. Size, along with the location and social setting, contributed to my ability to narrow down my list of top schools.

2. The Admissions Essay

Let’s face it, the idea of writing an essay that should state all the crucial knowledge there is to know about you and potentially decide the bulk of your near future seems intimidating (to say the least!). However, the panelists provided a number of useful tips that simplify the process. One very important suggestion was to be yourself and let your unique voice be heard within the essay. However, when describing yourself and your accomplishments thus far, it is not critical to have completed the most unique of tasks. For example, if you played basketball all four years of high school (me), then explain how the sport has affected you personally, and leave behind the fear that someone else has written on the same topic. When it comes down to it, no one has experienced things in the same way you have, and that’s what will help you stand out!

These great points by our panelists last night can help any college bound student feel more confident in their quest toward conquering the college admissions process. The best part is that these were only a few of the many tips provided by the experts, and we have it all on film! We will be posting a link to the video shortly, and hopefully it will help both parents and students, in Billy Wheelan’s words, “breathe” a little when tackling the path from high school to college.

Why Take APs?

2010-03-12T14:09:00.000-08:00

High school students often find themselves asking the questions, “Why is it important to take AP classes? Do colleges care whether I take them? Is it worth the extra work? How many should I take?” The fact is, AP classes are a lot of extra work, and it’s important to understand all the factors before making these decisions. So let’s break it down and discuss some of the ways AP courses can help:

Get a Taste of College

AP courses will challenge you and help you develop the confidence and scholastic skills you will need to succeed in college. These courses expose you to a new way of learning, one that will improve your writing, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills. Not only will you flourish academically, but you will acquire the study habits and time management skills that will prove to be crucial in tackling college-level courses down the road.

Set Yourself Apart

Do colleges take notice of APs? Absolutely. With colleges being more selective than ever (I know, we’re not happy about it either), AP courses will give you a lead in the admissions process. Doing well on an AP exam is a widely recognized sign of achievement. It reflects your dedication to hard work and your readiness to take on college-level coursework. Enrolling in AP courses can also perk up your college application by boosting your grade point average. More than 70% of AP schools give extra weight for AP courses in GPA calculations, with most giving somewhere between .76 and 1.0 point additional weight.* In many schools, a B in an AP course equals an A in a regular course (at least according to your GPA).

Get a Head Start

Qualifying AP exam grades can earn you college credit, advanced placement or both in more than 90% of four-year colleges in the Unites States and in more than 60 other countries.* AP credits can thus afford you the time and flexibility to design a more personalized college curriculum. You could move more quickly into higher-level courses in your field of interest, pursue a double major, and even graduate early. Click here to learn more about AP credit policies of the colleges that interest you. (Note: The most selective colleges usually require a score of 4 or 5 to grant course credit.) As a high school senior, you may shrug at this—but when you’re a college freshman and don’t have to take that core math requirement, thanks to your AP, you will be smiling.

Cut Costs

Not only can AP courses save you time, they can save you money. Recent studies have shown that students who enroll in AP courses are much more likely to graduate in four years (or less) than those who do not. Those who take longer than four years to graduate can expect to pay up to $18,000 for each additional year at a public university and an estimated average of $27,197 for each additional year at a private university.** That’s a lot of cash. On top of that, AP courses and exams can further mitigate today’s heavy cost of college by making you more eligible for academic scholarships and awards.

The moral of the story is the adage you’ve heard a thousand times before: Hard work now will pay off later. Taking APs in high school can give you a huge advantage in the college playing field. Nonetheless, when deciding which courses to enroll in, keep in mind the heavy workload associated with APs. Try to avoid taking on too many AP courses at once; it is much more favorable to do well on a few AP exams than to perform poorly on several. There is no magic number of APs to take as the college admissions process is complex, and there is usually no single factor (e.g. AP credits, SAT scores, extracurricular activities) that will make or break you.

