But then I remember swim lessons….

We had spent 2 summers in swim lessons.  Totally charming her teachers into a random bubble blow and possibly a dunk.  She HATED swimming, and we live in an area where I hear about kids drowning ALL the time.

She absolutely HATED these swim lessons. There were constant tears by her and every other kid..  So many pleas to go potty, so many pleas to get her out.

And then she swam.  And I’ve never seen such pride in a child of mine.  Something she TOTALLY thought she couldn’t do – -something she actually feared.  She conquered it.

I used to have a video in here, but she’s a teenager now, and it’s just not cool to do that. But I can’t tell you the pride that beamed through those kids by the end of the week.

They so desperately wanted to quit, but we knew it was best if they stayed…..

We can do hard things.

Now, not every event is something you can blow in their face and shove them under water and hope they come up with a ring.

Just recently I had a child try out for the school play.  This particular child pretty well thinks he walks on water.  He can do no wrong and is probably the best and the brightest that God ever made.

I do my best to cut him down, but sometimes I forget, and this was one of those times.

He thought for sure he’d be a lead or perhaps he’d just be the director and the teachers would just bow to him. {sigh}

He got a small supporting role — which was actually great for someone his age.

But all heck broke loose.

“MOM, if I can’t be the lead I don’t want to be in it at all.”

{insert fierce mamma dragon eyes}  I couldn’t believe my kid was saying this.

So, here’s a few tips for kids who want to quit:

 Soften the blow

When you see something that might challenge your child, maybe remember to mention this is going to be tough.  Maybe put that birdie in their ear that things might not go according to plan.  

This is my downfall with the play.  In order to get him excited to try out, I talked about the main characters and how fun it would be.  I failed to mention that he’s young and he’s likely to NOT be a main character. #fail

Before we keep going, I gotta give a plug for making thick margins in your life. You often need more “room” in your life to manage thing like this. Getting into routines makes a BIG difference — I’ve found it allows my family to help out more when we’re in routines:

Symphathize

Tell them that life often sucks, things are hard.  I’m pretty sure you could insert a story or two about your own life sucking.  Yes, this is hard.  I can see why you’d want to quit, I might even feel that same way too.  I sure do love you, and I’m sorry you can’t go through this.

Wish with them

I read this in a book once and it’s one of my favorite parenting techniques.  “I wish I was magical and could make it so ________ could happen (or not happen).”  It’s just showing them that it would take an act of magic, which you do not posess.  It’s a favorite standby of my own, it works well with quitters.

Talk about what will happen if they quit

Talk about the real life consequences.  For swimming, it would be that I would find her face down in someone’s pool, dead as a doornail.  She was 3, so I chose not to lean that direction.  

In reality, I didn’t have a quitting talk with her.  I mostly sypathized.  

For the play we talked about how the teacher would feel, and if it would hurt his chances of being in future plays if he was unwilling to play a smaller role.  We talked about how it would look to his friends.  We talked about how he would feel inside when he saw all of his friends having a great time doing it and he wasn’t.

Talk about how great it will be if they don’t quit

For the play we talked about how much fun it would be.  We were able to talk with someone who’d been in these plays before and he mentioned what an amazing time he’d had, even though he was never a lead.  That really helped.

If possible, leave the choice up to them.

After all the talking, I left the choice up to him.  This wasn’t a life or death thing, it was early and he hadn’t committed to a choice that it would really hurt others.  This would only hurt him if he dropped out.  He chose to stay in.  For swim lessons, there was never a choice.  It was me shoving her in the pool area and looking away.  Thank goodness for wonderful swim teachers.

I think that quitting is sometimes the best option.  But I think they need to have the full perspective (as shown above) before they can really make that type of choice.

Follow-up

A week or so after the decision was made, follow-up to see how the decision worked out for them.  This is a key step.  He might want to quit something later, and hopefully I can remind him what a good choice it was to stay in.

**I will say that we’ve had kids drop out of band half way through the season and it is a HUGE issue for everyone involved.  You really need to make it clear all the people they’re hurting by their decision.  They also need to be willing to take whatever consequences it brings.  

Things like a failing grade might come along with it.  Be sure to detail those possible outcomes with your kids so they can see the full picture (something kids are not great at).  Lara at Overstuffed has a great post about quitting music lessons on her blog.  I really like it.

Dealing with a quitter can bring out the mamma bear in so many ways.  Mad because they’re quitting, and mad at the group because you love your baby bear.  And mad because her porridge is always cold.  The key is showing the big picture.  They’re small, they need someone higher-up who knows what the big picture looks like.

Be sure to join my practical parenting newsletter for small parenting tips that can make a difference:

This post was originally written in November 2015, but has been updated.

The post 7 MomHacker Tips For When Your Child Wants to Quit appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Before we get going if you’re looking to make a good start on the new school year, don’t miss my course Family Routines. It’s meant to organize those PEOPLE so you do LESS. Sound good? Come join!

Ok, onto the list:

Back to School Dates

Do you have the list of dates that you’ll need for the school year — those include:

• Meet the Teacher Night
• Schedule Pick-up or Book Pick-up (or the day to pay fees boooo)
• Any meetings that usually happen before school
• First day of school (obviously)

New to the school and not sure what to watch for, find a mom in your neighborhood (bonus points if they go to your school) and ask them. You can also call the school and hopefully find a nice secretary who can help you out.

When we moved to a new school, when I went in they gave me a paper with dates….

A lot of districts have the calendar for the next few years already set — if you find them, just print them out now!

School Supplies

What types of school supplies will you need?

Personally, I’m a fan of waiting until I have a list. Would I much prefer to get them in the summer when the supplies are all fresh and new, yes — but often I need a RED folder, a TURQUOISE folder, and I knew I’d get them colors wrong — so I just wait to go til’ I get a list.

Some schools don’t have required supplies (bless you)…. so, you’ll need to find out if your school is going to give you a list, or if you’re just on your own.

Teenage Pro Tip: My kids all organized in their own way, so I tried to let them do their own thing and not conform to the binder system that worked for me in high school…. There’s LOTS of ways to organize your life, and using systems that work for YOU work the best.

Another pro tip is that things don’t need to be new. Get kids used to using the same binder until it’s worn-out (or goes missing). So many people want ALL new stuff at the beginning of the year, but teach your kids to replace as needed rather than just mindlessly buying the things every year.

That’s how a house ends-up with 20 pair of school scissors. I speak from experience.

While you’re here — check out practical parenting — my free parenting series

School Clothes

Ok, clothes. Once again, you’re filling-in needs here. I always found the beginning of school to be a smart time to buy new undies and socks since we were at the store, but kids do NOT need a whole new wardrobe for school.

I have a post on how many clothes kids need you might find helpful, and another one on your back to school wardrobe.

I don’t want to discount the “cool” feeling you get when you’re in an outfit you’re feeling like the bee’s knees in. I try to get my kids one or two new outfits. We also talk a lot about first impressions and how we want to start with our best foot forward in the new year (aka, no nasty sayings on our T-shirts… for instance).

Lunch Plans

What’s your plans for lunch?

Will you buy buying school lunch? Make sure how to fund that if you need to.

Will you be taking lunch from home? Now’s a great time to get kids in the habit of making their own lunches and getting some ideas of things they like.

I am a HUGE Fan of kids taking as much of the effort in making their own lunches as possible. From about 2nd grade on I am hands off in the experience besides buying things.

I have thrown SO much lunch away, at this point I hope to get a fruit or veg (mostly fruit, if I’m honest), a protein, and a treat.

I have ultimately highlighted these things for myself:

• My kids are only going to eat what they want regardless of what I send
• I want my kids happy and enjoying lunch
• The responsibility of learning to make your own lunch is priceless.

This isn’t to say that I don’t sometimes step-in and make something special for my kid’s lunch. BUT that’s special, not the routine.

Sometimes I’d make kababs, or a special sandwich and they felt it extra because not only was it something extra fun, but it was also work they didn’t have to do. like a fairy Godmother.

BTW, I have a whole lunch section in here to help you help your kids take responsibility!

After School Expectations

Summer is a great time to talk about expectations for after school once school starts (obviously, just in the week before they come home). If backpacks are expected to go to rooms (that’s what it is in my house) then we talk about that — and explain why that’s going to work best.

Will you be picking up, will you be taking home?

We have actually done “dry runs” with new Kindergarteners, where we got up at school time, got dressed, made a lunch, and headed to school to play on the playground. It’s served us well and sometimes gets out those jitters new Kindergartners can have (as well as new Kindergarten moms).

Grab my editable after school checklist right here:

Transportation Plans

Are you hoping to carpool, will kid be walking, biking or will you be driving daily.

I am a HUGE fan of giving kids as much control over the “getting to school” experience as you can. For us, that’s meant a lot of biking to school, sometimes with friends, or a parent, and sometimes alone once they were proficient.

Set-up carpool plans, check what time school is starting, and solidify what time you should be getting out of the house to be on time.

Chill Time

I tend to keep our summers pretty structured. But, the last week before school I let me kids just do what they want. They get up a little later (may not always be the best choice), I am looser with screen time, and friend time.

Everyone just needs to chill out before school starts, so don’t forget to allow that.

I sometimes felt like the structure was so important, I forget that not having structure sometimes reminds us how great that structure is.

One on One Time

I tried to take my kids out on a one-on-one date before school started. We’d get a back to school outfit, talk about any worries over a Wetzel’s pretzel at the mall…. it was just a good time to gauge what I needed to watch for.

I am a huge fan of the times we spent together, even if shopping with a 7 year old boy does feel like pure torture…. it doesn’t last forever. {but yes, it SEEMS like it will last forever}

I am in the sunsetting years of my time at school. My youngest is in high school, but watching my kids progress at school, helping teachers and other students at school has been one of my favorite things of being a mom.

If you’re a mom that’s new to the school system I can’t tell you what a fantastic journey you’re in for. Yes, there are a lot of limitations to school, but I encourage you to lift where you stand — to help out where you can, and help your kid see that school is important to you too.

Check out my post on the 5 things mom needs to do before Kindergarten.

School starting has always been my time to get new routines into place. Family Routines is the internet’s favorite ways to get your family to help out more (or even just get them going). Don’t miss your chance to sign up here:

What did I miss? Tell me any special back to school traditions you have!

The post School Essentials Checklist for Mom appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Note: This post is sponsored by Uber teen accounts. All thoughts and opinions expressed are my own. Big thanks to them for helping busy parents rest a little easier knowing their child will not be stranded. I am grateful for services like theirs for our busy families.

Panic sets-in when you can’t pick-up your teen

You know the feeling. You’re busy doing something and realize your teenager needs to be somewhere, and they need you to transport them.

Many parents have limited options, and it’s amazing that we now have something that can save us – Uber teen accounts! Be it sports, school, drama – they can request a ride to get them where they need to go.

For me, I have a real fear that my daughter is caught in a position where she’s uncomfortable and wants to leave, but can’t get a hold of me to come get her. Maybe it’s the mall, or with friends, or even an after school situation that she just doesn’t like. This allows her to have a way to remove herself from those instances with an option we as a family trust, which provides a lot of relief for busy moms of teens.

Options for parents:

We know parents have a village that is helping them out especially when it comes to giving their teens rides… they can be:

• A Neighbor (requires so much planning and coordination)
• Have the kid wait (is staying wherever they are actually better?)
• Another parent
• Take Public Transportation (if available)
• Grandparents
• Getting a ride with a teenage friend who has a license (parent nerves!)
  

But, while many of us have some of those options available, they don’t always work.  Maybe you don’t know anyone on their team yet, or you’re in a city without parents or family help – those parents have emergencies happen too! I’m so glad this is an option.

Creating an Uber teen account

Easily invite your teen to your family profile (you have lots of control)

Click on the person icon labeled “Account” near the bottom of the screen. Then you’ll see “Family and teens” come up. Once you click on that, you’ll be prompted to add your teen along with their phone number to invite them to join the family profile. 

Then, once they install the app, they will confirm that’s them and will need to accept the invitation to be added to your account. 

This does mean that they will have access to your payment methods saved to the app as well (so we set some really clear boundaries)! Each teen ride is paid for using the parent’s default payment method. 

Once they’re in there they can request a ride themselves.

Good news: Get 40% (up to $15) off 3 Uber Teen rides. Valid for the first 30 days for new users in select locations. See app for terms.

Were teen accounts created with safety in mind?

This is always the big question about our kids. Is this really a trustworthy option? We’ve been buckling these kids into 5 point restraints for YEARS and now we just let them in the car with a stranger? Let’s talk about the ways that Uber looks out for them and what enhanced safety features are involved.

Only highly-rated drivers are matched with teens

Only highly-rated drivers are given teen passengers, and Uber protects ALL parents by ensuring that drivers matched to teen accounts have undergone rigorous background checks. That means that the driver has already driven many clients and has been found to be trustworthy through their vetting process. It’s that extra layer we’re looking for with our kids.

Can parents track Uber trips? – Follow them on the app with real-time status updates

You can follow your child in real-time on the app. You can see them get picked up and dropped off in real-time. Makes you feel safer that they’re being taken care of.

Must sit in the back seat (and be buckled)

Teen riders must sit in the back seat and be buckled. This would be a good one to review with them at the time of signing-up on the app to clear-up the fact that dad sometimes sits by the driver when you’re all together, but they need to sit in the back.

I also tell my kids I always sit in the back when possible, it just gives me and the driver some space from each other.

