The Map Magazine

Learning to read can be a challenging adventure for some children. It seems that everyone from a child’s teacher to Mom and Dad and even Grandma is excited and waiting for the child to learn to read. All the pressure and expectations from the adults can sure put a damper on the excitement for the child. This loss of excitement can lead to a child who loses the desire to read. If we as parents can find ways to make reading fun and enjoyable, our children will be more willing to sit down and read a book together.

Here are a few ideas you can do to make reading fun for your child.

Popcorn Reading

This is a fun way for a child to be able to read the words he/she knows and pass on the words that are causing frustration. While reading a book together, each of you take a turn reading aloud. When the one who is reading says the word “popcorn”, it is the other persons turn to read.

Reading Buddy

Pair your reader up with an older “reading buddy” and have them read a book out loud together. We all have had times where an explanation of something made more sense coming from one of our peers or a sibling. This gives you child the opportunity to practice reading without an adults watchful eye causing possible nervousness.

Highlight Heaven

Grab an older book and a highlighter and have your child highlight every word one the page that he/she can read. After all the words your child knows are highlighted on the page, take a moment and have your child look and see how many words he/she can actually read. This is quite a confidence booster.

Flashlight Reading

Before your child is too tired at the end of the day, take some time and read in dark room. Take a flashlight with you and read the book by flashlight. Little boys especially like this one.

Secret Hideout

What child hasn’t built a fort at one time or another? If you don’t already have a fort in your house or outside in the yard, help your child create one. It can a blanket fort, a plywood fort outside, a tree house, or even a simple under to bed fort. (Just make sure you both can fit…being able to get out once you’ve gotten in is helpful too!) Bring your child’s favorite reading book, get comfortable and read away.

Reading Corner

Make a “reading corner” somewhere in your home. Let your child be a part of decorating it and picking just the right spot to place it. Add some bean bags or pillows, maybe a favorite poster on the wall or even some family pictures.

Take a break and just read to your child sometimes

No explanation needed here.

Picture Detective

Have your child flip through a book and look at all the pictures and tell you what he/she thinks is going to happen in the story. Read the story and see how close he/she was.

Pop-up word

Pick one word that your child particularly has a hard time with and every time your child reads that word, both of you stand up. This will help him/her remember the word because an action is associated with it. This works particularly well with kinesthetic learners. (A child who wants to move all the time and likes to touch and feel everything.)

Star of the Story

Have you ever seen a personalized story book where your child’s name is printed in the story? This is a unique way to get your reluctant reader excited about a book. In these kinds of books, your child’s name and the name of his/her friends are printed in the story-line, making your child the star of his/her very own book! How motivating is that? He/she will have to read the book to find out what kind of adventure he/she will be going on!

To learn more about personalized story books, click the link below.

Sometimes all it takes to make reading fun is some imagination and a change of scenery.

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The first thing that comes to mind when I picture abdominal exercises is someone laying on the ground with the feet flat and knees bent, struggling to sit up. Then laying back down and struggling to sit up again. While sit-ups are a good abdominal workout, there are so many more options. Crunches are more popular than sit-ups. Instead of sitting all the way up, you simple lift your head and shoulders off of the mat. It is less strenuous on your back that way and also an easier exercise to perform. It is important to focus on using your abdominal muscles to reach your head and neck up, otherwise your abs aren’t getting much of a workout.

You can do crunches in all kinds of variations. Lay your knees down to either side to focus on working out the side muscles of your stomach. Lift your knees up at a 90 degree angle to work out your lower abdominal muscles. Crunches are probably one of the most versatile and popular abdominal exercises. You can also take crunches up a notch when you do them while balancing on an inflatable exercise ball. In order to keep from rolling away and falling off the ball you will have to activate more of your muscles. So this gives you more bang for your buck as you work out. In addition, most gyms have several types of abdominal machines where you can add resistance to your crunches to build up your strength.

Learn about the Perfect six pack method special system to building abs and core power.

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Be aware. You may become totally overwhelmed when you get the results of the special education testing on your child. There is a lot of “stuff” on that report! And much of it sounds like a foreign language to many people.

You get one piece the results from the Intelligence part of the test. This is extremely important information, but know that it will most likely come in disguise.