Talk to your teachers or school counselor about the AP courses and exams available at your school, or read more about APs online.

*www.collegeboard.com

**Costs include tuition, fees, and books only, and do not include room, board, and other living expenses. Average Estimated Undergraduate Budgets, 2008-09 (Enrollment-Weighted). The College Board, ”Trends in College Pricing,” 2008.

Humble Soup

2010-03-05T12:00:00.000-08:00

Like many students, there was a point in my academic career when I questioned the relevance of school. I had convinced myself there was little possibility that I would “ever use this stuff again” once I left the classroom.

So, feeling brazen, one day I challenged my teacher with my “rationalistic” perspective. I raised my hand and blurted out, Why do we have to LEARN this, anyway? It’s so BORING!

The class went silent. Luckily, my teacher had a seasoned rebuttal and without blinking replied, “Well, are you planning on eating lunch today?”

Taking a stance, I nodded.

“What do you have in your lunch?” He asked.

Frowning, I listed a cheese sandwich, an apple, a yogurt, and an oatmeal cookie.

“I see," he replied. ‘You know, without geometry and fractions, you wouldn’t be eating ¾ of your lunch today.”

Cynically, I pondered the point of his statement. Of course, after class as I was gathering my books, my teacher sat down next to me.

“So, Sallie, it seems like you are frustrated with fractions.”

Nodding, I told him that yes, I thought fractions were dreadfully boring, not to mention I just couldn’t see myself ever needing to use such a thing ever again. Plus, studying fractions on flashcards was lame.

"Well, do you like to cook?” He inquired.

Yes, I do it all the time with my mother.

“Great!" he announced as he stood up and strolled over to his book case. After taking a few minutes to run his fingers along the spines of a few of the most weathered in his collection, he wiggled one out, let it flop open to a random page, read a few lines, and then in a dramatic swoop, he tore out the whole page and then tore the page in half.

Looking at the shard of paper, I saw that it was a recipe for spaghetti sauce – but, he had removed all the measurements for each ingredient.

“That’s your homework assignment for tonight. Make this sauce.”

Later that day, I presented my mother with my assignment. She smiled and said she couldn’t express enough how excited she was to have a night off from dinner duty. And so it began – I pulled out all the ingredients listed, set them on the counter and surveyed the scene.

Ground beef. Salt. Pepper. Olive oil. Celery. Carrot. Onion. Tomato paste. Tomato chunks. Red wine. Garlic. Basil. Bay leaf.

Oh, this is going to be easy, I thought. Following the instructions to a T, I tossed in a hunk of beef, veggies and olive oil. I let it simmer down and then sloshed in an unknown amount of tomato paste and tomato chunks, followed by a good half bottle of red wine and the listed seasonings.

Cool, I thought, as I covered the pot. Now I let it simmer for 25 minutes, and the sauce is done!

Twenty five minutes later, I lifted the top off the pot to survey the scene. My mother, who was standing next to me, peered inside.

“Wasn’t this a recipe for tomato sauce?”

On my tip-toes, I looked into the pot. To my dismay, I was met with a pot of tomato soup.

I looked at my mother.

“Well, how much wine did you use,” she asked, poking a spoon at the bubbling liquid.

Oh – maybe half a bottle? I shrugged.

Doubling over in laughter, when she was finally composed, she reached for one of her cookbooks and flipped to a spaghetti sauce recipe that called for wine. A quarter cup of wine, that is.

The next day, my math teacher eagerly approached me before class.

“So, how did it go?”

I shifted my gaze a bit uneasily.

It went, well, I guess. But I ended up with SOUP instead of sauce.

“So something was off – do you know what?”

I nodded.

Too much wine for the amount of everything else in the pot.

“Ah," he confirmed. "So knowing how much of an ingredient you need per whole recipe is a KEY component to the successful outcome of – any dish?”

I sheepishly blinked in silence. Indeed, he was right.

