There is nothing that can have a more direct impact on your income than your value as an employee. The more you’re worth, the more people are willing to pay for you. It’s as simple as that. So how can you increase your worth and be that ideal employee that an employer would be thrilled to have under them? Being a hard worker is great, but if there are other hard workers that have a wider range of skills they can get the edge over you. Here are some tips that can help you to increase your value as a potential employee.
Learn a New Language
If you love a challenge, learning a language can be very enjoyable. Getting to the stage where you can speak another language is immensely satisfying and can even increase your mental function in older age. It also instantly adds value to your employability as commerce is global and any company that exports products or services will have value in an employee that can communicate with those who can’t speak English.
Major changes happened to education in the 21st century, and now we have a chance to combine the Internet and education to study. Many teachers and professors try a new way of grading students: online assessments. How good and important is this new method of evaluation? In this article, you can find out everything about online education and a new type of testing, as well as the reason why online assessment is effective.
When you’ve made the bold and brave decision to homeschool your children you want to know that the resources you’re using are going to hit the mark. You want to know that what you’re using in your classroom is the most modern, the most well-researched and the best material that you can provide. A home school is not a compromise after all and education is at the forefront of your child’s time spent in the home classroom, alongside their emotional development.
In this review we’re taking a look at some homeschooling resources starting from the very smallest students and upwards. We take a look at some early years resources to get you started, moving on to literacy and numeracy material.
KidSmart is a great new educational app for primary school children from reception, all the way up to year 6 and can also be used for 11+ preparation if you are preparing your child for grammar school entry.
With three children in primary school, and one preschool age, I was really interested to put this app to the test with my kids and have found it to be a great tool for home learning. KidSmart is very comprehensive, covering both Maths and English topics for all ages and is pretty flexible – it adapts to your child, finding the right level for them and automatically generating suitable questions to challenge them.
I was easily able to create four profiles within the app, for each of my children, so that their progress will be tracked separately. They each got a cute little avatar so they can recognise their accounts straight away, and each child can have rewards set up within their account to motivate them to complete the tasks.
You can change these within the parent area, adding any reward that you like, and you can increase the amount of coins you would like them to earn to get it and so on. This did really appeal to the boys, as they saw that it could be a great way to earn little treats that they had been hoping for, and my eldest soon noticed that if he got a certain amount of questions correct in a row, and then all of his questions correct, then he would be rewarded with bonus coins helping him to reach the targets quicker. This can help them to focus and concentrate, as they’re keen to get those top scores and avoid the silly mistakes.
As the children work, as well as gaining coins towards their real word rewards, they will unlock different creatures and characters for maps within the game, which adds a bit of fun and my younger two boys particularly enjoyed this.
These maps are also educational as you do get information on the animals or landmarks that you unlock too, to add a bit of general knowledge.
I also liked them after completing a certain amount of the English or Maths worksheets, each child would unlock some short educational videos too to help break up the work and keep things interesting. These could be on a variety of topics, like Science, or for the youngest children it could be a short video with letter sounds.
There are also some educational games included that they can choose to play on at any time.
While working through the worksheets within the app, if the children do get an answer wrong or are not sure then there are hints and explanations provided if needed
Or if more input is needed you can even flag the question and get more in depth question from a real life tutor within the app. This is not something we tried ourselves as yet, as the boys found that they were able to understand the work with the written explanations and with me at home to help them as needed, but it is definitely an interesting concept to have tutors available within the app itself.
As a parent, you can also get a great over view of your child’s work and see which areas and topics they need more work on and how they are progressing, as well as getting reports of exactly what tasks they have been completing each day.
KidSmart is an easy to use app, both for kids and parents. We really liked how comprehensive it is, and it has a great balance of in depth learning, fun, and motivation for the kids with the real world reward system.
To find out more, and to get a whopping 20% discount for anyone registering before the end of February, head over to www.kidsmartapp.co.uk and click on ‘Get Early Access’. Then as soon as the app is live (which will be by the end of February) you will be sent the link to the app store to download it!
We were provided with pre-launch access to the app in order to test it out and share our review
There’s no question about the fact that learning a second language is good for your child (and for you for what matters.) A growing body of evidence shows that children who study a foreign language get better grades than those that speak just one language. Moreover, they do better than their monolingual counterparts on standardized tests, both in math and oral exams.
Experts claim that learning a new language rewires the brain by forcing it to mimic the brain patterns of native speakers.
Improved cognitive and analytical abilities, better communication, an increased sense of self-worth are also among the many benefits of learning a foreign language.
By now, you’re convinced that teaching your child a foreign language is probably the best thing you can do for their development. But, when is the best time to learn a second language?
Songs and rhymes are a great way for young children and babies to learn, whether it’s to help them learn and remember particular concepts like the days of the week or colours, or just to help them develop their language skills in general.
Nowadays with the internet, parents are spoilt for choice with so many videos easily available especially on YouTube but it can be hard to know where are the best places to find quality content. Recently I heard about ChuChu TV which is easily among the most popular for children’s entertainment, with over 6 million subscribers. The channel is home to animated performances of well-known nursery rhymes and other kids’ songs, and has a great selection of over 130 fun and colourful educational videos for the little ones to enjoy.
Does music benefit the learning process? Yes, it does. Research made it clear years ago that learning musical chords can help pass college boards.
It’s Not “Just” Music
Studies have shown that learning music not only benefits the learning process, but it also strengthens skills kids use in other subject areas. Learning music basically makes kids access numerous skill sets (quite often simultaneously). For example, children use their eyes and ears as well as large and small muscles. It is a stimulating and integrating activity.
Not everyone will know where their nearest Forest School is, indeed not everyone will have ever heard of Forest Schools. I hadn’t until we started looking for a pre school for my little boy.
Like most parents I imagine, I envisaged the start of Pre School to involve a brightly coloured room full of toys, tables with colouring and sticking activities, and a room full of noisy children.
That was, until I was told about a local Nursery/Pre school run entirely outdoors. ‘The School In The Woods’ was a complete surprise to me, and yet it made perfect sense both in it’s values and in the way it worked practically.
This Fine Motor Sun Craft is from our contributor Nicola at Craftykidsathome.com
The sun has been shining high in the sky over here in Ireland, so I have been busy pegging out lots of washing on our washing line. Bella has been very keen to help me out and with a boost up from a little step, she has been happily pegging out some of her own clothes.
Opening and closing pegs is a great activity for preschoolers, as it gives the muscles in their fingers a great workout, helping to strengthen their fine motor skills. Bella starts big school after the summer holidays, so we have been doing lots of fine motor work at home to get her hands strong and ready for learning to write.
And all of that pegging out in the sunshine inspired this fun Fine Motor Sun Craft, which works on building fine motor and number recognition skills.
To help your child to use his or her full potential and achieve great things in school and after it, it’s very important to understand their learning abilities. Not all children are created equal which is why they have different learning abilities and different potential. Understanding this learning potential enables you and teachers to create a unique approach that will help your boy or girl flourish, motivated to learn more, and learn better. In this article, we’re going to discuss learning abilities and how to determine them.
Learning styles
Term Learning styles refer to different ways in which every person learns, processes, and retains information. Toddlers and young children primarily learn from hands-on experiences such as moving, touching, or doing. As your child grows up you will start to notice his or her strengths and preferences. These preferences and strengths tell you more about your child’s learning abilities and preferred learning style.