One of its disguises, or aliases, might be “Broad Cognitive Ability”. Another may be “Aptitude.” But, basically, they are measures of the same thing - your child’s ability to process and learn information. So, for the sake of keeping things simple, let’s just call it “aptitude.”

As I’ve stated many times, in order for a child to be considered learning disabled, he has to show an average “aptitude” for learning. He must have the same ability to learn as well as any other child of his age or grade. An average aptitude score would be about 100, with anything between 85 and 115 being in the average range.

There are many different tests that measure a child’s aptitude. One of these tests is the WISC-III. The Performance, or Perceptual Organization, section is the part that measures aptitude. It is divided into subtests, or smaller tests, and they assess different things that make up a person’s aptitude.

Another common test used to measure aptitude is the Woodcock-Johnson Psychoeducational Battery - Revised. The aptitude section of this test is called the Tests of Cognitive Ability, and the overall aptitude score is called “Broad Cognitive Ability”. It also has smaller tests called subtests, to measure aptitude, but they measure aptitude in a little different way than the WISC does.

There are other tests to determine your child’s aptitude that don’t involve reading or writing. Sometimes these tests are given if there is a language problem that might interfere with getting a true picture of the child’s ability.

The important things to remember are that 1) you will probably see a score from one of these tests on your child’s report, and 2) that score should be within the range of 85 to 115, for the most part.

The information you get from these scores will also tell you what the child is having difficulty with. For example, perhaps he has difficulty remembering what he sees. Perhaps he can’t remember more than 1 or 2 directions at a time. Perhaps he can’t process new information as fast as other children. These are important clues to letting you and the teachers know what to work on with your child and how to best help him.

When you get this information, the next thing that will happen is that this “aptitude” score will be compared with the child’s “achievement” score.

His achievement score is a measure of what he knows and what he has learned. These will be his scores in things like reading, written language, and math. In order for your child to show a learning disability, there has to be a large gap between his “aptitude” score (his ability to process information and learn) and what he has actually learned.

In other words, the report is showing that, although the child is able to learn as well as anyone else of his age or grade, something is causing this to not happen the way it should.

Why is that happening? When the pieces of the evaluation are put together, it should provide information about why your child is not learning the way the other children are. It will provide clues to you and his teachers about how to help him in the best way possible and how to help him help himself.

For more plain talk about learning disabilities, please visit us at www.ldperspectives.com.

About the Author

Sandy Gauvin is a retired educator who has seen learning disabilities from many perspectives - as the parent of a daughter with learning disabilities, as the teacher of children with learning disabilities, and as an advocate for others who have diagnosed and unrecognized learning disabilities. Sandy shares her wisdom and her resources at www.LDPerspectives.com.

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Shoppers spent more than $15.5 billion this Christmas on gifts
on the Internet alone. Just imagine how many millions went to
unwanted polka dot sweaters, electric nose hair clippers, and
thigh masters. That wasted cash piled up under the Christmas
tree. We’ve all had it happen to us.In fact, you had it happen
to you this year. You unwrapped the pretty red bow and tore
through the shiny paper on that present from your Uncle Mortie,
and immediately, you had to put on your best poker face.

How did you know I needed a sushi roller kit?” you exclaimed
with as much excitement as you could muster through gritted
teeth.

The problem is you don’t eat fish sticks, let alone raw salmon.

You can’t be too sore at poor Uncle Mortie, though, and the
other friends and family who gave you unwanted holiday gifts
this season. Buying Christmas gifts is difficult work. Then
again, getting rid of a doosie of a Christmas gift is no piece
of fruitcake either. That is, unless you know how to use the
Internet to return your unwanted gifts from the comfort of your
own home or, better yet, sell them for better use.

You’re probably wondering how it’s possible to sell off Santa’s
slip-ups when you feel bad enough returning them. In most cases,
your friends or loved one invested time and money into shopping
for your gift. They browsed countless Web pages. They trudged
through the mall. And they were sentenced to hard time in the
cashier line. All of it they did to please you.

