A Rand study indicates that well-designed summer programs can help low-income students read and do math better. The key to academic gains in summer programs are steady attendance and a high-quality program with engaging, fun activities for school children and highly effective teachers teaching for at least three hours a day.
Reading over the summer not only keeps your child from losing ground, but actually improves skills for the coming year. Here are some suggestions to keep a book in your child’s hands over the summer months.
Learn some of the ways that pre-kindergarten through elementary school teachers can enhance the vocabulary development of young children. The article focuses on teaching words from texts that are read aloud to children and presents activities that help young children make sense of new words.
There’s something for everyone in this booklist: flights of fact and fantasy, traditional aviation from the air and with one foot on the ground; daredevil flights and flights of fancy; flyers both funny and brave.
What is better on a warm summer afternoon than a game of baseball? It is the great American pastime, after all! Meet baseball players whose passion broke various barriers and find out about the history of the game.
All eyes looked to South Africa for the World Cup in 2010. From folktales to soccer stories to Nelson Mandela’s childhood, these books offer a wonderful introduction to South Africa’s people and natural environment. Many of the books also address the long struggle to overcome apartheid, gently opening the discussion for young readers with stories that are both realistic and hopeful.
In this PBS special, Academy Award-winner Morgan Freeman is the narrator of A Tale of Two Schools, a one-hour documentary that tells the intimate story of a tumultuous year at two vulnerable schools. It’s a tale of hope, of faith, and of the power of committed adults to help shape the life of a child.
Preschoolers who are getting ready to read expand their knowledge of the building blocks of oral and written language, and their use and appreciation of language. Learn activities parents can use at home to support children’s growth in each of these areas.
A psychologist specializing in language-based learning disabilities explains how to talk to children about their LD: All the parts you need to be smart are in your brain. Nothing is missing or broken. The difference between your brain and one that doesn’t have an LD is that your brain gets “traffic jams” on certain highways.
Most words in a child’s vocabulary come from everyday encounters with language. Children pick up language from books, media, and conversations with the people in their lives. Here are some ways you can increase your child’s vocabulary and background knowledge, and strengthen the foundation for their reading success.
Experts Marcia Invernizzi, Carole Prest, and Anne Hoover discuss tutoring programs, tutor training, what the latest research tells us, and the different forms tutoring can take.