For a while, I thought that my lesson was solely related to math. It wasn’t until I found myself dreading practicing Latin grammar rules with a high school classmate that I realized if we could commiserate, couldn’t we somehow find a way to make studying together fun?

Hence, the second part of my lesson on fractions sprung to life. Heading into the kitchen, we decided to cook an entire meal – using only vocabulary words from our study list and attempting to construct sentences using proper Latin grammar rules. The next day we both received A’s on our Latin grammar test, and we vowed to study the fun way for the rest of the semester.

Here are a few more ways to make studying fun:

Multiplication Tables: Grab a deck of cards, and throw down two. Shout out the product. This game can be played with one person at a time answering as quickly as possible, or it can be played as a competition to see who can come up with the answer first.

SAT Vocabulary Words: Pin index cards with vocabulary words around the house in key places like mirrors, the refrigerator, or next to the front door. Consider laminating word lists and sticking them in the shower or using them as placemats.

Language Skills: With a friend, pick a fun activity like cooking, a board game, or riding bikes. Communicate and play during that activity using as little native language as possible.

A Shallow Sea of Over-Scheduled Existence

2010-02-22T17:57:00.000-08:00

In her poem, “Not Waving but Drowning,” Stevie Smith writes, “I was much too far out all my life / And not waving but drowning.” I remember reading this poem in high school and relating to it all too well. As a high school freshman, I was the classically overbooked student – I was a two-sport varsity athlete, homecoming princess, straight A student, LINK team leader, and class Vice President. Although I appeared to be waving, I felt like I was drowning in a shallow sea of over-commitment.

My biggest fear was free time and boredom. I didn’t know myself without my commitments or what to do if I didn’t have somewhere to be. I defined myself by what I did, not who I was. The college application process seemed to reward this perspective. I was asked to report my grades and activities, and the general idea was the more the merrier! Even community service became an activity to take pride in.

It’s easy for gifted students to get caught up in a sea of over-scheduled existence. While it may seem appealing to participate in so many things, even gifted students struggle to find their paths to individual success and achievement. Unlike the student who has deficits in some subjects or abilities and excels in others, the gifted student succeeds at everything! So while some students can rely on interest or natural intellect to help them weed through the undesirable, the gifted students struggle to find their way amidst a fountain of innumerable successes - and while they may appear composed and directed on the outside, on the inside they are often silently struggling to figure out who they are and what they want out of life.

In light of my own retrospect, I challenge gifted, overscheduled, and overcommitted students to try something new for a day – Do Nothing. Take the hint from your peers who appear to be under-booked or uninterested and figure out what to do with yourself in the face of boredom. Put your calendar and intellect aside for a few hours, a weekend, or a few months this summer and depend on your creativity to fill your time. In a 2002 article from Newsweek titled “Doing nothing is something,” Anna Quindlen writes:

Downtime is where we become ourselves, looking into the middle distance, kicking at the curb, lying on the grass or sitting on the stoop and staring at the tedious blue of the summer sky. I don’t believe you can write poetry, or compose music, or become an actor without downtime, and plenty of it, a hiatus that passes for boredom but is really the quiet moving of the wheels inside that fuel creativity.

I hope that someday a college application will ask students, “What do you do when you have nothing to do?” Or that a business will hire recent college grads under the premise that they won’t live and die at their cubicles. The lack of free time has become synonymous with productivity and efficiency, and this culture of workaholics is trickling down into America’s youth. In a 2005 article in Education Week, Rhea R. Borja states:

In recent years more parents have started sending their 3 to 5-year-old children to for-profit tutoring centers to give them an academic edge in elementary school. Tutoring for tots has been spurred by increased academic accountability in schools, heightened competition to get into top-ranked colleges and new research that links early exposure to books, music and language to better academic performance in later years.

We are trying to give children as young as preschool the competitive edge, but at what cost to their creativity and introspective abilities? We need to strike a balance between academic enrichment and personal growth and development.