At the same time, however, your friends or loved one couldn’t
read your mind as Jolly Old Saint Nick supposedly can. They
could never tell if you’d appreciate that coffee table book on
coffee tables, or that matching set of plaid socks and necktie.
They could only guess at your inseam or your blouse size, or
whether you look best in blue or black. And they had no way of
telling that your third cousin on your father’s side got you the
same exact gift. With no list of who was naughty and who was
nice, Uncle Mortie and company added to the millions wasted
worldwide.

This waste doesn’t have to be. Your loved ones only wanted to
make you happy with their presents. So it stands to reason that
if their gift didn’t do the trick-because it was the wrong size,
a duplicate present, or completely off the mark-they would want
you to fix the situation. Whatever it takes, they would want you
to be happy, right?

That leaves you with two options. You could return the gift to
the mega store or the maul-er, mall. You would join the
thousands of your neighbors with the same idea, all of whom are
cramming into your local stores and cash register lines to
return their unwanted gifts. Then you would also have to face
the thousands of bargain shoppers out there looking for those
post-Christmas specials, a rush that lasts well through January.

What’s worse, some stores won’t let you return goods if you
don’t have the original credit card or receipt. That means you
could at best be left with gift cards with expiration dates at
stores that you may not like. At worst, you could be stuck with
your gift, not knowing what to do with it.

Now you’re seeing the light. No, it’s not the light from the
inflatable 12-foot Santa Claus and reindeer on your neighbor’s
front lawn. It’s the light from your computer monitor: the
Internet. Today’s Web can link you with someone who will think
Uncle Mortie’s gift is a precious treasure. This person, whether
they’re in Peoria or Pawtucket, North Carolina or the North
Pole, is willing to pay good money for it.

Classified Internet sites can link you to this person faster
than it would take you to stow the sushi set up in your attic.
The best classified sites out there will also be free of
transaction and membership fees. What’s more, they allow you to
negotiate price directly with your buyer and plan shipping
arrangements, all with privacy and precision in mind.

You’ll end up with cash to buy that special something you really
wanted. Your buyer will be pleased with Uncle Mortie’s gift.
Uncle Mortie, well, he’ll be glad the gift he gave you, doesn’t
just sit in the attic.

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If you think your children play to many computer games - try
this trick. Get them to play word games known to both develop
kids mentally while improving their spelling. It works!

Spelvin http://www.deprice.com/spelvin.htm

Spell as many words as you can with 7 letters. Use the Hold
buttons and then pull Spin to refresh the tiles you wish weren’t
there. Play Spelvin as you scramble for words and gamble with
Juice to spin for better letters.

Word Mojo Gold http://www.deprice.com/wordmojogold.htm

Prepare yourself for an exciting new word game that takes
spelling and creating chains of words to new levels of fun.
Simply create intersecting words over the random colored tiles
to acquire 3 or more Mega Mojo Letters and you’ll advance to the
Mega Mojo round. Exceed your target score each round and you’ve
got major Mojo!

Flip Words http://www.deprice.com/flipwords.htm

You’ll flip over our new word game: Flip Words. Click on letters
to make words and solve familiar phrases. The first letter of
each word you make will be revealed in the phrase you’re trying
to solve. Once you recognize the phrase, you can submit your
guess or try to reveal all the letters for a special bonus.
You’ll never run out of phrases because you can create your own
and automatically download new phrases created by others. You
can even save your game and resume it later!

Jig Words http://www.deprice.com/jigwords.htm

Click on letters to spell words and reveal fun photos! There are
two modes to play: “Jig Words” mode challenges you to find all
the possible words and includes exciting “Word Duel” bonus
rounds. “Letter Racing” mode places you in competition with 3
other players to see who can make words the fastest! As you make
words, you’re also revealing hundreds of fun photos and you can
even add your favorite photos right into the game. Plus, you can
create photo packs and easily share them with your friends and
family!

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It is not your fault if popular self-help courses have never worked for you over the long term.

How to get motivated is not adequately dealt with.

Why?

Because generally speaking there are problems with the material you have read and listened to in these courses:

To appeal to a wider audience the self-help experts often leave out the more complex and the more powerful concepts and techniques - the best ones for getting motivated!

Instead you get a burst of short term inspiration that cannot and will not last. While the best material is only taught to a small group of enthusiasts who are willing to pay extra for it.