Real time ride sensing monitors their rides for any issues

Uber has a safety feature called RideCheck
that will monitor for any issues along the way. If their ride goes off course, stops unexpectedly, or ends early RideCheck sends a notification to both your teen and the driver to make sure they’re okay. Often, if you need someone to get your kid you may not be able to follow along every minute of their ride – so RideCheck will monitor them for you too.

Uber Age Requirement to Ride

You have to be 13 or older to use Uber teen accounts. Also, your child ages 13 to 17 must have permission from a parent or legal guardian. I added her to my family profile and then she was able to download and join my account.

FYI, in order to get your own Uber account you have to be 18.  

Parents can contact the driver in the app

You can also contact the driver on the app, just in case there’s any miscommunication or issues that arise. Makes that handy for parents.

Unique Pin

Before a teen gets in the car for a trip, they’ll be prompted to give their driver a unique one-time PIN. Drivers will not be able to start the trip until they enter the correct code into their app, providing an extra layer of protection to ensure teens get into the right car with the right driver.

However, I think it’s important to teach kids proper etiquette for their rideshare right off the bat. Make sure they know to check the license plate # and then ask who they’re here for, along with giving the PIN when they accept a ride.

Our Experience with Uber teen accounts

Of course, we wanted to give it a try – so we had my daughter request a ride to a local ice cream place (we wanted to do a trial trip somewhere when she was calm and not nervous).

Initially, I struggled to navigate the app, but once I refreshed, I was able to use the live trip tracking feature under “Activity.” I could see when she was waiting to be picked up as well as when she was headed home – I could track her the whole way. It also gave me the option to contact 911 or call safety support at any point along the way.

Here is what my screen looked like:

This is what you tap on to see that:

The process was super smooth. They confirmed her name and then asked for the unique pin to start the ride. Once the driver confirmed all details were a match, they were off, and I could see her along the way!

A few things I wondered:

Was it more expensive than a “regular” trip: No, I looked up how much it cost for me to take a trip right then and it was the same amount.

How was her driver: Both of her drivers were close to 5 stars and obviously had done lots of trips.

She said it was easy peasy, and she would be willing to do it if she ever found herself in a situation she needed away from (but couldn’t get hold of me).

Discuss Using Uber With Your Teen Before Set-Up

I would definitely recommend having a discussion with your teen while you are setting up their end of the account. Things to consider during this time are:

• Who pays for the ride – the parent
• Times it would be appropriate to use it
• How to safely use it
• How the drivers can have audio recording on their end for both of their safety so they need to be aware of that
• Can they bring friends (one other person over the age of 13 is allowed on the ride).

How you can use Uber teen accounts:

There are a few ways that you can use Uber teen accounts:

After school program transportation

Don’t let your kids miss out on their beloved after-school activities because you can’t make pick-up at the random after-school times.  

Your ride to school service

Have a late night shift or an early morning meeting – Uber teen accounts can help get children to school drop off!

How to pick up a kid from school when working?

Can’t make pick-up? Uber can help! These before and after school transportation services just make a difference when parents can’t do it themselves. Remember both YOU or your child can trigger the ride for them.

Teach Kids how to Use Uber Effectively

Make sure you are doing this service for your child as they embark on using rideshare services on their own. I see a lot of adults using Uber without going the extra mile to take necessary precautions… so make sure that they know to:

• Match License Plates
• Ask the driver who they are here for (don’t give your name first)
• Use the PIN as provided with Uber teen accounts.

And, make sure that you are modeling this behavior as you use Uber when you take trips with your teen. We’ve gotten to the point that when I pull-up after drama club my daughter says “Who are you here for?” just to be that teenager – but I’m glad she knows. This is definitely not meant to be your ONLY kid transportation, but it is there if you need it.

What do you think – would you use Uber for teenagers? I think it’s a great option!  Remember you can get 40% (up to $15) off 3 Uber Teen rides, valid for the first 30 days for new users in select locations. See app for terms.

The post Using Uber teen accounts for Back To School appeared first on Pulling Curls.

I think these tips are going to save you time, save you money and help give your kids some clothes-confidence that you need in a room with strangers.

#1 Use Stitch Fix Kids

Lots of moms know about Stitch Fix for THEM but we’ve actually had really good luck with Stitch Fix for Kids!

We’ve found that there are a few key perks to Stitch fix KIDS (vs how we use it as an adult)

1. You get 10 items, so it gives you a nice amount of variety
2. Items are much cheaper for kids than they are for adults. Shirts run $10-20, jeans in the $25 range. It’s nice. PLUS is you get all 5 items, you can save 25%.
3. Even with 10 items, our box is usually well under $200 if we purchase all 10 items.
4. The clothes aren’t the ones from Target or Costco that many kids are wearing, it gives them items others won’t have.
5. The stylists often send things I wouldn’t normally pick out, and my daughter has had chance to try on some different things, and really figure out her own style.

A few tips for getting a good box:

• Be sure to fill-out the information thoroughly upon sign-up. Be as specific as you can be.
• When you schedule a fix be sure to tell your stylist exactly what your child needs. Do they not need shorts, but really need t-shirts, be as specific as you can.
• If there’s something you do not want from Stitch Fix (aka, shoes) be sure to mention that in the note
• If you have to return items, be as specific as you can as to why you didn’t like/need the item.
• If you have signed-up before, make sure you check out your kid’s sizes before you have them send a box.

We don’t use this for all our clothes, it is a fun way to splurge. We get a box twice a year. Once before school and then one in early fall for some more wintery clothes. So, keep reading, I have more tips!

#2 Don’t Fill-Up in the Fall

For us, it’s crazy hot at the beginning of the school year. We already have summer clothes, so I prefer to get a couple of things (stay tuned for that) but not fill their wardrobe before school starts.

I’d rather pick up things throughout the year that they like.

I’m always on the hunt for clothes at stores like Costco, Target, etc. If you just buy a few pieces each month you don’t have to splurge a bunch before school starts.

This really helps our budget since back to school is pretty pricey with school fees and school supplies eating a lot of it.

However, looking your best helps with confidence, which is why I always….

#3 Get a First Day Outfit

While we don’t fill our bureau before school starts, I do like to get each child a first day outfit. Sometimes that includes a pair of shoes and underwear/socks if they need it.

We go to the store and make a date of it, it’s a fun tradition and I think those new clothes give kids some confidence to what can be a very nerve-wracking day.

If the budget is tight, just set what the kid can spend. Or, just get a new shirt instead of with pants. One new item still feels great (I speak from experience).

#4 Make Sure to Take Inventory

Whatever you do, make SURE to take stock of what your child HAS (and fits) before you make any school choices. I have children’s clothing inventory that you can use to make sure you don’t go overboard with clothes!

Before you go, a few truths for you to know:

1. Buying used is a big win. Not only does it save clothes that might go to the landfill and gives them new life. It saves money and allows you to get much more bang for your buck (because we’ve used Goodwill since my daughter was a tiny kid she thinks it’s just very normal)
2. Kids really don’t need a ton of clothes. It just gives you more to wash and more to clutter their dressers, so restraint can save you in the long run on this!
3. Remember your CHILD needs to feel great in the clothes, not you — so try to find a happy medium between what you like and what they like. It’s easy to get caught in those battles (but, you’re paying so I agree that you ultimately get to win anything you just want to veto).

And, if you’d like to get into good routines like these, be sure to join me in Family Routines where we have tips for clothes, lunches and even after school as well!

The post 4 Easy Secrets to Creating an A+ School Wardrobe for Your Kids appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Disclosure: This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Cricut. The opinions and text are all mine.

My kids are heading back to school soon and this year they’re required to have a lot of their own school supplies. We decided to break out our Cricut Joy to do the labeling. From pens to vinyl there are a lot of fun ways to personalize back to school supplies with Cricut Joy. Also, you guys remember that the Joy is my FAVORITE product to use (you’ll see it pop up in my Instagram now and then) because it’s SO easy to take out, use and PUT AWAY. Organizers love it!

Why Cricut Joy for Back to School labels?

The great thing about labeling school supplies is they’re small. You don’t need to cut something 11″ wide so you don’t need to have a larger Cricut machine. You know I love the Cricut Joy and the smart materials make projects like labels so quick and easy (see my pantry project here).

For my labels I’m using a variety of materials; vinyl, writable vinyl, pens and even a piece of faux leather. Have you seen the new Foil Transfer Tool for the Cricut Joy? I’m going to show you how to use it to create a luggage tag that can be added to a backpack.

Small Label for School Supplies

When it comes to your child’s school supplies like water bottles, lunch boxes, pencil cases, and other kid’s school gear you want to make sure that each school item has at least their last name on it. Depending on where you buy your school items, your kids might have the same items as a lot of other students. If their things have custom name labels on them, it will be easy for them to make sure they are grabbing the right stuff each day.

Making small kids labels for these items is super easy with the Cricut Joy, and it doesn’t take a lot of time. You can make several of the same name stickers that they can just stick labels on all their items or you can let them get creative and you can help them create their own design for name tags that they can put on different items. 

If you are going to need waterproof labels for things like sippy cups, lunch containers, or sports equipment, you’ll want to use permanent vinyl and make sure you give it time to set completely and make sure you hand wash so they don’t peel. Also, if you need daycare labels to put on baby bottles or food containers, make sure you put the label on the bottom where it won’t end up near your baby’s mouth.

How to Make Labels with Cricut Joy

The Cricut Joy is fun and easy to use! I’m going to show you how to make a couple school supply labels in different sizes. We’ll make writable vinyl monogram stickers, a vinyl monogram, a layered monogram sticker, and a leather luggage tag for a backpack. 

You are going to want to make sure you have all of your supplies together for the project so you can craft along with me to make cut personalized labels for your children’s back to school items. You can also easily make iron-on labels for your child’s school uniforms or gym clothes. You can see how I made a shirt using iron-on vinyl here!

Writable Vinyl Monogram Stickers

The first labels we made are these writable vinyl monogram stickers. My daughter thought it was so fun to have her pens and pencils labeled along with all her other supplies. There is no question which supplies are hers.

To make these stickers you’ll need the following supplies:

Cricut Joy
Smart Label Writable Vinyl
Cricut Joy Pens – We used Grey and Turquoise

I found this image in Design Space by searching “monogram P”. The image name is “Serif Split Monogram P, Draw” and the number is “#M2610CB74”. I didn’t search every letter but I searched a few and found a similar image for the different letters so I think there is one for all of them.

The overall sticker size for the pens and pencils is only 3/4″ tall. I was really impressed with how well it drew and cut even small.

The font I selected to write “Paige” is Fontastic Fonts – DJ Doodlers and the Style is writing. I used the same image resized to 2″ tall to create the stickers for a lot of her other supplies.

Because they are a single cut they are just like a sticker so no Transfer Tape is required. I just peeled them up with my fingers and placed them where I wanted them.

The great thing about Smart Label Writable Vinyl is that the ink dries almost instantly. When using the Cricut Joy Pens I haven’t had any of them smear at all. Please note if you’re using a different type of pen or material please test them first so you don’t waste any of your vinyl.

Also, I have found these labels to be SUPER sturdy. Like, surprisingly so — so no need to worry they’ll be a mess by day 2.

Personalized School Folder with Monogram

This might be Paige’s favorite project of the set. She needs a few of these plastic folders with a pocket and we found this monogram P in Design Space.

Supplies needed to create this project:
Cricut Joy
Smart Vinyl – (I used Removable Hydrangeas Sampler)
Transfer Tape
Scraper Tool
Weeding Tool
Plastic School Folder

Using some Smart Vinyl – Removable (teal from the Hydrangeas Sampler) we set the image size as large as we could cut on the Joy and applied it to the folder with Transfer Tape. This image is called “Valentines Monogram P” and the image number is “#M1284F18E”. Great news is there is an entire image set so it doesn’t matter what letter you need, it’s there!

Layered Monogram Pencil Box

What says “school supplies” more than a pencil box? Everyone needs a pencil box to hold all their school supplies.

Can you tell we love monograms yet? We thought it would be fun to layer our vinyl this time.

Supplies needed to create a layered monogram pencil box:
Pencil Box
Cricut Joy
Cricut Smart Vinyl Permanent – White
Light Grip Mat
Cricut Vinyl Permanent – Pink
Transfer Tape
Scraper Tool
Weeding Tool

This is a simple project to create. Cut your materials as prompted by Design Space. Weed the excess from your design. Using Transfer Tape apply the single letter monogram first (for tips on using Joy Smart Vinyl and getting it to release from the backing check out this post).

Once the letter is applied, use the same Transfer Tape (as long as it’s still sticky) to apply the name in the opening of the split P.

Make sure everything is well attached with the scraping tool and remove the transfer tape.

The image we used for this project is “Serif Split Monogram P” and the image number is “#M2610EE49”. We used “Dj Doodlers” font for Paige.

Cricut Leather Luggage Tag

Did you know you can cut Faux Leather with the Cricut Joy? I’m going to teach you how! The new Foil Transfer Tool for Cricut Joy is so fun to use and I love how it looks on this red faux leather.

It’s always fun to personalize backpacks. When children are transported by you to and from school you can add their name to their backpack and not be worried about someone seeing their name. As they get older or ride buses or bikes there may be a need for some caution.

This luggage tag is a great way to label a backpack (inside or outside) without making their name easy for strangers to see.