It may seem silly, but it may never be too late to learn the old maxim: “Go outside and play.” It’s the wisdom of many generations before us, and downtime may be the key that unlocks our best thoughts and our true creativity.

Works Cited:

Borja, Rhea R. "Growing Niche for Tutoring Chains: Prekindergartens' Academic Prep." Education Week 25.8 (2005): 10. Academic Search Elite. EBSCO. Web. 22 Feb. 2010.

Quindlen, Anna. "Doing nothing is something. " Newsweek 13 (2002): ABI/
INFORM Global, ProQuest. Web. 22 Feb. 2010.

Dream School or Safety School - It All Works Out for the Best

2010-02-18T18:42:00.000-08:00

The college application process can be pretty intense and in the moment, can sometimes feel like life or death. When I was a 17 year-old senior, I thought I wanted to study math or computer science at University of Virginia – so when I found out that I only got into my safety schools, I remember feeling like the reality of my “college dream” was very different from what I had months to imagine it becoming. It seemed brutal at the time, but I can tell you from my experience and the experiences of many friends – everything generally works out for the best.

As luck would have it, it turned out that I was most interested in studying business, and the school I ended up attending (Michigan) had the best business program of any school that I applied to. I ended up having an amazing college experience that I wouldn’t have changed for the world (Go Blue!).

A lot of life happens between the age of 17 (when you pick a college) and the age of 22 (when you graduate from college). As it turned out, some of my friends who got to go to their “dream school” (i.e. the highest ranking school they got into) ended up transferring after a year to their real dream school. Others went to a big school, only to realize that they wanted to be at a small school. Some went to school to study history, only to realize they wanted to study medicine. Some went to school to study business only to realize that they wanted to teach and travel the world. You get the point – choosing a college is not the final decision – it’s the first of many choices. Once in school the opportunity to make that decision feel like it reflects who you are will present itself over and over again. My advice:

1) Get a college counselor. A good college counselor can really help a high school student find a school that is truly the right fit for them and then help them get in. (I didn’t have one – but I wish I did.) The best counselors understand how much students change after they leave high school and help students select schools that can grow and change with them.

2) Have an open mind and a positive attitude. Not everyone has the college experience that they imagined when they were 17, but everyone who has an open mind and a positive attitude will have a great college experience. Like many things in life, things work out for the best when you’re willing to be flexible and approach new situations with optimism.

4 Tips to Learning a Foreign Language

2010-02-05T17:03:00.000-08:00

Have you ever sat through a math class and felt like your teacher was speaking a foreign language? Were you dazed and confused? Well, in French and Spanish class, your teacher is speaking a foreign language. It is no wonder that you would feel perplexed and uncomfortable! Here are a few tips to make the most of your time spent tackling a new language.

Practice out loud and on paper

While writing skills are crucial to mastering a language, oral expression is a key stepping stone on the road to fluency. Foreign languages present a whole new range of sounds and, though it may feel awkward at first, reading out loud will train your facial and throat muscles to produce these new sounds. Making flashcards is a great way to practice. You will develop a visual memory of what you’ve written on the cards and an auditory memory of what you’ve read out loud, making this particular learning tool doubly effective.

Utilize available resources

When doing homework, take the time to get it right. Use a dictionary to look up words you are unfamiliar with. Refer to verb tables and grammar guides when necessary. Your textbook is always a good place to start when in doubt. In class, communicate with your instructor. Tell your teacher about any difficulties you are having, and be open to his/her suggestions. If you have a tutor, take advantage by asking questions you may not have had the opportunity to bring up in class. Being proactive in this way will only broaden your grasp of the language.

Maximize exposure

Immerse yourself in the language as often as possible. Consider watching a movie or television program, or listening to the radio (many foreign radio and television stations have streaming or archived programs online). If you encounter a native speaker, attempt to have a conversation with him/her. These exercises are especially helpful in developing an authentic accent. Don’t worry about not understanding everything you hear. Listening alone will increase familiarity with the language and ultimately improve comprehension.