The irony is that the most powerful techniques, although sometimes unusual, are understandable and effective for most people. As long as you are taught a step-by-step approach you can follow to get motivated.

It is usually the explanation of why it works that leaves people totally confused. But as long as you have the how-to you can start getting results right away and get motivated.

As a result of the decision to leave out the best material you end up learning some simple ideas that work only when you already feel positive and dynamic.

For example, someone tells you to get motivated and to give it your best. If you are feeling unmotivated a pep talk like that will do you very little good.

Imagine what it would be like if instead you could tune in your motivation in the same way you tune in a TV. Well you can once you know how to.

And this is possible for you only when you discover the step by step approach that unleashes the dormant motivation power inside you.

Knowing what to do is very different from knowing how to do it.

Many self help courses teach you what to do but not how to do it or how to stay motivated over time.

As a result you may feel wiser AND more frustrated! At least before you did not know what to do — now you know what to do but cannot do it.

Stay clear of any material that does not focus on the how to of motivation. And make sure you get the key distinctions you need to master the strategies.

For example, we have all heard a lot about the importance of goal setting. And we might even write our goals down and review them from time to time.

But how do you explain your lack of interest in pursuing your goals? Your lack of motivation?

It is because an essential element is missing from the goal setting process.

Unless your goals are in alignment with your highest values and they feel right for you it is highly unlikely you will achieve them.

In fact, you may sabotage your efforts to get ahead. And all your work will be characterized by lethargy and seemingly never ending and tiring effort.

To sum up - look for practical self-motivation material that takes powerful processes and breaks them down into simple step by step systems.

And realize that knowing what to do is pointless unless you know how to.

Spend a little time each day conditioning your mind and you will be astounded at your rapid progress….

Peter Murphy is a peak performance expert. He recently produced a very popular free report, the 5 Step Motivation Report. Apply now because it is available for a limited time only at:
http://www.getmotivatedstaymotivated.com/special.htm

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A woman’s skin is very important. It is important for a woman to have clean, clear radiant skin. There are many simple ways that a woman can keep her skin looking clean, healthy, and beautiful, and we will discuss a few of these ways.

There are many products on the market which can keep the skin looking lovely, better skin product, anti aging skin care products. Not every skin product is not good for all types of skin. A person with oily skin must use a certain type of product which is meant only for oily skin. Cleansers, toners, and make up for oily skin are usually made with alcohol. The alcohol in these products helps to dry out the oil. It is not a good idea for a person with oily skin to moisturize. This can make the problem worse.

When a person has dry skin, it is necessary that she also use products which are specifically designed for dry skin. These products are alcohol free which is necessary for dry skin. The alcohol tends to dry the skin out. Using make up without alcohol is also necessary. It is a good idea for a person with dry skin to moisturize as often as possible with a moisturizer designed for dry skin.

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QUESTION:

I’m subletting an apartment. My landlord wants to evict me for
smoking — and for allowing my guests to smoke, too. The tenant
whom I rent from didn’t mention any rules about smoking, nor
were there any in the tenant’s lease nor in my month-to-month
sublease. I pay rent on time. What are my rights?

ANSWER:

Given the news reports over the harmful effects of tobacco
smoke, some landlords are writing lease and rental agreement
clauses that prohibit smoking, either in the tenant’s unit or
even the entire building. There has not yet been a successful
legal challenge to a clearly written clause.

But it is quite a different animal to rewrite the rules or make
them up smack dab in the middle of the lease. If the original
tenant has a fixed-term lease, the landlord cannot change its
terms until the lease expires. If that tenant rents
month-to-month, the landlord can make a change after giving the
tenant proper notice — that is 30 days in most states.

Now, since you are a subtenant of a tenant with a lease, you
must abide by the terms and conditions of the tenant’s lease.
For example, a no-pets clause in the lease would apply to you.
But you also get to enjoy the rule about no changes mid-lease –
which means that the landlord cannot insist that you stop
smoking. But watch out — if the tenant from whom you rent were
to decide that he didn’t want you to smoke in the apartment, he
could give you proper notice (again, usually 30 days) and you’d
have to comply.

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