Supplies needed to create a Foil Faux Leather Luggage Tag:

Cricut Joy
Foil Tool Kit
Cricut Faux Leather
Green Standard Grip Mat

If you want to make this project you might be thinking “but my Joy won’t let me cut Faux leather”. I did some testing and by selecting Heavy Cardstock the Faux Leather cut beautifully on the first time. Cricut Joy supports the material Heavy Cardstock.

Here is a tip to getting your Foil to transfer as well as ours did. You’re going to follow the directions for applying the foil in Design Space. After your Foil Tool is done doing it’s job your Joy is going to prompt you to remove the Foil Tool and insert the fine point blade.

Here’s the tip. Take out the Foil Tool but don’t put in the blade. Do not remove your Foil sheet. Select go and your machine will think it’s cutting. Once it’s done “cutting” it will give you the opportunity to “rerun”; you want to do this without unloading the mat. This will allow your Joy to run the Foil Tool in the exact same spot and give you a nice clean transfer.

Now you can remove the foil sheet and change the foil tool to the fine point blade. Allow the machine to cut the faux leather. My machine cut it beautifully without having to do anything extra. I do recommend checking the cut before unloading your mat to make sure it cut cleanly.

I used the Luggage Tag image #M199A47DB, Apple Image #M26D21A0A, and font Elementary. Make sure for the Apple Image and Font you change the “Style” to Foil.

Another backpack label option:

If you’re looking for a more permanent way to label your child’s backpack that doesn’t have their name on the outside check out this project in Design Space. You can click that link or search “Backpack Name and Number” under projects in Design Space.

Final (and most important) Back to School Supply!

If you aren’t using your Cricut Joy to create handmade cards you’re missing out. The Card Mat and Insert Cards are so fun and quick. Design Space has so many different designs to choose from you’re sure to find something that fits your needs. I had fun creating this card with my daughter and she’s excited to give it to her teacher. This is a great opportunity to share any concerns or things she’s looking forward to in the new school year. It’s also an opportunity for you to share any of your thoughts, concerns, or abilities to help out with the teacher too.

Supplies needed to create this card:

Cricut Joy
Joy Card Mat
Insert Card Kit – Rainbow Scales Sampler
A+ Teacher Card cut file in Design Space
Brayer

I’ve seen a lot of people complain about the Card Mats losing their stick. Using a Brayer to really burnish the card onto the mat has helped me have successful cards every time. I also suggest always placing the clear plastic sheet over the top of the mat when not in use to protect the adhesive from dust.

Insert cards are super easy to create. Just follow the prompts in Design Space and you’ll have a card in minutes.

Why personalize back to school supplies with Cricut Joy?

I don’t think I’m alone with kids who are a little apprehensive about returning to school. Taking the time to sit together and come up with ways to label all the school supplies gave us an opportunity to talk about what they’re excited about and maybe a little worried about.

By the time we had all the supplies labeled Paige was excited to put everything in her backpack and show her friends some of the cool labels.

Tips for working with Cricut Permanent Vinyl

Personalize back to school supplies with Cricut Joy for long lasting labeling! For the best results when working with Cricut Permanent Vinyl here are a few tips to follow:

1. Make sure your surface is clean. It’s recommended to wipe things clean and then when possible wipe with rubbing alcohol. Allow to dry completely before applying vinyl.
2. When applying vinyl burnish well with the Transfer Tape on top of vinyl to make sure vinyl is well adhered to the surface. I recommend leaving the Transfer Tape on top when burnishing to prevent any scratches in the vinyl.
3. Do not handle your project for 48-72 hours after applying vinyl. This allows the adhesive time to adhere to the surface for permanence.

I hope these projects have inspired you to sit with your child and start getting ready for school. Cricut Joy is a great way to label school supplies and if I can have fun doing it I know you will to!

If you have any questions leave them in the comments and I’ll do my best to help you out.

The post Personalize Back to School Supplies with Cricut Joy appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Today’s guest is Dr. Marnie Ginsberg. She is the founder of Reading Simplified, whose mission is to support busy, overwhelmed teachers & parents learn a research-based system of effective and efficient instruction that accelerates all students’ reading achievement. Marnie’s surprise at finding so many of the middle school students in her classroom reading well below their grade, spurred a passion for finding and disseminating solutions. What followed included private tutoring, university research, the creation of an evidence-based reading program, and ultimately the development of Reading Simplified.

ReadingSimplified.com
Facebook.com/Readingsimplified
Twitter.com/readsimplified
Instagram.com/readingsimplified
youtube.com/thereadingcoach

This episode was inspired by my posts on teaching reading.

Big thanks to our sponsor Family Routines — because if you want to get into a routine, and have your family help out more it’s the course for you!

In this episode

How schools teach our kids to read (and if it’s the best option for our kids)

How to use the library to help our kids read.

What to do if they’re not interested.

Other things that might interest you

Producer: Drew Erickson

Check out my other parenting podcasts:

Transcript

[00:00:00.000] – Hilary Erickson

Hey, guys. Welcome back to the Pulling Curls Podcast. Today on Episode 186, we are talking about reading. Let’s untangle it.

[00:00:18.170] – Hilary Erickson

Hi, I’m Hilary Erickson, the curly head behind the Pulling Curls Podcast: pregnancy and parenting untangled. There’s no right answer for every family, but on this show, we hope to give you some ideas to make life simpler at your house. Life’s tangled just like my hair.

[00:00:39.000] – Hilary Erickson

Today’s guest is the head behind Reading Simplified. She was a teacher in middle school and realized that her kids in her classroom were just not reading, and so she has come up with a movement of her own. She has so many good tips for reading. I want to introduce today’s guest, Marnie Ginsberg.

[00:01:01.260] – Hilary Erickson

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[00:01:37.820] – Hilary Erickson

Hey, Marnie, welcome to the Pulling Curls Podcast.

[00:01:40.240] – Marnie Ginsberg

I’m so excited to be here, Hilary. Thank you.

[00:01:42.810] – Hilary Erickson

Now, this is a topic I am super passionate about. I love teaching my kids reading because I’m weird like that. I always thought one of them would not be into it, but all of my kids, all three, just loved all that early reading stuff. So my big question for you, because I read a lot online, is that it doesn’t actually end up helping them long term. But I feel like it does because my kids have been really good academically as well. What do you think or what did the study show?

[00:02:12.500] – Marnie Ginsberg

That early reading? Yeah. There is mixed research on it, and I think that’s because the child development is just so variable, multi variable. But we do have a very well known study that has been widely cited from the 80s about the Matthew effects. And this leading researcher adopted this idea of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew, that the rich get richer.

[00:02:36.120] – Marnie Ginsberg

And that’s how, and since then, other research studies have validated that, that when you get off to a good start learning how to crack the code, then you read more and you like it because you’re confident. And then you read more, then you learn how to recognize words better, and then you even get a better vocabulary.

[00:02:58.860] – Marnie Ginsberg

And so this is just a positive snowball that does indeed start very early. In fact, we know that those kids that in his study, this Matthew effects paper, those kids that got to the end of first grade that had already figured out the foundational skills, they were going to have high achievement in school. It was pretty not a one to one relationship, but a very strong correlation. And we also have contrary studies showing that if kids do not read by the end of first grade, well, it’s highly likely, in fact, nine out of 10 times, they won’t read well in fourth grade and maybe beyond.

[00:03:34.940] – Marnie Ginsberg

And those are devastating scenarios for children. Your self identity, self concept, your motivation for school, you cannot learn as well from all the other areas of school because reading is the backbone of all academic learning.

[00:03:51.220] – Marnie Ginsberg

And so we see high correlations between those on welfare and low literacy rates, those in the prison system with low literacy. So getting off to an early good start is such a protective factor for a child. And unfortunately, in the US and in most English speaking countries, we’ve been led astray in how we’re supposed to teach reading. Most teachers have been given misinformation about how kids learn to read, and so a lot of children struggle unnecessarily in those early days.

[00:04:28.740] – Marnie Ginsberg

I recommend a podcast that just came out. It’s just six episodes by an award winning journalist. And the podcast is called Sold a Story. And it talks about how teachers and publishers and even university teacher prep have misled people in what we know about how the brain learns to read. And so as a result, a lot of kids struggle early on. So your audience of parents needs to be aware of the challenges. Of course, there’s certainly bright lights in places, but there are challenges that many kids face in school because many teachers have tools that are highly ineffective.

[00:05:06.500] – Marnie Ginsberg

And in fact, over 65% of US fourth graders are not proficient in reading.

[00:05:12.390] – Hilary Erickson

Oh, man. And I bet that’s gone down since COVID.

[00:05:16.820] – Marnie Ginsberg

Well, yeah, the number of lacking proficiency has gone up. It just came out last month and the data was not good across the board for the most part.

[00:05:25.670] – Hilary Erickson

I mean, a few thoughts just on what you said so far. I think reading, obviously, I think it’s best taught one on one. It makes it so hard in the classroom. So I’ve done a lot of reading intervention at school just as a PTA mom and agree seeing those kids that are just struggling so hard. I’ve seen them go through all the grades now that I have kids that have graduated high school and you do see them struggle.

[00:05:49.110] – Hilary Erickson

But in general, those are the kids that are struggling in all areas. They’re also struggling in math, not always the case. Sometimes your brain just works in a specific way. So that’s hard. But also socioeconomic status. know, like, if mom, dad are never home because they’re just trying to put food on the table, that makes it really hard for kids to learn. So there’s a lot of factors on all these studies.

[00:06:09.080] – Marnie Ginsberg

That’s true. Researchers have shown that as few as 2% to 5% of kids should actually struggle if they’re given high quality research based interventions, at least in terms of recognizing those words. Then we have another level of skill that needs to develop over a lifetime, which is just learning the background knowledge. So you can be a good reader because being a good reader is highly associated with knowing a lot of stuff. So I can pick up this article from the New York Times about something in physics, and I don’t know much about physics, but I know enough to be able to comprehend it.

[00:06:41.120] – Marnie Ginsberg

But if I haven’t had that background knowledge, I’m at a disadvantage. So that is a lifelong thing. And it can be often, although not, of course, universally, that those who are in communities or families in poverty that they have less access to acquiring that background knowledge. So it’s, again, really important for the school to take on these issues of let’s get the kids cracking the code and then let’s fill up their minds with lots of knowledge about the world systematically.

[00:07:08.700] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah. Well, hopefully colleges are going to start teaching teachers or there’s going to be training to hopefully adjust it. But my listeners tend to not be teachers.

[00:07:17.450] – Marnie Ginsberg

Well, maybe some are. No, I know, but I just want folks to know about it because a lot of folks assume that the schools can take care of their child with reading. And certainly that works many many times, but it’s not working for a majority of our students right now. So we have to get involved.

[00:07:35.820] – Hilary Erickson

I will say I never relied on our teachers to teach my kids reading because they were reading before they went to school. And so I was like, if you could fix them in other areas, it’d be awesome.

[00:07:45.980] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yeah, I know that feeling.

[00:07:48.480] – Hilary Erickson

Okay, so what can parents be doing to support kids? Well, first off, what age do you recommend starting these activities with your kids?

[00:07:57.360] – Marnie Ginsberg

That also is widely variable in the research because learning to read is really a cultural accomplishment. So it has to do with what the family chooses, what the community, what the nation emphasizes.

[00:08:09.200] – Marnie Ginsberg

There are some countries that don’t start reading instruction until seven, and that’s like, it’s verbatant to do it before then. But Montessori schools have been doing beginning reading instruction for over 100 years around age 3. And I actually like, especially for the preschool age, to adopt Maria Montessori’s mantra, which is follow the child.

[00:08:33.000] – Marnie Ginsberg

So some children are really not very interested at two or 3 and sometimes even 4 in learning the letter sounds or sitting down to read a book. And so as a parent, we have to adjust to what they’re interested in because, yes, we want to provide them the skills, but we also want them to have a positive perspective on reading and a positive emotional bond with us as they think about reading.

[00:08:56.610] – Marnie Ginsberg

So we want to balance the two ends. It’s a tension because it can be challenging to get started with reading. So I personally, I would think that when the child was four, it would be wise to ensure that they’re learning their letter sounds and they’re getting beginning into the alphabetic principle, which is this concept that our written language is a code for sound.

[00:09:20.020] – Marnie Ginsberg

One easy way to do that is as you’re sitting with them and reading any book that they really enjoy, draw your finger along the print and make sure that each time you tap a word, you’re speaking that word, and then occasionally show them the alphabetic principle implicitly by dragging out the sounds in the word. So the mom sat down on the sofa, and so you’re just hinting it.

[00:09:45.740] – Marnie Ginsberg

Hey, those sounds that are coming out of my mouth, those relate to those squiggles on the page. That is the first insight to help with the alphabetic principle. And then occasionally, maybe even ask them, The mom sat on the… What’s that first sound while you’re pointing at it, and maybe they can come up with S, and so you’re easing them into it.

[00:10:05.380] – Marnie Ginsberg

And so that when kids come to kindergarten, if they know their letter sounds and they can hear some sounds and words, this is a very important early skill that’s called phonemic awareness, that perception of just what I gave an example of, can you break off the S at the beginning of sofa? That doesn’t come naturally, and it’s really an accomplishment that comes through reading instruction.

[00:10:28.560] – Marnie Ginsberg

So letter sounds and that early phonemic awareness is so important for preparing kids to be ready for kindergarten. And I think there’s certainly no harm in making sure that your kids are reading by kindergarten. That would be an enrichment and accelerated option. But many, many kids are perfectly capable of that. And if they resist, then give it a month. If they are two, three or four and pick it up again, or do it in five minute bursts, make it a game. And then over time, they will be more than well prepared for kindergarten.