Divide and conquer

This strategy is the recipe for success, regardless of your objective. As with physical exercise, long, strenuous practice sessions can often leave you feeling burnt out. On the other hand, short, regular sessions that lead to positive results are quite encouraging. Studies have shown that practicing a language on a regular basis for short periods of time increases retention. So, aim for small, reachable goals. Every goal achieved or hurdle overcome will boost your confidence and motivate you to learn more.

Remember, not understanding what you hear or read is a completely natural part of the language learning process. Rest assured that, with the right dedication and time, the foreign language you have undertaken won’t seem so foreign after all!

Read Baby Read!

2010-01-25T11:51:00.000-08:00

How did you learn to read?

Some of us memorized sight words, and others used configuration or context cues. However, one thing is for sure…if you learned to read in a California public school in the late 80’s or early 90’s– you weren’t taught phonics. California dropped phonics from its reading curricula in 1987–when I was five!

I don’t remember learning to read, but I do remember reading. Like many young children, I memorized the words in picture books and convinced others that I was literate by the age of three! My book of choice was Goodnight Moon, the pop-up version.

While it’s possible to argue that I wasn’t really “reading," there is evidence to support that memorizing words is a behavior that precedes and eventually develops into conventional literacy. This idea is rooted in the concept of “emergent literacy." Sulzby and Teale (1996) state, "Emergent literacy is concerned with the earliest phases of literacy development, the period between birth and the time when children read and write conventionally. The term emergent literacy signals a belief that, in a literate society, young children–even 1- and 2-year-olds–are in the process of becoming literate."

Many kids who don’t remember learning to read remember one thing–being read to by their parents and caretakers. The idea of emergent literacy validates the significance of reading to children regularly. When we read to children, even as young as one and two years old, we help them build the foundation from which literacy develops. Since young children respond well to vivid images and word repetition, parents and caretakers often select to read picture books. In a good picture book, the images tell the story, and the words merely contribute to the flow of the story. It’s no coincidence that Goodnight Moon, with its pop-up pictures, word repetition, and embedded nightly ritual was at the top of my list!

If you need help selecting a good picture book or other reading material to share with your kid(s), consider award winners. The following honors are given to top-quality books and should become the basic criterion for any search for grade K-8 literature.

Caldecott Medal: This medal is awarded annually to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children by the Association for Library Service to Children. The 2010 Caldecott Medal winner is The Lion & the Mouse, illustrated and written by Jerry Pinkney. For a full list of Caldecott Medal winners from 1938-Present, click here: Caldecott Medal Winners 1938-2009.

Newbery Medal: The Newbery Medal is awarded annually by the Association for Library Services to Children to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American Literature for children. The 2010 Newbery Medal winner is When you Reach Me by Rebecca Stead. For a list of Newbery Medal winners and Honor Books from 1922-Present, click here: Newbery Medal Winners 1922-2009.

Young Reader Medal: Members of the California Young Reader Medal Committee nominate books to be read by students in four categories: Primary (Grades K-2), Intermediate (Grades 3-6), Middle School / Junior High (Grades 6-9), and Young Adult (Grades 9-12). Students read all of the books in a given category and vote for their favorite. The authors of the winning books are awarded the California Young Reader Medal award annually. For a list of books that have one the votes of California readers, click here: California Young Reader Medal Winners.

Happy reading!

A Collegiate Athlete's Guide to The Game of School

2010-01-15T11:49:00.000-08:00

The college community offers a variety of activities, and as someone who likes to take advantage of every opportunity, it would be a shame if I let anything get in my way. As a collegiate athlete, it is often assumed that I don't have time to do anything except go to school, practice, eat, sleep, and play basketball. However, early on I learned that this did not have to be the case.

