Everyday Ways to Help Kids Learn

 

Read this article from parenting.com which features Lisa Niver Rajna, science teacher!

Looking at a Construction Site
Most adults think of science as an experiment or equation that has nothing to do with everyday life. But science is the process for figuring out how things work, explains Lisa Niver Rajna, a K-6 science teacher in Los Angeles. When you think of it that way, even a construction site can turn into a physics lesson.

Going on a Walk
Observation is the basis of science, so do what Rajna does when she takes her students out on a walk: ask your child to put on his imaginary detective hat and tell you everything he sees.

What kids can learn: You can work in a lesson about photosynthesis when you and your child have a conversation about leaves: Why are they green in the spring, and why do they change color in the fall and drop off the trees? See how many different insects you see or different bird songs you hear. City kids can also soak up a little physics by noticing the timing of the traffic lights—do they depend on the flow of traffic to change or are they pre-set?

Snapping a Pic
Your phone is always with you, so turn its camera into a teaching tool and your child can pick up some very cool scientific principles of light, says Rajna.

What kids can learn: Get your child to snap a photo series of his shadow (or do it for him); by identifying which side of the photo his shadow is on and how long it is, he can learn about the earth’s rotation and the sun’s position. Or teach optics with apps like CamWow (for iPhones) or Effects Booth (for Droids). Both apps, which let you pick a variety of real-time filters that make objects look like something in a funhouse mirror as they bulge, elongate, and split in two, are fun (and funny) ways to talk about how light travels, and how it can be distorted by hitting a convex or concave lens.
 http://www.parenting.com/gallery/everyday-ways-sneak-learning

Lisa Ellen Niver

Lisa Niver is an award-winning travel expert who has explored 102 countries on six continents. This University of Pennsylvania graduate sailed across the seas for seven years with Princess Cruises, Royal Caribbean, and Renaissance Cruises and spent three years backpacking across Asia. Discover her articles in publications from AARP: The Magazine and AAA Explorer to WIRED and Wharton Magazine, as well as her site WeSaidGoTravel. On her award nominated global podcast, Make Your Own Map, Niver has interviewed Deepak Chopra, Olympic medalists, and numerous bestselling authors, and as a journalist has been invited to both the Oscars and the United Nations. For her print and digital stories as well as her television segments, she has been awarded three Southern California Journalism Awards and two National Arts and Entertainment Journalism Awards and been a finalist twenty-two times. Named a #3 travel influencer for 2023, Niver talks travel on broadcast television at KTLA TV Los Angeles, her YouTube channel with over 2 million views, and in her memoir, Brave-ish, One Breakup, Six Continents and Feeling Fearless After Fifty.

One response to “Everyday Ways to Help Kids Learn

  1. I love this. Kids are naturally curious/naturally scientists about the world around them, and it makes me sad when test-focused education squashes that love for the world and how it works.

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