[00:11:01.270] – Hilary Erickson

I wanted to speak to like… Because with my first kid, I was like, I don’t know what to do with them. So I just did things that were fun. Now, one of the things that I think is underutilized by a lot of parents is the library because it is so free.

[00:11:16.320] – Marnie Ginsberg

And so fun.

[00:11:17.760] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah. I mean, besides the whole lost library book phenomenon, which is an opportunity cost of going to the library. That’s another podcast. Right. But that’s also teaching your kids responsibility. We have a special spot where library books go. So that’s a lesson. But just taking kids to the library, there is always something at the library that little kids are interested in. Older teens, less so.

[00:11:40.860] – Marnie Ginsberg

Right. Yeah. They may have puppet shows. They’ll have the read aloud just looking at the books. Yeah. If anything that we can do as parents to help the child identify as a reader is huge.

[00:11:52.900] – Marnie Ginsberg

When COVID hit, my daughter wanted to buy some books at Barnes & noble. I tell you what, I went every time she asked. I could have bought those books at the library. I could have checked them out the library, but it was like, well, first of all, the libraries were closed, so it was like an outing. I wanted to nurture this is a relationship.

[00:12:11.580] – Marnie Ginsberg

Mom and daughter are going to have a good time and we’re going to go pick what you want within reason. And it was really beneficial. And she actually started reading again after a little slump that happened when a teacher told her she had to read only up to her ability level. She was like third or fourth grade and she wasn’t really interested in middle school novels, even though she was capable. And that was a bit bummer. So this revived it, and she’s been reading ever since. The point is, yeah, the libraries, even though I mentioned going to the bookstore, the libraries are priceless, as you say. And again, follow the child. What are they interested in? Yeah, sometimes at the time we want them to be exposed to great literature.

[00:12:51.900] – Marnie Ginsberg

But if they want to read these silly books in a series that you’re tired of, just try to strengthen yourself and keep doing it because if they’re enjoying it, you’re on the right track.

[00:13:01.280] – Hilary Erickson

Good old Captain Underpants.

[00:13:03.720] – Marnie Ginsberg

Exactly.

[00:13:05.310] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah. And I think a lot of times the non-fiction section is underutilized by moms of little kids because you don’t have to read every word that’s on that page about spiders. But if your kid loves spiders, then get the book, look at the pictures, just talk about it. I think, and I remind you that it is so free.

[00:13:23.100] – Hilary Erickson

I think a lot of parents are like, well, books are expensive. I don’t want to buy a ton on Amazon. And I’m like, don’t buy any, buy some books. You obviously want books at your house. When they’re little because they eat the books, you need to have your own books. But it’s so much easier to organize books that aren’t yours that just go back to the library. So a huge fan of that.

[00:13:40.580] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yeah. I was just going to say, many of us tend to be a fiction reader or a non fiction reader, and then whatever our default is, then we unintentionally pass that on to the child by just not exposing them. So yeah, be more than willing to branch out into other genres and particularly non-fiction, because again, that’s where the kids are going to get the most knowledge of the world, which will help them succeed in so many areas of life and become a better reader.

[00:14:03.260] – Hilary Erickson

I had largely ignored non-fiction books until I had a kid at school when one of the teachers was like, How often do you go into the non-fiction section? I was like, What?

[00:14:11.660] – Marnie Ginsberg

I’m so sorry. Where is that?

[00:14:13.520] – Hilary Erickson

I’ve just been focusing on the Thomas the Tank Engine books. And the other thing was we just made it so much fun at our house. It was just part of our day. We had a letter puzzle, we would hide the letters around the house, and then we would make the sounds. There are a lot of really fun activities that you can do.

[00:14:29.350] – Hilary Erickson

There was never a point in time where I was pushing my kids into reading, but we extended that into we would be in the car and I would be like, cat. And it would be a guessing game of what is that word that mom just sounded out because my first one had a really hard time sounding out letters. And so there are going to be bumps in the road. I just want to say as you’re teaching your kids to read, that’s totally normal. And every kid is really different, I find amongst my three. They each struggled with something different.

[00:14:56.730] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yeah. I love how you were doing that, that phonemic awareness preparation, basically, and also revealing the alphabetic principle, maybe drawing those sounds out cat or what word am I saying? And that’s going to help them with blending, which is the first step in their decoding process.

[00:15:13.470] – Hilary Erickson

These are fun things that you can do in the car. I think the problem is a lot of times moms just don’t know these fun things that you can easily incorporate into your day. We had tons of sticker books. I’m totally the sticker book mom. There’s a lot of letter sticker books out there that you could just while you’re putting the sticker on, you go Ah Ah Ah Ah, and I was like, Well, I’m not a professional. Maybe I’m doing this wrong. That’s what I would think as a mom. It turns out you can’t really do it all that wrong, I guess.

[00:15:43.880] – Marnie Ginsberg

Most kids are going to pick it up fairly easy when they have that type of enrichment. But a lot of children also still struggle. They may have some learning difficulties. They may even have dyslexia, and so they may need more intense help. And also that might show up as, I don’t want to do this. That alone for sure is not a single warning factor.

[00:16:06.150] – Marnie Ginsberg

But if they’re not interested, you might, again, need to be more creative, get some help. But I love what you’re saying. I mean, if you can’t think of a game, what can you hide? How many different ways can you hide something where they have to go seeking outside, inside that, you can hide a letter or you can hide words, you can hide sentences. And like a scavenger hunt, you find the first thing and then that will tell you where to go to get the next thing. And each time, of course, they have to read the sentence.

[00:16:34.720] – Marnie Ginsberg

I’ve seen a really fun video of a parent taping words on the wall and a kid shooting them with a nerf gun.

[00:16:42.340] – Hilary Erickson

That’s awesome.

[00:16:43.200] – Marnie Ginsberg

Which is take whatever your kids enjoy and put a word or a letter sound in front of him.

[00:16:47.520] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah. Two of the other activities my kids really like, there’s the bread tags that close your bread. It’s a plastic tag. Anyway, they all fit together. I read this in some books, so you could write, and again, we were poor, so you could write the letters on the bread tags, and then they could try and fit them together, like a word puzzle. But again, the poor man’s word puzzle. So that was a fun way to do it. And they can put together sounds that don’t really go together, right? Right.

[00:17:15.390] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yeah. Practicing and then they can make, is this a real word or not? And that’s the game. You could use pebbles or stones, too, for writing with a Sharpie. Yeah.

[00:17:25.660] – Hilary Erickson

And we used to, I would give my kids a high lighter, which was generally a mom tool, and they could go with a piece of newspaper and highlight all the A’s.

[00:17:34.370] – Marnie Ginsberg

Fun.

[00:17:34.760] – Hilary Erickson

So there really are, I think a lot of times we think of it as drudgery because it is. When you do reading intervention at the school, it is a little bit drudgery.

[00:17:43.030] – Marnie Ginsberg

Especially if they didn’t, because back to the earlier question, they didn’t get off to a good start. There’s that lack of motivation, the sense of failure, and it happens quickly. Even in kindergarten, kids start to recognize, Wait a minute, I’m not picking this thing up as much as easily as everybody else. They all know that reading is the main activity at school and they’re desperate to do it.

[00:18:04.390] – Marnie Ginsberg

So yeah, that’s why I… Even though there’s mixed opinions in the reading world about starting early, if you can, again, follow the child, I think you’re so much better off that way to give them a good start so that they have positive emotions about it and they have at least solid skills entering kindergarten.

[00:18:24.020] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah. And I’ve seen so many kids pick it up so well in kindergarten and first grade just with seeing the other kids, there’s a good amount of pressure at school. So don’t feel like all is lost if your kid is entering kindergarten or first grade because it’s such a magical time, too, when your kids suddenly pick up reading. It is a whole new world when all of a sudden they’re like, That sign says stop. And you’re like, yes, that’s why I’m stopping.

[00:18:50.360] – Marnie Ginsberg

Well, maybe I could just give a little framework for your listeners because I think most people have got the idea, well, you’re just going to teach the alphabet. Okay. Yes. And I actually prefer to teach the letter sounds at least first primary because that is what helps you decode a word. If you look at the word CAT and you say the letter sounds, CAT does not sound anything like the actual word itself cat. Hearing, knowing that the letter C is if you do that first, it will help lay the groundwork for the first step of cracking the code and decoding.

[00:19:24.540] – Marnie Ginsberg

It also helps with the secondary thing that I really emphasized earlier, the alphabetic principle, do they get that those little squiggles are codes for sound? Letter, sound, knowledge, the alphabetic principle, and then the third one, the phonemic awareness, the perception of those sounds and words, can they break apart the word sit into s-i-t? And can they put it back together when they hear the sound separately? If you build those three skills into your toddler and preschool experience, along with reading and enjoying books, they will be set.

[00:19:57.880] – Hilary Erickson

I’ve talked to a couple of occupational therapists for Zero to Three lately on the podcast, and it’s just like when you start to feel insane as a mom because you’re like, here we go, we’re going to go do the laundry. What do you think is in the laundry today? What colors are we going to find? And you’re like, I am romper room. I would look at myself and just be like, I need a new life because you’re just constantly talking, you’re constantly trying to build up these skills. And it’s just a constant effort, I think. And if you can build letters and letter sounds into it, it can really be fun. And again, when your kids learn how to read, it is pure magic.

[00:20:32.900] – Marnie Ginsberg

It’s fun to watch.

[00:20:35.600] – Marnie Ginsberg

Big props to the moms out there teaching kids to read. And you can’t expect the school to just do it because it is a one on one principle. And obviously our teachers, 20 kids in a kindergarten class.

[00:20:46.330] – Marnie Ginsberg

It’s too hard. Back to the Montessori idea. My kids went through that and I think just the format of it is genius because a typical classroom is ages 3 to 6 or 3 to 5, not sure. So that means that in any given year, about a third of the class is learning to read. So the teacher can sit with those children and give them more intensive feedback, which is one of the most important things we can do. Once our students get started with cracking the code, then the best thing that they can do is practice with us supporting them with a lot of encouragement and also specific tips.

[00:21:21.550] – Marnie Ginsberg

So if they read the word cat as cat, you’d say you just tap the A and say, yes, it could be. But in this word, what else could it be? So you give them a little cue, but make them do the work unless they’re super frustrated. And that’s the feedback that not only helps them with the word cat, but then that’s a generative thing that will help them with so many other words and so many other phonics patterns. And so, yeah, getting whether it’s one on one with a mom or dad or a caregiver or in a small group at school, that’s the highest leverage activity we have at our disposal to help them become a good reader.

[00:22:01.500] – Marnie Ginsberg

And sadly, it doesn’t happen as much as it probably should, both at school and sometimes at home. I think we probably should say related to this whole topic that the screens are the enemy to becoming a good reader. It’s a totally different world than when we grew up. The books were the most exciting thing. I’m old enough, sometimes there was literally nothing on TV. We don’t have that situation anymore.

[00:22:27.070] – Marnie Ginsberg

So if parents can put pretty firm boundaries on how much time kids have with a device so that they don’t expect the world to come at them in three second intervals nonstop, then they will have the attention span to cope with a longer story or to cope with the hard work of sounding things out because at first it can be hard work.

[00:22:50.420] – Marnie Ginsberg

If the kids are prepared well, they don’t necessarily feel like it’s that hard work because they’re so excited, they know they’re off to the races. But if they have anything that’s gotten in the way and then like you said, with intervention, it becomes quite a struggle. And so you need to adjust and play games and do things to make it fun and inspiring.

[00:23:08.560] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah. The good thing about screens is though there are some fun apps where they teach letter sounds. So you can because we’re all going to have screen time on. I hear you.

[00:23:18.540] – Hilary Erickson

The electric company taught me to read.

[00:23:21.210] – Marnie Ginsberg

Probably, right? Cool. Yeah. I have a collection on my YouTube channel of the different electric company in between the Lions and SeSAMe Street videos that I’ve cultivated to. If you’re going to teach the O sound, you could go and watch these videos. So yeah, definitely use technology wisely. The app Grapho game has been researched many times and has been demonstrated to be a pretty easy way for kids to learn the letter sounds. And another one that I really like relates to a game that I teach that I play called Switch It. But the app that is similar to this game, which helps with cracking the code, is called What’s Changed. And so kids are exposed to maybe cat again. I’m really beating this cat down. Let’s change cat to sat and then change sat to sit and then change sit to pit and pit to pot. So maybe even getting over to changing that last letter, pot to pot. So that comparison of single changes really zeroes in the child’s mind to notice both the phonemic awareness and the letter sound knowledge. And that contrasting activity really accelerates kids reading really quite rapidly. So we do it with apps, but we also play it with just little letter sound cards on a board with lines at the bottom.

[00:24:37.490] – Marnie Ginsberg

So they’re dragging the correct letter sound card onto the right line in the position of the word. And you don’t need anything fancy. Just cut up a little index card and put one sound on each card. So the SH in show would be on one card because it’s one sound, which just relates to how our code works. It’s a code.

[00:24:58.650] – Hilary Erickson

For sounds. Yeah, there’s so many fun ways. And I think the importance is to make it fun. Find what’s fun for your kids. So even if the only thing that’s fun is going to the library and finding books about football or trucks, then do that. Because those are all the baby steps that everyone else is using. I think a lot of parents feel like they’re behind, but doing the fun things will eventually bring good stuff. Yeah.

