The new Nike ad campaign featuring Colin Kaepernick has everyone talking, and we should be talking to our children about it. As you probably know, Nike has made Kaepernick the face of its 30th anniversary campaign. Kaepernick announced this a few days ago by tweeting a close up of his face, with the message "Believe in something. Even if [...]
GCP co-hosted the Back-to-School #ReadinessCheck Chat last Wednesday, along with @BeALearningHero, @GreatSchools, @NationalPTA and other education advocates. This lively session offered a lot of great suggestions as to how parents can best help their children to be ready for a strong start to the school year. Here are some of the highlights: How to Prep For the New School [...]
On June 14, 2017, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden (one of the subjects of last week's Thoughtful Thursday) appointed Tracy K. Smith as the twenty-second United States Poet Laureate. In case you were wondering, the U.S. Poet Laureate serves as the official poet of the United States, and seeks to promote a greater national appreciation of the reading and [...]
Don't you just love a good public library? Those of us born in the pre-internet world fondly remember wandering up and down the isles of the local public library, looking for the next great read or the critical info for that paper due too soon. Public libraries today have adapted to the new digital world and are still going [...]
GCP parents, it's time to get focused on helping our sons and daughters get ready for their best school year yet. Here are some helpful resources: Readiness Check: You know what grades your kids got last year, but how much of the material do they confidently understand? Does a C in math for the semester mean that your child [...]
The selection of today's Thoughtful Thursday offering, "The First Book" by the celebrated poet Rita Dove, was inspired by yesterday's post about LeBron James' wonderful new IPromise public school in Akron Ohio. The school is designed to inspire middle school students who are performing below their grade levels. Helping them with reading skills will surely be an important part [...]
GCP Parents, hope you and your families are having a great summer! Now is a good time to focus on making sure that your children start the school year right. Have you been combatting summer slide with your children? If not, there is still time. Wherever you are in this process, we've got tips to make it easier. Several [...]
Did you know that today is National Summer Learning Day? (We didn’t either, and thanks to Bill Lewis for bringing this to GCP’s attention.) With over 6 weeks to go until the end of August, there is still plenty of time to encourage your son or daughter to focus on sharpening his or her skills during the summer. No [...]
The American Academy of Pediatrics recently released a statement encouraging parents to ban direct screen time (television, movies, and any portable screen device) for children under two years of age. The Academy explained, “This updated policy statement provides further evidence that media — both foreground and background — have potentially negative effects and no known positive effects for children [...]
How many times have your heard your child say "Ugh, I can't get this!" or "This will never work!" and throw down his pencil in dismay? While your first instinct might be to rush over to try to help fix the problem, or to encourage your child by saying "you're so smart, you can figure it out", researchers say [...]