Although it’s only the week before Easter, before you know it school will be out for the summer. When we were young many of us spent our summers hanging out with friends on stoops, in the park, at the beach or community pool, or, only if our parents or teachers insisted, in summer school. Today there is a dizzying [...]
Eighty-two percent of children between the ages of 14 and 17 use social networks, according to the Pew Internet and American Life Project. A generation ago, parents could monitor their children’s’ social activity much more easily. Today, with the proliferation of social networks such as Facebook, Bebo, Myspace and Formspring and the ubiquity of computers and smartphones, your kids [...]
Here’s an idea for family fun this Spring Break season or on any rainy weekend: board games. Sounds corny, perhaps, but you can have a great time playing board games with your children. It is a golden opportunity to spend time together without any screens, and a good way to build skills, confidence and good sportsmanship (which you must [...]
It’s 9pm, and my middle schooler suddenly remembers that he has a history quiz tomorrow. Where is that study sheet? Crumpled up at the bottom of his backpack, or left in his locker? At 9:30 we find it, buried under one of the many piles of papers on my desk, where it has been for the last two days. [...]
Are Black and Hispanic college educated parents doing all that they should to help their children learn? Ask Dr. Ronald Ferguson, Harvard professor and director of Harvard’s Achievement Gap Initiative, and he will point to Table A8 in his book Towards Excellence With Equity: An Emerging Vision for Closing the Achievement Gap (Harvard Education Press, 2007), which justifies the [...]
Patricia H. Shimm, author of "Parenting Your Toddler: The Expert's Guide to the Tough and Tender Years", has run the Barnard College Center for Toddler Development for over 20 years and knows the benefits of parent groups. Shimm established parent groups as part of the Toddler Center program since its inception, and has run scores of them for decades. [...]
Dr. Tammy Mann, Executive Director of the Frederick D. Patterson Research Institute at the United Negro College Fund, leads the Institute’s efforts to improve educational opportunities and outcomes for African American children from preschool through college. While many of the Institute’s programs are gender neutral, she is acutely aware of the need to focus on boys. “On UNCF campuses [...]
Wendy Van Amson is the co-founder of the Independent Schools Diversity Network (“ISDN”), an alliance of parents and educators dedicated to facilitating diversity efforts within the New York City independent school community. Wendy and her co-founder Esther Hatch formed ISDN in 2003. Wendy and her husband have three children: a daughter who is a college sophomore, a daughter who [...]