[00:25:22.980] – Marnie Ginsberg

And if you’re feeling behind, like, I can’t read aloud today, pull out an audiobook book, which could be something free that you access on the internet. It could be easily accessible things from the library. And that is a great way to get the extra enrichment and expose them to higher level of language, written language. Most kids can handle at least two grade levels above their current age in terms of comprehension. So a typical kindergartener, I wouldn’t want to just read aloud to them something that’s considered a kindergarten book. They could probably easily handle a second or third grade novel or book about planes.

[00:25:57.640] – Hilary Erickson

Yeah, that’s awesome.

[00:25:58.360] – Marnie Ginsberg

And they can listen to it.

[00:25:59.530] – Marnie Ginsberg

Oh, man, we loved the books on tape at our house. We had the old Disney Kinds, parents out there. Come on, you remember the little chime as you’d read The Three Little Pigs?

[00:26:08.380] – Marnie Ginsberg

Anyway, I just want parents to think about fun ways that they can introduce learning and honestly get learning even in my middle schooler. During COVID, we didn’t go to the library, we didn’t really buy a lot of books. And so sometimes I’m like, oh, yeah, the library. We need to reintegrate that back into our lives.

[00:26:24.720] – Hilary Erickson

Because it used to be such a big part of our lives.

[00:26:27.730] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yeah, they just shut it down completely in where I was living at the time.

[00:26:30.830] – Hilary Erickson

We could request books, but I found that kids were like, do you want to request one? And she was like, What am I going to request? And I was like, I don’t know. You got to go look.

[00:26:38.660] – Marnie Ginsberg

You don’t have your favorite author at that point when you’re five or seven.

[00:26:42.480] – Hilary Erickson

All right, thanks for coming on, Marnie. Where can people find you?

[00:26:45.790] – Marnie Ginsberg

Well, head over to readingsimplified.com. And if you look for that, the first button, you’ll see an opportunity to download that Switch It game. So the game that pairs the contrast, the letter sounds. So a lot of folks might enjoy that. It’ll help anyone with early on who’s trying to crack the code. And it also helps older students who are struggling with cracking the code, readingsimplified.com.

[00:27:11.940] – Hilary Erickson

Okay, awesome. And your YouTube channel is on there, too, because I thought that playlist with all the PBS stuff.

[00:27:16.510] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yeah, that would be at YouTube.com/@readingsimplified.

[00:27:22.200] – Hilary Erickson

Like the @ symbol?

[00:27:24.440] – Marnie Ginsberg

The @ symbol. Yeah, good question. YouTube.com/@readingsimplified.

[00:27:30.900] – Hilary Erickson

All one word. Yeah, we all just got handles on YouTube.

[00:27:33.460] – Marnie Ginsberg

Yes, exactly.

[00:27:35.600] – Hilary Erickson

All right, thanks for coming on, Marnie.

[00:27:37.060] – Marnie Ginsberg

It’s my treat, Hilary. Thank you.

[00:27:38.860] – Hilary Erickson

Okay, I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. I don’t know if you’ve listened to my episode that I did, I think, last month on things I did that other parents hate. But there are so many fun ways to integrate letters into your day with your kids. And just talking about letter sounds when you’re in the car, it’s really easy to point out letters.

[00:27:57.770] – Hilary Erickson

So honestly, I think if you just make letters part of your day with little kids, it will slowly become more part of your day. You’re not really teaching reading, you’re just having fun together. And I know as a parent, you’re trying to find ways to talk with your kids or integrate them into the world around them. And learning letters is a great way to do it. So hopefully this gave you guys some ideas. If you have questions for Marnie or you have some thoughts on the podcast about what your kids struggled with, come on over and tell us on Instagram. I will have a post about this episode and we would love to chat with you more.

[00:28:28.220] – Hilary Erickson

Stay tuned. For our pregnant mamas, we are talking about what the hospital does to prevent things from going wrong with you. And the next week we’re having some talk about girl bosses and why we don’t support each other, so stay tuned.

[00:28:40.920] – Hilary Erickson

Thanks so much for joining us on today’s episode. The Pulling Curls Podcast grows when you share us on social media or leave a review. If you do, please tag us so that we can share and send you a virtual hug, which, frankly, is my favorite hugging. Until next time, we hope you have a tangle free day.

The post Teaching Reading with Dr. Marnie Ginsberg of Reading Simplified — Episode 186 appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Recently, teachers in Arizona went on strike. This post is going to talk about what happens during a teacher strike, how it works, and what happens to students.

Table of contents

**I am writing this just a few days after our teachers returned to school after a strike.  Emotions are all over the place, but I want to make this post just informational, for parents who are looking for info should it happen at their school.**

Sidenote:  Family routines are like 400% more important when things are messed-up by stuff like a strike.  I clung to ours when I had 3 kids unexpectedly at home (with no plans on what to do).  The things in this course saved me.

What happens to students during a teacher strike?

It seems to depend on the area and the school officials.

As I watch other districts, some of them still have classes.

In the case of our teachers’ strike (which is all I can really speak to), the students were not allowed to come to school. I had heard that policemen would be on campus to make sure parents didn’t drop kids off. (?)

Parents had to find other options for their kids.

Many churches opened up daycares. Things like karate classes, gymnastics, and gyms often opened up for the full day. Many places saw a place to make money and dove in to “help” out.

Not to say that these places were necessary, but most of them did come at a cost, which would’ve been a financial burden on the parents.

Why do teachers strike?

In Arizona, teachers struck because education funding in Arizona is very low. They wanted higher pay, but also more funding for all areas of education in Arizona. 

They were very clear that it wasn’t just about a higher salary for them (and I do believe it wasn’t), but in fact, it was also about pay raises as well (as any strike is).

Do teachers get paid for each strike day?

That actually seemed to be up to each individual district. Our district chose (through a school board vote) to not pay teachers, staff, or school administrators who were off during that period. Those staff and teachers are (I believe) going to make up those days elsewhere. If your area has a teachers’ union they may have a different situation based on their teachers union contracts.

However, they did miss a paycheck during the strike (I believe).

As we have a very supportive parent base there were a lot of fundraisers to help those who were unable to make ends meet with the missing paycheck money. Parents collected food, gift cards, and gas cards to help out.

How long can a teacher strike last?

Who knows. That’s the hardest part. For us, in our district, they announced the strike on a Thursday — the strike started the following Thursday (giving families lead time to work on safe places for their children) and lasted through to the next Friday when children returned to school.

In total, our strike was 6 school days but lasted 8 total days. I have heard of strikes lasting 9 — not sure if that included weekend days or just school days).

In reality, our strike could’ve been a lot faster if our state legislature had taken it more seriously from the beginning (they adjourned early on the Thursday of the strike, and legislatures weren’t even at the capitol the Friday of the strike). The strike did end when they passed school district budgets with increased educational funding.

How does a teacher strike work?

This was my biggest question as we went into it. This was the first time I had dealt with a teacher strike. I’ve heard about crossing the picket line and union members fighting with each other – I didn’t know what to expect.

First off, we don’t have teacher unions, so it may work differently in a state that has a union. Our teachers can belong to an association (it is not required as it was when my husband taught in California).

They announced a vote on whether or not they should strike. Our teachers had 3 days to vote on striking and then the results were announced on a Thursday.

They announced that the strike would begin on the following Thursday (giving parents 7 days to prepare)

Sidenote: I think, most people thought that it wouldn’t ever happen. I run the newsletter for our Jr High and it was hard to get anything firm from the district on what their plans were (as late as the Tuesday before the strike they seemed to think the work stoppage wouldn’t happen).

By Tuesday evening the district had sent out a notice that they would likely shut the schools starting on Thursday.

It was pretty clear that they may open schools if they had enough staffing, and that the decision would be made each day around 5 pm as to what they planned to do the following day.

The first email I actually got about it all was actually from my employer (I work as a nurse). They had daycare options available and were asking those who didn’t have children to place be flexible for those who had childcare issues and be willing to switch.

Parents were also making lists of options for childcare during the strike and distributing them on social media. Many local places opened their doors. Places like gym classes and regular extracurricular activities opened up daytime options. While these places did make money, it was also clear that people were trying to help out parents as much as possible. Some churches even opened up free daycare asking only for donations.

Speaking of social media, there were a lot of groups set up to help support teachers. And a lot of people were not in support of our teachers.

Frankly, I wasn’t a fan of being on social media at the time (plus, I had kids at home and that was stressful enough).

While I am totally behind our teachers, it was extremely stressful. I work from home, and the kids were home. I had to adjust what I was able to get done and just deal with the sudden chaos. It also reminded me to get my stuff together before the summer.

While I tried to keep my frustrations with the capitol, it was hard not to let some frustrations leak into my feelings about school and towards the district. I’ll be honest.

And, as always — everyone spun it the way they wanted to see it. Which, basically drives me crazy. So I mostly just looked at Instagram.

How did parents get information on the teacher strike?

This was our first strike, at least the first I have dealt with. The school district used all the communication methods at its disposal. Each evening around 3-5 pm we would get a text, email, and phone call (from each district) that said if we were or were not having school.

On Tuesday they announced schools would re-open on Thursday, but on Wednesday at around 5 pm, they announced they realized they didn’t have the staffing to support a safe work environment and had to cancel Thursday’s school.

What happens to students when teachers go on strike?

The short answer? They stay home. Or they go to the capitol to protest.

The long answer — teachers were very thoughtful.

• Prom still happened
• Sports still happened
• The Jr High Disneyland trip still happened
• The high school play still happened.

I am grateful for teachers who put all this effort into our kids and still allowed them to compete and perform. Nothing major was missed (especially at the high school level). Good stuff.

Of course, our strike happened at possibly one of the worst times. AP testing was coming up, and AZ merit (our state testing) had just finished. Things were crazy.

Did you have to make up days for the strike?

This may have been the most stressful part, as we had a trip planned for the week after the strike.

Our elementary schools are in a different district than our other schools

And the elementary school district was not forthcoming with its plans.

In the beginning, I emailed the superintendent and asked her to consider going with the # of hours vs the # of days and she wrote back saying I was the only parent who had asked for that and she would stick to the # of days, but that we could pull our kids out early if we wanted to for previously planned things.

Of course, after the strike, she changed her tune.

We ended up taking one shortened day and making it a full day.

And that is enough hours.

Our school year remained the same, even though we missed 6 days.

How did parents help during the strike?

Besides parents taking the load of the children, parents helped in a number of ways.

Many opened their homes to working parents so their kids would have a safe place to be.

They helped collect food for kids who rely on the national school lunch program

As I said above they helped collect gift cards for staff/teachers who would be missing pay for essentials.

They spread the word, so parents would know what was going on.

All in all, life goes on after the strike? Was it worth it? Honestly, I have no idea.

I know that there are a LOT of parents are mainly ticked off. I get that side. We each do our job. I know we had nurses call in sick as they couldn’t get any daycare worked out and that shifted things at the hospital, and inductions were put on hold.

A lot of parents really stood beside teachers, and I really get that side too. We need more money for classrooms in Arizona, and I will certainly keep that in mind in November (although I always do, so that’s not a big change).

So, that’s that. We actually only have 3 weeks left of school here. My kids are pretty much over school at this point. I think it will be hard for teachers to get the kids to re-focus after those days off. We do love our teachers though, and I hope this creates a wave of change.

Have questions — post them below. Maybe I or another reader has an answer.

**Want to rant about a strike or teachers? Don’t post in the comments, I’ll just remove them. **

Frequently Asked Questions:

Are teacher strikes legal?

What is a legal strike? That will really depend on your state and maybe even your town/district/county. In public schools, teachers are public employees and in some places, state law prohibits public employee strikes.

Why do teachers strike?

This is a loaded question. There are many reasons why teachers might strike:

• Smaller class sizes
• Education reform
• Needing a new contract
• The negotiations process falling apart

Why did they start their strike on a Thursday?

It seems to make sense to start a strike Monday. That being said, our teachers voted to give parents 7 days to prepare for the upcoming strike. Since their vote was on a Thursday evening, not a Sunday evening that meant the strike started on Thursday.

And while you’re here, jump on my practical parenting newsletter — and check out my other education posts below that:

[pt_view id=”7e2061de27″]

The post What Happens to Students During a Teacher Strike? appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Hello. My name is Hilary and I am the mother of a new Kindergartener.  She is adorable, but we have Kindergarten ALL day and when she comes home you’d think she’s run a marathon, and she’s now Cleopatra.  If I knew how to peel grapes,and was willing to cut a palm frond off — you can guess what I’d be doing for her after school snack.

2020 ETA: She’s now in 5th grade and I couldn’t be happier that creating this checklist has been a great tool to help her be a little bit more organized during the school year. Emphasis on “a little bit”.

Suffice it to say that her brother (in 5th grade) isn’t much better.  They walk in the door and literally EXPLODE with school-ness.  I’m left asking, and asking, and asking.  Will you PLEASE put your things away?  Until today.   Enter my After School Checklist. I see lamination in its future {ps, I LOVE this laminator}

Before we get into the checklist — if After School Routines are something you struggle with (because I do, and it is something I have REALLY worked on) — I have a whole section on what to do after school in Family Routines.  You can join for just a month or a whole year, you can cancel at any time!  The price is great, and I guarantee you’ll like it!