Looking back, effective time management has been one of the most important factors to my ability to participate in school, sports, work, and other activities in a successful manner. At first, the idea of balancing numerous obligations seemed overwhelming, and often appeared unachievable. However, I have come to realize that even the most hectic schedule can be simplified, just so long as one sticks to the pledge: "Be where you need to be when you need to be there."

In terms of school, sports, work, and other activities - here is what it's all about:

1. SHOW UP
Knowing where you need to be and when you need to be there is half the battle. Staying organized is key. Whether you use a planner, agenda, or calendar, find a system that works best for you and stick with it!

2. BE PREPARED
In order to be prepared, you need to know what is expected of you. Be aware of assignments and deadlines and plan your approach in advance. I can’t compete on the basketball court if I haven't practiced my jump-shot, and a student can't succeed in the classroom if he/she hasn't studied for the test.

3. DO THE WORK
If you are showing up and you are prepared, you might as well do the work! Don't fail simply because you didn’t try. When I am in a basketball game, I play defense as best I can; likewise, when I am in study hall, I put all my effort into completing my homework.

Not only has effective time management enabled me to tame a hectic schedule, but it has given me the freedom to take advantage of opportunities that I may not have deemed feasible otherwise. Luckily, it works two-fold: not only am I available to do other things, but I am also set up for success ... and something tells me that this is a great tool that I will be able to use for the rest of my life.

By: Lisa Helmers, Office Manager, Launch Education

New Beginnings

2010-01-06T11:54:00.000-08:00

What happens when your computer breaks?
First and foremost, you attempt to repair it.

How does this relate to school?

Take a moment to imagine a broken student who is trapped in a never ending cycle -- a student who has entered into a downward spiral in which the student feels defeated after receiving a bad grade on an assignment, will lose motivation and put less effort into the next assignment. The outcome is no surprise -- the student earns another bad grade and the cycle continues.

How does one stop the cycle?
Repair and reboot.

As students venture into second semester, they should be inspired by the opportunity each new semester brings to start over – it is never too late to re-brand oneself as a good student who is motivated to succeed in school. A new semester brings a new opportunity to repair what may have fallen apart during the previous semester. With effort, patience, and focus, a failing student can choose to start over again and make the necessary changes to succeed. By repairing one's attitude and looking at the factors that contributed to one’s fall in the previous semester, a student can make a plan and seek out the necessary support to turn over a new leaf in the New Year!

Who’s up for the challenge?

Technology: Making Your Holiday Gifts Smart

2009-12-21T18:52:00.000-08:00

Think of it as something like substituting prune puree for butter in your favorite brownie recipe. These high-tech toys may look and act like your everyday gadgets and gizmos – but secretly, they have the power to inspire learning under the guise of fun and convenience.

More Expensive (but very cool)

Amazon Kindle
This wireless hand-held reading device allows you to download the most recent books, magazines and newspapers with the push of a button. Weighing in at 10.3 ounces, your library just became portable. Price: $259.00

The Pulse

This digital smartpen “records everything you hear, say and write, and links your audio recordings to your notes.” A great gift for students (and adults!) of all ages. Price: $169.95

Dragon Naturally Speaking

Voice recognition software enables the busy body to take notes, write emails, and access their desktop – all by the power of the spoken word! Also available as a FREE iPhone application! Price: $99.99-$199.99

Less Expensive

Big Brain Academy (for Wii)

Earn a Wii Degree! Challenge yourself or a friend to a game that tests your aptitude in five areas: analysis, memory, visual recognition, number crunching, and quick thinking. Price: $29.99

M2Match2 (for your iPhone)

Practice your route memory and hand-eye coordination in short blasts. This iPhone application will strengthen your recognition and speed with catchy pictures and the touch of your fingertips! Price: $0.99

Vocabulary Cartoons Lite (for your iPhone)

It’s always a perfect time to improve your vocabulary repertoire. This FREE iPhone application implements cartoons and rhymes to help you remember even the most insipid of words. Price: Free!

