Category: KD Novelties

How Do I Keep My Kids Reading During the Summer?

Posted on | by KD Novelties

Now that the end of school year is in sight, kids are probably gearing up for the summer holiday. The summer months are when most families go on vacation, relax and spend time with one another. The season may go by in the blink of an eye for parents, but summers can feel quite long for kids, and it’s a rather long time for kids to go without reading. In order to keep kids on the reading level they finished with in the school year, it is important that parents remember to keep reading a constant throughout the summer vacation in order to keep their kids’ minds sharp and ready to learn once the new school year rolls around.

Encourage Them to Keep a Journal
If your summer is full of family time, trips and vacations, then a great way to maintain your kid’s reading skills and even enhance them is to inspire them to write. Ask them to write about your adventures as a family. Encourage them to share their thoughts, memories and experiences. Even though writing is not the same as reading, it uses the same parts of the brain and even helps to improve reading and comprehension skills. If you want, you can ask your kids to read you their entries once they’ve finished or at the end of the summer to look back on everything, while also bolstering their reading skills.

Read Before Bed

One of the best ways to help kids build a strong relationship with reading is to make it a habit. Having books around makes them a part of their life, especially their life at home, but actively reading books as a part of their day can help instill reading as a daily activity that will continue for years and years to come. Share a story before bed, or pick a chapter book to read a section from each night throughout the summer. Take turns reading, act out scenes, and do the voices to make it more exciting and interesting.

Read Everything, Read Everywhere

Reading does not have to occur with books alone. Encourage your kids to read road signs that you pass on the highway, teach them how to read a map, ask them what’s written on the cereal box they eat from every morning, or even ask them to read off the ingredients for the recipes you whip up for your next summer barbecue. Reading is an invaluable skill and it is used to help people understand letters, pay bills, and make a plethora of other daily decisions. Reading other things can help kids understand a broader range of concepts and ideas and can help encourage them to read everything everywhere they go. It can help prevent them from getting lost, accidentally eating something that they may be allergic too, or it could help them read the signs and labels they see every day.

Summer Reading
Many schools and classrooms now incorporate summer reading as a means to help make sure that kids read during the long break. Some schools may provide specific lists for certain teachers or grades whereas other schools may simply provide a list of recommendations with incentives to read as many books on the list as possible. The last thing that most kids want to think about over the summer vacation is homework, but there are ways in which you can make reading fun and interesting. First off, you can incorporate any of the ideas above: ask your kids to start a journal about the things they read, encourage them to read with you every day, act out scenes and storylines, draw and color pictures of characters and places from the books they have to read, or even offer incentives of your own for every book that they complete on their own. Choose a personalized book where they will star as the main character, this will sure get them excited about reading too!

Reading is vital and it is a skill-set that helps people learn about so many other things. A love of books is often synonymous with a love of learning; so make sure that you keep your children up to speed with their reading over the summer and to help them enjoy the process, too.

How To Choose A Daycare

Posted on | by KD Novelties

There will undoubtedly come a time when, as a parent, you may need to make arrangements to find a daycare center. Whether you need to go back to work or are working on a degree, or have other errands to run, you will want to find a trustworthy place where you can send your child and know that they are safe. There are several things that you should look for and insist upon when it comes to choosing the right place for your child to attend. But first, you should make sure that you visit and inspect any location that you may be considering so that you can give it a thorough assessment.

Do Your Research
This goes for just about anything, and with the help of the internet you are sure to find most of the resources that you will need in order to do a thorough search on a variety of different places in your area. Not only will you be able to look for basic necessities from your own personal wish list, but the most important part about the research process are the reviews. Even if a daycare looks to meet all of your needs and wants, reviews may help paint a better picture in terms of how well the facility provides those needs and executes them. Be wary, however, and make sure to be thorough. Sometimes not everything you read is true. Word of mouth and other forms of recommendation can help as well.

Take a Tour
Most, if not all, daycares and preschools offer tours to interested parents and guardians. While touring these locales, it is important that you pay attention to certain things. Make sure that you look at how clean the floor, surfaces and other items are. See if you can catch children and/or employees interacting and see how they handle situations. Pay attention to the size of group activities, how many children are under the care of a single individual and how much of the supplies, toys, equipment and other necessities are allocated – are caregivers strapped for space or other items? Is there enough room for the kids? Do they have enough toys, activities and attention?

Ask Questions
Whether you’re taking a tour, talking on the phone or communing in some other fashion, it is important that you ask the right questions.  Pay attention to the answers you are given and that you note the manner in which they were given as well. Listening to how a person responds to your queries, what sort of language and tone of voice they use, will tell you a lot. Try to gauge how genuine these answers are, how accurate, and how sincere.

Go With Your Gut
In the end, it is still important to heed your own feelings as well as your using your own judgment.  If something feels off, then look into it and maybe move on. Make sure that “bad feelings” do not go unnoticed or overlooked. Intuition can help you a great deal, and when it comes to caring for your child there is no such thing as being too thorough.

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Is Your Child Ready To Be Left Home Alone and Should You Leave Them?

Posted on | by KD Novelties

There will come a time when parents are faced with the decision to leave their children at home on their own. Whether an emergency calls for the circumstance or your child asks to be trusted with the responsibility, a parent will be faced with this situation at some point. There are plenty of things that you need to consider.

Legal Factors
Is your child old enough to be left alone on their own?

Compliments of Kids Health.org

There are only three states in the US that require a child be of a certain age before being left at home alone. In Illinois, children need to be 14 years old in order to be left alone, in Maryland 8 and in Oregon 10. Just because the other states do not have any official age restriction does not mean that there aren’t other things that you need to consider. There are other child protection laws in place that you need to be aware of and you can look to these laws when it comes to determining when it may be appropriate for you to leave your children at home alone.

Taking on Responsibility
Are they mature enough?
If your state does not identify a certain age as being appropriate to leave a child at home, you will need to use your own discretion. Some children mature quicker than others, but as a parent you will need to use your judgement as well as your own knowledge and familiarity with your children to know whether or not they can handle being alone on their own. Children should be relatively self-sufficient, well-behaved and they should also know what to do in an emergency.

Being Prepared
Do they know what to do in the event of an emergency?
In the event that something should happen, it is important that you trust your children to take care of themselves and do the right thing. Do they know who to call in the event of an emergency? Do they know what numbers to call and what to say? Do they know what to do about strangers, people coming to the door, or answering the phone if it rings? These things are all good to know, and even though no one wants to think that anything will happen while they are away, it is always important that kids are prepared regardless.

Setting Ground Rules
What can or can’t they do?
You should also make sure that your kids know what is and isn’t allowed. Depending on their age and skill level, are they allowed to cook? Can they have friends over? Can they use the computer? And if they are watching younger siblings, make sure that they are aware of what the younger kids can and cannot do as well, and make sure that they know how to be authoritative and responsible in an appropriate way with younger siblings, as well.

There are many things that you need to keep in mind as a parent, and sometimes you will learn new things like rules and exceptions once you begin to experience letting your child stay at home alone. But remember, the most important thing is to trust and know your child before making any big decisions when it comes to giving them such a responsibility.

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