After School Routine Checklist

This isn’t brain surgery people.  It’s just a mom wanting her kids to not leave a trail of items everywhere they walk once they enter the front door. So, I left it editable in case you have different needs.

By getting into an organized routine of doing these things, your kids (and thereby, you) will have a smoother afternoon after a long school day!)

Things to do after school:

Put Backpack Away — Having a designated spot for your child’s book bag helps a LOT! Bonus points if it’s on the floor they enter the house (I just find that is more doable for my kids) — but we still use our rooms. Go the extra mile kids!

Put Away Jacket/Coat — It is just SUCH a great habit to get into, put things where they go — touch them once!

Get out homework folder/give adults important papers — I hate the morning “can you sign this” routine — so much eaiser to look over documents in the evening! I have an inbox on my desk where I have the kids put things.

Put away lunchbox — once again, touch things once. Just make sure you have a spot for their lunch bag to go. That’s your part.

Do Homework — Remember, homework is their job. Be sure to have a spot in the kitchen/office/desk for them to do it!

Get Homework checked — if you do this (I don’t — I glance, but I don’t check each problem). I am not the teacher.

Put school clothes away — if you do this, my kids don’t put on play clothes (but I can see that as being important if your school uses uniforms) — btw, I have a post on how many clothes kids need to have.

Get a healthy snack — My kids are always STARVING when they get home, so be sure to put this where it makes sense for your family!

Make lunch ready for tomorrow — Honestly, I can’t imagine this happening, but having their lunch box ready for the next day would be great!

Of course, kids should then move on to other chores, practicing instruments, etc. All of that is editable in the checklist template!

Want to know more about some routines:

• Signs You’re Parenting Out of Fear
• School Essentials Checklist for Mom
• Organize Your Life One Week at a Time
• Getting Your Family to Help Out More
• Summer Activities for Kids

A reminder for perfect moms:

Note: Your child is NOT going to do this perfectly every day, especially if it’s a new routine. The idea is to get them into a routine where they are mostly doing these things. I don’t do my life perfectly every time, but I try. Hopefully our kids are trying too.

This printable checklist is a great way to help them remember all the things they have to do, and teach them responsibility. It’s just creating, simple good habits.

Editable After School Checklist

It’s nothing fancy.  Having clear expectations was most important to me. I don’t need her being caught up in how cute it is, although I may let her color it before I laminate it.  Easy, peasy, lemon-squeezy. {pfft, as if it was that easy}

What are your best tips for a smoother afternoon transition?  I could REALLY use them about now! Also, if you’re looking for some help with just the after-school basics, be sure to check out my Children’s Tasks checklist!

What does our after school routine chart look like?

Honestly, the schedule really dictates the schedule.

I usually allow for 1/2 hour for snacks and unpacking the lunch/backpack.  But after that, it’s off to clean up her room, get her jobs done, get on homework.

And then, it’s free time.  I really try not to deliniate too much what they have to do WHEN because sometimes they just need some cooling off (literally here — it’s still like 106 in the afternoons in September).

FAQ’s:

Q: Do you print off an afterschool routine for each day?

A: I actually laminate mine and have my kids use a dry erase marker. It’s a simple way to get the most use out of it.

Q: Do you tie screen time to finishing the chore chart?

A: There is “free” time and they can use that however they wish.

Don’t miss my Children’s Daily Task Checklist which you might find really handy as well!

Interested in more after school posts?  Don’t miss my after school cookies post to cheer your kids on to finish their checklist, and don’t miss my before school routine:

If you liked this post, join my practical parenting series — that gives you some actionable ideas for easier parenting.

The post Editable After School Checklist appeared first on Pulling Curls.

I had gum put in my hair.  I had glasses and REALLY frizzy hair, a giant retainer and then braces.  Life wasn’t pretty back then.  I wouldn’t say it’s especially pretty now… but I hope you get the picture.

I seriously need a picture of me when I was about 12…. I’m going to work on that.

This post was originally written in May 2014, but has been updated.

Anyway, I learned how to know that I was good and OK.  I didn’t need my mom to fight my battles.  I didn’t need to care what everyone thought.  Here’s a newsflash, people still tease me now.  Most of the time I know if I dish it, I need to take it — but sometimes my dander gets up.  Which, of course, is a shame since I am allergic to dander.

But, I digress.

I see posts on Facebook about people’s kids being bullied by being called names or not being played with at recess.

And I just don’t think that’s bullying.  When I think bullying, I think the kid in A Christmas Story that comes and pounds that kid like crazy until he’s bleeding.

Of course, that’s extreme.

I actually turned this post into a podcast where I interview one of my favorite teachers in Episode 006 of the Pulling Curls Podcast — where we talk about when is the best time to step in or stay away:

My Child is Being Bullied

I would say that my mother dander hasn’t particularly gone up for my kids.  Sure, they get called names and feel like no one is playing with them.  Sure, I get called names and I sometimes feel like no one is playing with me.  Because I live with imperfect humans who are trying to be funny and survive in their own way.

I have learned to become a duck and let the water slide right off.

Are we raising kids without their duck skin?  Are we raising kids who allow each bit of water to enter their skin and weaken them a bit?

For me, when my kids have complaints of “bullying” (and they too have found this to be a “trigger” word and sometimes use it).  I come back with these:

BTW, I think this kind of stuff can seem SO hard when the rest of your life is already really heavy on your shoulders. Have you considered getting in some easy routines to make your family days easier, and you’re more able to handle crazy situations like this?

What to ask your kid when they say they’ve been bullied

1.  How was your day? — sometimes your day is just rotten, so whatever anyone does you feel like you’re being bullied by life and that person just put a face to the bully.  It’s understandable.  I sing them Let It Go — often in my amazing opera voice.

2.  I ask them if that is someone they value?  I mean, if someone I could care less about says something mean to me — I don’t really care.  They need to decide whose opinions they value.  You can’t value everyone’s because we’re all so different.  I am learning this as I get more comments on my blog.  Someone called me ignorant about healthcare last week.  It got my dander up.  {let it go}

3.  I ask them if what they said is true?  Like, if they smell — have they not taken a shower?  Positive peer pressure rocks!  That’s not bullying, that’s GETTING MY KIDS TO SHOWER.  Thank you!

4.  I give them a hug.  Sometimes you just need a hug and that makes it fine.  Sometimes I just need a hug.  I know how that feels.

5.  I evaluate it.  I’m not saying that there isn’t bullying.  But I find bullying to be consistent, VERY mean spirited, often physically harmful or at least emotionally quite harmful.  And then it might be time to act.

How to decide if it’s bullying or teasing?

Every situation there is different, I am sure your mom-sense {similar to spider sense} will react in a way that you KNOW something is wrong.

A lot of the time I only have one side of the story and I will query his teacher to find out the other side of the story.  She often knows the truth and already has a handle on the situation.

Who to talk to if your child has a bully

Of course, if the teacher is not handling it I would bring it up to the principal or the assistant principal.  In the hospital, when we — as nurses — feel like we or patients are bieng bullied into something unsafe we move it up the “chain of command”.

In the school district that looks like this:

Teacher >> Assistant principal >> Principal >> Superintendent >> School board {not sure who’s after that, and it may vary depending on your state}

Tips for moving up the “chain of command”

1.  Start with an email or a voicemail (I think teachers rarely check voicemail anymore, so email is often the best)
2.  Have a phone call or an in-person visit with the teacher.  You will be able to communicate clearer in person
3.  If you still feel like the problem isn’t being solved, move up — and send an email to the principal, then a phone call or an in person visit.

**If you are really finding that the principal is uninterested in your problem or isn’t taking action (sometimes they’re all talk) — I might consider switching schools.  If you REALLY think your child is that unsafe at that school, that’s a problem — and it will be hard to trust anything about that school.

Keep in mind that school teachers & administration are not able to talk to you about the consequences for other students as there are privacy concerns.  So, just because they don’t SAY exactly what happed, doesn’t mean something didn’t happen.

However, as much as you complain about the other side, you also need to arm your child with the tools to handle simple “bullying”:

Toolbox for bullying

1.  Self-esteem.  Build them up, help them see strong characteristics that they possess.  Both parents need to be actively involved in building up your child’s self-image.
2. Positive inner voice.  Help them see how they can remind themselves that they’re OK in their head.  Positive self-talk can take you a lot of places and can often replace what they’re hearing outside their own brain.
3. Talk to someone they trust.  They can talk to a teacher about how they’re feeling and get resources from other adults — this is a SUPER important skill.  That adult can often help build their self-esteem (the more voices the better).  The adult can also discern a bit more easily if this is a situation that needs intervention.
4. Talk about situations and how they can handle it.  Do they walk away?  Do they become witty and find a retort?  “So’s your mom”…..

Anyway, those are my thoughts?  What do you think?  Do you think bullying has become a “code” word for anything your kid doesn’t like?  Turns out I bully my kids into cleaning their room every day.  That’s just how I am.  Deal with it kiddos!

Please join me in Family Routines so you can have more bandwidth to deal with crazy issues like this (because you home life will be running itself).

If you’re not quite ready for Family Routines, check out Practical Parenting — a free parenting class that might give you some new ideas for old problems;

The post What Do I Do if My Child is Being Bullied? Bullying stories to make a change appeared first on Pulling Curls.

Elementary aged kids LOVE to read, but that love seems to wane as our kids get older. How do we get teenagers to read, and what are some good books to suggest if you can’t seem to get them interested in reading?

Don’t miss my free Teen Summer Reading Bingo that will help your kids vary what they’re reading this summer:

Today’s guest is Bryce Moore. He is the author of several teen type fiction books including The Memory Thief and Vodnik. He also has a blog at BryceMoore.com with all his musings and ramblings.

Big thanks to our sponsor Family Routines. If you’re looking to get your life into a routine to have more time to promote reading, be sure to check it out!

And, if you’re wanting to up your parenting game, don’t miss Practical Parenting that I mention in the episode:

In this episode we’re going to talk about:

• Why the love of reading lessens as kids get older
• The things we’re doing wrong with our teens that makes them not read.
• Emphasize that reading shouldn’t be approached as a punishment.
• Why teens need to keep reading

Items Mentioned:

On the Road

Book Bub

Scribd — and my post on why we use it.

Kindle Reader (vs Kindle Fire)

Contagion

Bryce’s Top 5 Books for Teens:

• Skyward by Branden Sanderson
• Sufficiently Advanced Magic by Andrew Rowe
• Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging: Confessions of Georgia Nicolson
• Screaming Staircase by Jonathan Stroud
• Uglies by Scott Westerfield

Bryce’s Top Series for Teens:

Disc World Series (Bryce likes this one) by Terry Pratchett

I AM Not a Serial Killer by Dan Wells (he also likes Blue Screen)

Other things that might interest you:

I did a post on stuff for teens to do during the summer that has a lot of good ideas for engaging teen activities.

Producer: Drew Erickson

Check out my other parenting podcasts:

Check out all my podcasts:

Transcript:

Hilary Erickson 0:00
Hey guys, welcome back to the Pulling Curls Podcast. Today on episode 45, we’re talking about reading. Now little kids love to read right but I’ve noticed as my kids grow up that love of reading just diminishes and I want to keep it around because reading is the gateway to all the good things right so let’s untangle it.

Welcome to the Pulling Curls Podcast, where we untangle everything from pregnancy parenting, home routines, even some family travel because heavens knows our lives are tangled I’m your host Hilary Erickson.

Okay guys, if you want to get in a routine of reading at your house, be sure and check out my free series practical parenting I will put the link in the show notes you can jump in and we’ll get on a routine together. All right, today’s show guest is actually a published author. He has a few books out the me mory thief BOD Nick and Katherine available. My kids have read them. They love them. They are definitely trend on the teen side. I have teen boys who have loved them. He’s also a librarian. He’s Not insanely boring. I want to welcome my cousin, Bryce Moore.

This episode of The pulling curls podcast is sponsored by family routines how to automate your housewife life. ever wish life was more like you pictured it would be before you had kids. Being able to spend less time with the mundane tasks and more time teaching kids the fun and valuable life skills you know they need. Family Routines teaches families to simplify daily tasks into routines that help them feel more peace and joy. Save 15% with a coupon code untangled? You can find it at pullingcurls.com in the menu under courses, or in this episode show notes.

Hey Bryce, welcome to the polling girls podcast.

Bryce Cundick 1:39
Hello.

Hilary Erickson 1:41
How are you today?

Bryce Cundick 1:42
I’m doing okay, how are you?

Hilary Erickson 1:44
Good. We are recording this in quarantine. That’s the beauty of Zoom.

Bryce Cundick 1:49
The beauty of Zoom? Yeah, I think it’s just awesome.

Hilary Erickson 1:52
Yeah, all found the beauty of Zoom.

Bryce Cundick 1:54
Yeah, you know, maybe I’m still looking for it.

Hilary Erickson 1:58
Still on the hunt. Bryce had more backgrounds to his Zoom than I’ve ever seen. It was impressive.

Bryce Cundick 2:04
I’m on Zoom meetings for about six hours a day. At least.

Hilary Erickson 2:07
That sounds like so much fun.

Bryce Cundick 2:08
So I was really excited when you asked me to be on this, and I discovered it was actually another Zoom meeting.

Hilary Erickson 2:14
You’re welcome. All right. So Bryce, give us a little bit of your background.