Test Day Tips for Standardized Tests

2009-12-09T12:33:00.000-08:00

Standardized tests are a fact of every student’s life. Whether applying to private school, college, or graduate school, standardized tests pop up again and again – whether students like it or not.

Succeeding on these exams is as much about a student’s mind being in the right place on test day as anything else. I remember tossing and turning the night before a standardized test with anxiety about all the things that could go wrong on test day that were outside of my control: the power would go out while I was sleeping and my alarm clock wouldn’t go off, all of my pencils would break in my backpack, or worse yet … I feared that I forgot to register for the exam! After months of hard work and preparation, we shouldn’t let these self-defeating thoughts take us hostage on test day. We should approach test day with confidence knowing that our hard work and preparation will pay off.

Here are a few reminders and tips to help optimize your performance on test day:

1. Review your registration information to make certain you know where to arrive and when.

2. Bring a valid student ID, bottle of water, watch, tissues, and a snack with you to the exam.

3. Bring at least three semi-dull number 2 pencils with erasers to use on the exam. Sharpened pencils break easily and mechanical pencils involve too much clicking (dull pencils are also better for shading in circles).

4. Bring erasable pens with you to the exam to use on the essay section (if there is one). It is better to erase your mistakes than to cross them out, and erasable pens will enable you to do this.

5. Wear comfortable shoes so that you can easily move your toes. Wiggling your toes during the exam will help you to stay focused and keep your blood flowing!

6. Eat a balanced breakfast that is satiating but not so filling that you feel sleepy. You can eat snacks during your break periods, so don’t over eat at the breakfast table, but also don’t skip out on the most important meal of the day! I have listed some of my favorite breakfast and snack suggestions below:

A piece of whole grain toast with nut butter (I prefer almond butter) and a glass of fresh juice. Cut up a granny smith apple to bring as a snack.
2 scrambled eggs, a piece of whole grain toast, and a glass of fresh juice. Bring a handful of almonds and a banana or apple slices for a snack.
1 cup of oatmeal or other hot, whole grain cereal with almonds and raisins sprinkled on top. Bring a hardboiled egg and a piece of fruit as a snack.

7. Bring something enjoyable to read with you to the exam. After you have finished and reviewed the section of the exam you are working on, you may have time leftover before the start of the next section. Rather than twiddling your thumbs, read something entertaining and relaxing. Don’t read anything that would compromise your sense of confidence or focus.

8. Dress for success, but wear something comfortable. The better you look and feel, the more confident you will perform! My mother told me to wear my favorite pair of socks on test day and to think of this hidden joy as my secret weapon. Think of something that will work for you to calm your nerves and give you something to smile about on test day.

9. Relax, Breathe, and Succeed! We are all rooting for you!

Planning the SAT Timeline (continued)

2009-12-07T11:40:00.000-08:00

PART 2: Making a Timeline

(Haven't read Part 1 yet? Catch up here)

First, let’s address a topic that we’re asked about all the time: The SAT vs. the ACT.

So here’s the deal: All colleges and universities accept both the SAT and the ACT. Some students opt to take both exams to figure out which one they prefer—however, we recommend that students focus their study time on one exam instead of dividing their energy between two exams (that are used for the same purpose!).

Another question we hear: When do I start studying?

For the SAT or ACT, students should begin studying no later than three months prior to their test date. Many students then opt for the SAT in March, or the ACT in February or April, and again in the fall (October or September, respectively). So juniors planning on taking the March 2010 SAT should get started soon. Students who want to be extra prepared for spring tests often begin with a light study load as early as September.

And how about the SAT Subject Tests (AKA the SAT II’s)?