Bryce Cundick 2:21
Sure, sure. I write books. Under the there’s two parts. There’s two Bryce’s and when we were prepping for this, I was like, “which Bryce should I should I highlight?” and we’re like, go with the Bryce Moore. And so yeah, price more when I’m Bryce Moore. I write books, young adult and middle grade fantasy. I’ve written to vote Nick, young adult and memory thesis, middle grade fantasy, and I’ve got another one coming out next year. Murder castle, which is a young adult thriller for but then I don’t bet does not pay enough to pay the bills. And so to pay the bills, and my normal alter ego is Bryce Cundick, where I’m the library director at a university college library in Maine. I’ve been the past president of the Maine Library Association, very active in the library world. And so there’s that part of me to the library world, the library. It’s a wonderful world. Way better than zoom world, I guess.

Hilary Erickson 3:16
Yeah. Well, I’m part of the labor nurse world. So I guess we all have our worlds.

Bryce Cundick 3:22
I guess.

Hilary Erickson 3:23
I don’t think the library and the labor nurse intersect very frequently.

Bryce Cundick 3:27
Not often now.

Hilary Erickson 3:28
Yeah. Okay. And you have kids?

Bryce Cundick 3:30
I do I have three.

Hilary Erickson 3:31
One’s a teen son.

Bryce Cundick 3:32
I’ve got a seven year old daughter, a 12 year old daughter, and 16 year old son.

Hilary Erickson 3:39
Awesome. And would you say that the books you write are geared towards boys, like in a generic, gender sense?

Bryce Cundick 3:47
ish? You know, I mean, I, you know, I think I’d like, I would like to think every author thinks of themselves as writing for everybody. But the two protagonists of my two books that are out right now are both boys, although the protagonists of my third b ook that’s coming out The summer is a girl.

Hilary Erickson 4:02
Okay,

Bryce Cundick 4:03
But it’s a horror book so I don’t know if the girl likes horror, then it’s the girl book. If the girl doesn’t, then it’s not a girl. You know what I mean? Like,

Hilary Erickson 4:10
obviously there’s inner intertwining of the gender reading.

Bryce Cundick 4:14
Yeah, I don’t write little women. I don’t write, you know, Jane Eyre. So and I also don’t write, The Fault in Our Stars. I write books that I’d like to read. So I guess I’m writing for myself. But you know, I, I don’t think that the boy girl divide is necessarily as big as marketers would like you to think it is.

Hilary Erickson 4:33
That’s good to know. Although I don’t know a lot of boys who read Twilight. I read Twilight. I’ll just leave that there.

Bryce Cundick 4:39
Hey, you know, I know people like to like to rag on Twilight. But I personally think that anything that becomes that popular, there’s something to be learned from it. Oh, I devoured it.

Hilary Erickson 4:50
Yeah. Yeah, I think it was on a car trip. And so I just booked a book to book.

Bryce Cundick 4:55
I read the first I think I read the first two and that was like, Okay, I got it. Now.

Hilary Erickson 5:00
That was that was probably a good stopping point, frankly.

Bryce Cundick 5:03
Yeah, it was just like Aragon Aragon was really big A while ago and I read the first couple of polls and I was like, Okay, I’m good.

Hilary Erickson 5:10
I read the first good 10 pages. I felt good

Bryce Cundick 5:14
commitment.

Hilary Erickson 5:16
Alright, so I see kids who love to read write these aspirations readers in elementary school almost every kid I meet in elementary loves to read at least some something they love to read. But as the kids get older, it kind of wanes. So why do you think teens lose their love of reading?

Bryce Cundick 5:33
So I think a c ouple things for that. Number one, I think the required reading takes up more over more and more. Like do you like to listen to music?

Hilary Erickson 5:42
Yeah,

Bryce Cundick 5:42
you personally, what’s your favorite genre?

Hilary Erickson 5:44
Probably pop.

Bryce Cundick 5:45
Pop. Okay, what genre do you hate?

Hilary Erickson 5:47
Ah, like classical like new, new classical where it’s all

Bryce Cundick 5:53
all like abstract and yeah. Okay. What if I told you that you had to listen to new classical abstract for like the next ear and I we were gonna listen to it for like an hour a day and that was like you just had to do that. And you said he would not like you and, and like so the definition of music is now new classical. That’s the best. That’s music anything of anything else that’s not music.

Hilary Erickson 6:14
Yeah, that’s true. That was definitely High School for me The Hobbit

Bryce Cundick 6:20
you would stop like liking music, right? If If everyone was defining music as this abstract thing that you don’t like, suddenly you wouldn’t like it anymore.

Hilary Erickson 6:29
Yeah, that’s true. In elementary like you can work with you know, Captain Underpants is like a- okay.

Bryce Cundick 6:35
Yeah, because everyone’s like, just read something read anything. It’s just great. And then suddenly in high school and in in middle school, to an extent as well, suddenly, you have to read the right things for it to count. And I think that like okay, Case in point so I’m, I’m a librarian. I like to read I’m an author as well. So I used figure I, you know, anything that’s written I’m gonna like doing, like reading a couple of years ago. ago, we did a book club for my library for my campus and the theme we we pick the theme of travel, and I wanted to have one book that was more contemporary and one that’s like a classic. And I was like, okay, travel, travel. I brainstorm for like, I don’t know, three minutes sounds like on the road. It’s a book about travel. It’s literally says on there, we’ll do that for our classic and I had never read it before. Like, it’s a classic. I’m a I have an English master’s degree in English, a master’s degree in library science. I’m sure this is gonna be great. It doesn’t. Things don’t become classics without being worthwhile. I started the book. I was like, I have made a big mistake. I hated it. I could not stand that book. But I had to finish it because it was the book. Everyone was reading that I told everyone they had to read

Hilary Erickson 7:45
that you chose,

Bryce Cundick 7:47
and I chose and I loathed the whole thing. It was so bad. And in hindsight, I never should have chosen that book. Friends don’t let friends choose books for book club that they’ve never read before.

Hilary Erickson 7:59
Did anybody Students like it?

Bryce Cundick 8:00
I don’t think anybody read it. Except maybe some English professors who are like, “oh boy, it’s On the Road,” you know. And in hindsight, like if I have on my, my English master’s degree holding hat, I could, I could look at the book and I could parse the book and be like, Okay, what does this mean, but, and in my head of like, I’d like to read something that I’m actually going to enjoy and No, never. So, you know, I think I think that’s a big part of it, is we start assigning more and more read, like, right reading, correct reading, proper reading to students, and they just don’t like it.

Hilary Erickson 8:33
Yeah.

Bryce Cundick 8:34
The other thing is that we stopped counting all the other reading that they’re doing, and we start saying, okay, the only thing that will count is this, are these books, you have to be reading books. And, you know, I think that a lot of teens shift their reading habits and they’re, they’re reading maybe they’re reading pop things online, maybe they’re reading blogs, maybe, you know,

Hilary Erickson 8:51
Reddit… they’re reading Reddit,

Bryce Cundick 8:53
Reddit read, it’s great. I read a lot of Reddit myself, and you know, so I don’t know I to me, I think it would be more Important to view reading as broadly as possible, because, you know, reading anything helps that said, You know, I obviously I would love it if people read more books, because you know, author and because –books. But I think that yeah they they lose their love of reading is also another thing that I wanted to say is that they just get distracted. There’s so many different things for them to do between sports, after school activities, all the all the learning that they’re doing work, you know, they, a lot of them are starting getting part-time jobs. There’s just a lot of different things they have going on. And that’s excluding all the other pop culture distractions that they can have between Netflix and Hulu. And I mean, you just name it, there’s all sorts of other things they could be doing.

And so to read, again, another example for me, about four years ago, I just noticed that I wasn’t reading that much anymore. I felt like I took a step back. I looked at my Goodreads account, like you know, I finished maybe like 16 Books last year, and that felt pretty pitiful for library and I was like, what? They’re gonna tear up my library card. Okay, they’re gonna cut it up. I mean, our library cards are tapered. Now they’re, they’re plastic. And so I had to make a goal to read more. So now my current goal is to read a book a week, and I can do that, but I have to work at it. I have to, and I do it because I love it. But I do have to be like, Okay, I got it. I got to read. Now I got to read some books, because if I don’t, then I just get distracted. I’m like a cocker spaniel. Like, what’s on Facebook? What’s on Reddit? And if that’s me, as a library director, know, how am I supposed? How are we supposed to expect our kids to be able to put up with the same to resist the same siren’s call of Reddit and Facebook and everything else that’s on their phone?

Hilary Erickson 10:48
Yeah. I will say during quarantine my kids have probably read a little bit more.

Bryce Cundick 10:52
What’s it look a little bit more?

Hilary Erickson 10:54
I don’t know. I haven’t forced reading time for an hour at my house. So

Bryce Cundick 10:58
How do you know they’re reading? What are they reading, you know? It’s Lord of the Flies out there.

Hilary Erickson 11:04
We go this Lord of the Flies out there pretty much there’s a head on a stake in my yard. So… but also as we’re getting into summer I think it’s great for parents give tips for parents to maybe get around that I know my junior will be a junior has required summer reading that he is super excited about already.

Bryce Cundick 11:24
So you sometimes I can’t tell your sarcasm meter Are you serious that he’s super excited about it? Or is that sarcastic now?

Hilary Erickson 11:31
What kid loves the summer reading assignments?

Bryce Cundick 11:34
My kids still love Summer Reading like because they participate in the library summer reading program

Hilary Erickson 11:39
to one that’s required at high school honors English so they have a summer book that they have to read and then put 5000 sticky notes and

Bryce Cundick 11:47
yeah, I mean, again, I get that I get the theory behind it like oh, we’re gonna make sure the kids still love reading and don’t forget that they love reading over the summer to me I would. I would much rather that teachers just be like find a book that age appropriate. So don’t read, like, you know, See Spot Run, “look, I read a book.” But find a book that’s at least somewhere in your age group or above, and read it and enjoy it. That, I think, would go a lot farther than just, “hey, you’re gonna read On the Road this summer. And you’re gonna like it. By golly.” No, I think things that parents can do. Number one would be be an example. So if you never read a book, and you tell your kid to read a book, they’re just gonna add it to, you know, their ongoing list of ways My parents are hypocrites, and then not want to read. So, you know, if they’re if you’re if your kids see your reading that legitimatize is reading, reading books, another thing like you could do, it’s crazy concept, but like, talk to them about what they’re reading, not like in a judgmental way, like, oh, you’re reading that? Isn’t there something better? You could? Couldn’t you be reading on the road or something like, you know, more highbrow? protip? Don’t have your kids read on the road? Just because it’s bad content? So you know, like, talk to them.

What are they reading, talk to them about what you’re reading and like, why you Like, you know why you’re not liking it? Like, it’s great to be like, Oh yeah, I started this book, I could not stand it, and I put it down. That’s another thing like, emphasize to your kids, they don’t have to finish what they read. It’s not, this is not their vegetables, reading shouldn’t be approached as a vegetable. It’s not a punishment. It’s not like you better do that, or else I’m going to make you read. Or it should be a fun thing. I mean, it’s not like, you got to do that, or you’re gonna have to watch Netflix kid. I mean, Netflix is a fun thing. Reading is a fun thing. So you know, like, I know, there’s a lot of adults out there who feel like as soon as they open a book and start reading it, they’ve made like a social contract that they will finish that book. No, don’t don’t do that. If you don’t like a book, don’t finish the book. Especially if you’re a slow reader. I mean, if reading a book, it’s gonna take you like, if you love a book, it’s gonna take you a week or two weeks or a month, and you hate a book that’s gonna take you like two months or three months. And then think of all the books you’re sacrificing by finishing that one book that you started by accident, but you just couldn’t put down because you felt like you had to finish it. So yeah, don’t don’t force it with our kids. Don’t make them do things that are not like give access to reading take them to the library regularly aquin libraries were open back. Yes, back in the olden days what I’ve honestly one of the things I do. So I have a Kindle. I know I’m not supposed to endorse Amazon. But I like reading on my Kindle, because I can read at night with the light out, and I don’t bother my wife.

And she I got her a Kindle so that she can read at night with a lighter and she doesn’t bother me if there’s a successful marriage but not bothering the other person. Right, right. So I have a Kindle, and I subscribe to a thing called bookbub. bookbub sends me an email every single day with deals, Kindle deals, and I shut up every day, I look on and see what’s on what’s on sale. And we’re talking about like, deals that the books are like two bucks or three bucks. And so anytime I see a book that I’m like, Oh, yeah, I wanted to see that. I want to read that or books that I’ve read before a long time ago. I was like, Oh, yeah, that was good book. I buy it. It’s three bucks, you know, I mean, why not? And so my Kindle library is pretty big at this point. Because there’s I mean, it’s not like if you go on bookbub it’s not like automatically suddenly everything that you see is like, Oh, that looks great. That looks great. Now sometimes there’s a lot of there’s a week will go by that I don’t buy anything. But usually, you know, once a week once every other week, there’s at least something that I’m like, Oh, yeah, that one looks good. Like I saw the entire James Bond series went up for sale for I think it was like 10 bucks. Maybe it was 15 bucks. That was like 15 bucks. It was a buck buck. I was like, I’m not sure why not. So I’m reading the first James Bond book right now. That’s the current my current work in progress, but so that way, you said yeah, the library’s closed but I can just show my kids Hey, you can read any of these books that are on all of your devices, because you can share it your kids have Kindles they do. They have Kindles. Actually, I ended up getting my son has a Kindle. My daughter does not she has an iPad. And I did that for my son. He has an iPad as well, but I made him get a Kindle because, again, I had an iPad I ended up getting an actual Kindle Kindle novel Kindle Fire but like literally an ebook reader because it’s less distracting. When I have a Kindle in my hand, I’m reading a book when I’m reading a book on my iPad, like if I get two adults, but I’m like, I wonder what’s on Reddit. I wonder what’s on Facebook. And suddenly, I like, picked up the iPad with full intent to read a book. And 10 minutes later, I am most definitely not reading a book. And so that’s why I have just normal Kindles. Because it’s, there’s less temptation for the cocker spaniel to get distracted in my head.