Most students prefer 4-6 weeks of preparation before a SAT Subject Test. Since material on SAT Subject Tests aligns so closely with content taught in academic subjects, we recommend that students take the SAT II in May or June. As for which test to take, students are typically best served by taking the SAT II's that match their best subjects in school.

When planning out a timeline, remember to take into account all vacations (if studying will be on hold during them), and begin preparation earlier to accommodate the missed weeks. Consider also the schedules of sports and other activities that may hamper a student’s energy level and ability to devote time to test prep when planning things out. Finally, students often find it difficult to dedicate time to test prep while studying for final exams, so standardized tests should only coincide with final exams in the case of a Subject Test in the same subject as an exam being taken.

Here is a step-by-step guide to determining test dates:

1. Look at SAT and ACT schedules
2. Consider the schedules of vacations, extra-curricular activities, and final exams
3. Choose test dates
a. Count weeks backwards from the test dates to account for the time needed to prepare
b. Circle preparation start-dates
4. Begin exploring options for assistance (classes, tutoring, self-study, etc!)

Good luck!

Planning the SAT Timeline (Start Now!)

2009-12-04T17:31:00.000-08:00

Part 1: Winter Break- A Perfect Time for SAT Planning

Recently conquering the planning and execution of the infamous Thanksgiving Dinner has given me a deepened appreciation for today’s students. Not only do they have to juggle school work, extra-curricular activities, and family time on a daily basis—but the demands are year-round!

It is no wonder that many of our tutors spend significant time with their students practicing the habits of the How of school—skills that relate to organization, time management, and scheduling out adequate time for exam preparation. Not only are these fundamental practices are the necessary in order to be successful in school, students will use these skills for the rest of their lives.

Planning ahead is even more important when students begin taking standardized tests. Since most tests happen in the spring, winter break is an ideal time for parents to sit down with their student and figure out the test-taking timeline.

Before you sit down for this discussion, parents and students should have the following calendars at their disposal:

• The 2010 SAT Schedule: offered in January, March, May, June, October, November, and December (exact dates here)

• The 2010 ACT Schedule: offered in February, April, June, September, October, and December (exact dates here)

• The student’s Final Exam Schedule

• Vacation Dates

• Sports/Extra-Curricular Activities Schedules

And don’t forget to take a deep breath. Remember, even junior year is manageable if you plan ahead and pace yourself!

What Makes An Effective Tutor?

2009-11-27T16:29:00.000-08:00

Part 4: Working Toward Independence

What can seem like a great student-tutor match may actually be detrimental to a student in the long run if the tutor is functioning as a crutch. We often think about the old proverb, “Feed a man a fish and he will eat for a night; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime” – a good tutor is always trying to teach the student to fish and leave the student independently successful. A tutor should be a mentor and a coach, but never an assistant.

Tutoring should be about building skills for life success as much as student success. In Part 3 below, we discussed our view of student achievement through the three-layered prism of the What, How, and Why. We believe that independence must be built in all three of these areas.

In the What layer (subject matter understanding), students must not simply learn to memorize formulas or methods needed to succeed on one test or assignment, but rather, they need to be taught to grasp the underlying concepts at hand. That level of depth of understanding will stick with a student and forms the foundation for future independent understanding.

When it comes to the How layer (fundamental student skills), a tutor must work with the student to build long-lasting skills relating to organization, time management, studying, writing, problem-solving, presenting, student-teacher interaction, etc., etc. These skills, if truly ingrained in a student’s habits and understanding, will provide the bedrock for success in college, graduate school, and an eventual career – all well beyond the tutor’s time with the student.

It is often true foundational strides in the above areas that leads to real changes in a student’s confidence, motivation, and attitude, or what we call the Why of school. A student that succeeds but feels that he or she did so mainly because of a tutor’s help is not going to have gained any inner confidence from tutoring, and any increase in motivation will likely be short-lived. But when a student really begins to believe in his or herself, it can result in a whole new attitude, and the results can be staggering. This is why we come to work every day!