Hilary Erickson 16:26
Yeah, that’s true. We subscribe to Scribd. But I’ll start a book and then I find an email. Yeah, comes to me. So we have Kindle fires. But I think that’s a good idea. The bookbub is a good idea. Do they have a use books frequently?

Bryce Cundick 16:40
Yeah. With bookbub. What you do is you tell them, what genres you’re interested in. And so I think I’ve checked off mysteries and young adult and fantasy and science fiction and delivers those to you What about like,

Hilary Erickson 16:53
younger kids like tweens?

Bryce Cundick 16:54
Yeah, it’s got some of that into like, I’ve gotten I’ve gotten some classics offered. Again, most of the books that I’m getting on their books that I’m like, Oh yeah, that looks like it’ll be good for me. But I got like I just got a being complete Berenstain Bears. I mean, I know that’s like even younger but I got that for my daughter. I think it was going for like, I don’t know four bucks or something ridiculous. No, that’s awesome. Yeah, so again, so I don’t know for tweens because they don’t get a lot of twins. I did get like the island of the blue dolphin to Newberry winner so sort of a classic I read that when I also got another one. That’s Oh, roll of thunder hear my cry. I’m making this up. There’s a book that

Hilary Erickson 17:35
I remember that

Bryce Cundick 17:36
I got that was excellent. And now I’m like big library and fail forgetting it. There’s probably librarians across the cross. She just heard a gasp as all your library and let’s just call this what

Hilary Erickson 17:46
so many libraries. So many.

Bryce Cundick 17:50
So many. Yeah.

Hilary Erickson 17:52
All right. So we’ve talking about books do you have like five ish that you love for teens if parents if kids are like I don’t know what to read. Whatever five that maybe parents could

Bryce Cundick 18:02
put up, okay, I did narrow down to five books that I can. Okay for a library library and author coming up with like, a list of five anything is very difficult. But hey, I didn’t have a zoom meeting this morning. And so I did take some time to come up with the number one like the best book I’ve read in probably like the last five years, is a young adult book skyward by Brandon Sanderson. It’s science fiction. And I. So when I read a book, I keep track of everything, and I read it from one to 10. And skyward is one that honestly if I could have given it 11, I would have given it 11 he was just that good. I recommend that this book even like to my mom, and she finishes, she loved it. She loved it so much. She got the sequel, which is not as good as the first one. But it’s still very good. But yeah, skyward is just hands on. My wife has loved it. My son devoured it. I think it’s awesome. It’s just a great book. It’s a book. So it takes place on a on a different planet. There’s a girl who’s sort of stuck Down in the in the caverns of this planet. It’s on this world. You can’t see the sky. Something happened on this world long time ago sort of encase the planet basically in these big things of moving metal and there’s a class system down there. They’re sort of like the peons who have to like, sort of scrounge for food this girl’s like one of those scroungers but she dreams of one day being being able to become a starship pilot and spoiler she does get to become a sky sky. Man, you know, I didn’t it’s called skyward Come on. Say it’s excellent. It’s just great read and a ton of fun. So there’s that one I get

Hilary Erickson 19:34
the love. They love a lot of it. Yes. Yeah.

Bryce Cundick 19:37
He’s, I mean pretty much anything but and he’s written he’s written a lot of young adult he’s written some adult ones as well. But he wrote the flightless firefight series in firefight say now I’m, I’m failing as a Brandon Sanderson fan as well. But so if you only asked me for one, you know, I did not want to come up with a list of five Brandon Sanderson books. That’s why I’ve got so if I recommend one Brennan Center book it would be skyward. Okay, awesome. Another one that I would recommend is sufficiently advanced magic by Andrew row. And this one is it’s one that I would just call like, pop fun. It’s like if you were reading a Final Fantasy game. And so there’s sort of a sub genre and fantasy right now that’s called lit RPG literary role playing games. And it’s like you’re reading a video game. And so the book is, it’s a fantasy book. It was self published a while ago, I picked it up on a whim, I’d heard good things about it. I was like, yeah, I’m probably gonna put this down after 20 pages, but I think it was on sale for maybe free or maybe two bucks, so why not? And I loved it. It was so much fun to read. It’s just about this kid in a fantasy setting your classic fantasy setting but like, there’s science to it. And so he like develops ways to like measure how much magic capability has and he like, it’s just a lot of fun. I’d recommend that one more on the thriller II scary but middle grade side, there’s a series called the lock series. The first one is called screaming staircase. And it’s written supposedly for middle graders. But this book actually scared me as a Stephen King reading adult. I had to put it down and I was like, Okay, I think I’m just gonna step away from this book for a bit. It’s really creepy. It’s about a teenage murder investigator sort of, they investigate the paranormal. It’s really creepy and a lot of fun and yes, it’s like, supposedly middle grade but I think teams would really like it. I know I really liked it. I’ve another library and adult librarian recommended to me that’s how I’d heard about it in the first place. So if you want some creep, definitely go with that. But you’d also thriller

Hilary Erickson 21:39
II was my nickname in college. Oh, yeah. No doubt.

Bryce Cundick 21:45
On the other side, so yes, for girls recommendations as well. This I had to go a bit farther back. But have you ever heard of the book Angus thongs and full frontal snogging? No, but it sounds bad. So it’s, it’s British, so snogging British snogging is British for kissing. It’s a young adult book, supposedly like the sort of like a tell all book by a British teenage girl. It’s hilarious. It is so much fun. And it’s not I mean like granted It’s been a while since I read it, but I remember I read it I liked it enough that I read the next two in the series. And again for me if I I will read anything except maybe on the road. But oh, you know, I want to be exposed to things and so I’ll read it like like with with Twilight, I read Twilight enjoy Twilight. read the second book because I enjoyed the first laugh didn’t like the second book enough to keep on reading beyond that. But so Angus thongs and full from just mocking the fact that I finished. The next two shows that I really did enjoy it. It’s not fantasy. It’s contemporary, but it’s funny. And the fifth one also has a girl protagonist it’s called uglies by Scott westerfeld a beer and you’ve that. Yeah, I’ve read the PDF. That one I really enjoyed. It’s back from 2005 which is sad. When I say it’s back from 2005, and then I realized that’s 15 years ago, before a lot of these teenagers were born, which makes me feel very old, but hey, what can you do? So, I like that one. uglies, it’s a book about a girl so it’s a sort of post up nap, not post apocalyptic, but you know sort of non utopian society but this in this society you can have a surgical procedure that makes you beautiful and makes it so that you can like hobnob with all the best people but then they discover that that’s coming at a price there’s always a price you know, always a price What’s up with that? So the five yes Skywards sufficiently advanced magic Lockwood series Angus thongs and full frontal snogging and the ugly series I would I give any one of those so stamp of

Hilary Erickson 23:44
approval and I will link all those in the show notes of parents are looking for them. So that’s awesome. Any other series’s? That sounds like those I know uglies is a series

Bryce Cundick 23:53
Yeah. And Lockwood is and Angus became one sufficiently advanced magic has some sequels and every Thing skyward Yeah, so I guess those are all series but you did ask for series and I have two more series that I can recommend. The first is the Discworld series by Terry Pratchett. And the best way entry into that, like terrified is a feature sprawling series. It’s probably like, I don’t know, 30 4050 books, many books, and they’re not like chronologically dependent. So it’s not like you have to start with book one and read book two. They’re just all populated in a in a place called Discworld. Their humorous fantasy. And the wee free men has a great entry point for it for teams, or even teen girls. It’s about a girl who becomes a witch. And she has a runnin with these band of like, basically milsim Smurfs, called the knack Mack seagull, and they’re Scottish. And they like to steal and cuss and drink and they’re very funny.

Hilary Erickson 24:51
They sound like my people.

Bryce Cundick 24:52
Yeah, you know, if you were just a bit shorter and blue, that’d be you. So I really recommend that and I also love one of my favorite books from it. It’s called the end more reasons as educated rodents to take on the on the Pied Piper tail. Except there’s a cat who has a group of trained rats that go along with him everywhere and make everyone think that there’s a rat infestation. And then he comes close to that he’s a talking cat, except they come across an actual rat problem. And drama ensues. It’s good. A lot of fun. Well, it sounds interesting. And then the other series that I’d recommend would be book by Dan wells. He’s got two series out that I really like, versus the series called I am not a serial killer, which I think is just a genius title. It’s about a kid who knows that he has all the sort of pre like the red flags in his personality that would bet like he reads a book. He reads up online, like, how do you know, typical signs of a serial killer? And he’s like, that’s me. Me, me. Me also. And he’s so he realizes you know, he’s a basically like a A teenage psychopath and he doesn’t want to doesn’t want to be a serial killer. And so he develops a whole bunch of rules for himself that he’s like, Okay, I need to not like torture animals. And I know this just sounds like horrendous, but it’s really good. And then it’s got it’s got a twist toward them for the middle that takes it even more into the foreground, but it’s a lot of fun. And another series by him is blue screen. And that’s more post apocalyptic, Techno thriller, about some teams who are dealing with, with a virtual drug. And it’s written in the in the near future, probably, you know, like 1020 years in the future, and it’s a lot of fun.

Hilary Erickson 26:36
Yeah. Is there any book about people who wear masks and have to stay far away from each other? feel like this is your option, Bryce, get it

Bryce Cundick 26:47
done? Sure it is I’m doing it actually, the book I’m looking at the book right now takes place in 1918. And I was attracted to it because there’s a serial killer involved and I didn’t even realize until I was doing research down like wait 1918 this is this is Spanish influenza and so I could totally do something which makes me even more water right?

Hilary Erickson 27:04
Yeah, it sounds fascinating. I love wearing a man Yo,

Bryce Cundick 27:08
isn’t a great it’s like, I just watched Oh, sorry. One thing the other night contagion that

Hilary Erickson 27:15
that’s too much for me right now.

Bryce Cundick 27:16
Steven Soderbergh 2011 and it is just bizarre because you totally like this could be about now except the diseases that is a little bit more deadly. And it’s funny because like I remember watching when it first came out, and they’re talking about like our values are knots and all this like Oh, that’s so interesting. So the disease and this has an R value of two and like it causes like the world to like blow up and I’m looking at it now like I really have to come on. You got to get that R value up a bit three or four or five or six that might you know, but to come on. Yeah. Good movie. Interesting, scary.

Hilary Erickson 27:50
I have stopped watching all medical dramas, which is usually my form of entertainment. So yeah, little too close to home now.

Bryce Cundick 27:58
I wonder why.

Hilary Erickson 28:00
So is it important to get our teens to read?

Bryce Cundick 28:04
Yes, it’s important because I will I mean, okay, it’s important to get kids to read in general, because the more you read, the better you can consume information. And if you can read and consume information in more information makes you a better person being able to read and understand what you read and apply it like as librarians to librarians. I know a lot of people just think of us as like, you know, those people who like we’re the gatekeepers to books, library, I use libraries more as gatekeepers to information, and encourage people to be information literate. And that means being able to find information, analyze information, understand information, and apply information. And I don’t know about you, but I think people are really struggling with that these days on like, like on Facebook, though, they’ll find something on Facebook, and they’ll be like, well, that I read it on Facebook. And so it must be I read it, it was online, and you need to be able to discern good information from bad information. There’s lots of bad information out there and you it’s hard to do that if you don’t read regularly, because there’s nuances to it. And so if you can read, and you’re comfortable reading, it just makes everything so much easier. And I wish that more people in the world would read because I really don’t feel like a lot of our problems would be solved by readers.

Hilary Erickson 29:17
I love it. Reading is the gatekeeper to all the things. All the things yeah, even calculus, which, frankly should be kept behind a gate as far as I understand.

Bryce Cundick 29:29
Word on the Street.

Hilary Erickson 29:30
Alright, thanks for coming on Bryce. Thanks for having me. Okay, I hope you guys liked that episode. It really got me thinking about how I want to approach my teen this summer with reading. We’re not going to be doing like worksheets and stuff. I do have my younger ones still doing some worksheets and math and stuff like that. I am going to have my older one doing some LSAT prep, but I really want him to be reading like things that he enjoys. versus just like Reddit, which is a hot topic in our house. I have to say so I hope you guys got some ideas to get your teens reading this summer as well as fertilizing a love of reading for your kids throughout their life. And if you are inspired to get your teens to read more, I actually created a teen of reading bingo, which sounds kind of dumb, but my teen tweens have been pretty excited about it. It just has different genres. That’s all I was aiming for nothing like crazy, or it’s kind of hard because I don’t have access to a library at least when I’m recording this. So I wanted them to be able to find stuff online and it’s really been helpful so far. So download it, it’s in this shows episode show notes. If you can’t find the show notes, you can go to pulling curls, calm to podcasts. And this is Episode 45. If you liked today’s episode, we’d love it if you would share, subscribe and review it really makes a difference. We drop an episode every Monday and until then I hope you have a tangle free day.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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