College Ready

Sharing strategies for student success, college readiness and academic coaching

Category Archives: College


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Get Involved. Help Others. Have Fun. Summer Community Service for Teens

Coaches Corner:

Ahhh, Summer. To students, it means freedom and fun and lazy days with friends. With so much free time, this could also mean the perfect opportunity for your teen to try out volunteering at a local non-profit.

Often, teens need community service  for a high school requirement. Others want to volunteer as part of their preparations for applying to colleges and universities. But that isn’t what summertime is all about. Summer is about the unknown, trying new things, and finding new paths. That’s why trying on a new role as a volunteer is the perfect way to help others and have some fun in the sun! Endless opportunities exist for teens to get their feet wet and find an authentic way to get involved. Some teens will love the fast pace of organizing a soccer match at a youth camp, while others will love the serenity of restoring a park trail.

One simple suggestion–I am a big fan of libraries, and summer reading programs. These programs often use kids as young as 13 as volunteers to sign up participants, and help run events. It gives your child a chance to start small. Typically, a teen volunteers for a one-two hour shift just once a week. These programs couldn’t run without the help of the teens who show up each summer.

Check out what is going on locally this summer in your area and you just might find you have a teen that wants to get involved. A quick and easy web search will help you find an organization in need. One great resource is VolunteerMatch.org. They’ve connected over 7.9 million volunteers with opportunities to help in their communities.

Community service isn’t just a buzz word for a college application. It’s about all the good we do, and the good we feel, when we help others in need.

Whether you like the great outdoors, or prefer the great American novel, there’s an Opp for That! An opportunity to volunteer, that is. Here are more organizations that are in need of teens to volunteer in their programs:

United Way Be a reading mentor to a child who needs a little extra support

National Parks Help maintain and preserve the great outdoors

Volunteer.gov America’s Natural and Cultural Resources Volunteer Portal

Major League Baseball Action Teams: Goups of high school students who plan volunteer events. They receive support from Major League baseball players & inspire others to volunteer.


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8 Types of Learners: Multiple Intelligences in the Classroom

What’s Your Learning Style?

AKA, what kind of smart are you?

Here’s an innovative and highly visual look at the types of learners we work with in our classrooms. Recognizing these multiple intelligences as valid and effective allows for diverse contributions to the academic conversation. Ask your students at the start of the school year to self-identify where they are on this wheel.  Let them “see” that there are “all kinds of smart.”

multiple intelligence wheel

You can also encourage students to take any number of free online surveys that will help them to determine which type of learner they are. Here is one I often use with my students, from the folks at LiteracyNet. There are 56 questions,(don’t worry, it goes fast, just a bubble to select), and after answering all of them, the student will get their top three strengths, as well as how the other 5 intelligences rank. This information is extremely helpful to students, as they can devise study strategies around their individual learning styles.

Fun facts: Did you know that 65 % of all students are visual learners? (Mind Tools, 1988). However, as much as 80% of instruction is typically done orally. (University of Illinois, 2009)


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24 Quotes for Living a Happy Life, from Dr. Seuss

Let’s face it–all the best quotes come from Dr. Seuss! I think I could comfortably say that everything I ever needed to learn, I learned from him. Kindness. Respect for the Earth. Tolerance for people who are different than yourself. Treating the smallest among us as equals. Loving yourself.

I thought I’d share this collection of inspirational quotes now, since it is commencement time and young people are graduating, from Kindergarten to college. You can’t beat the timeless advice of good ole’ Dr. Seuss. There’s something here for EVERYONE. He’s the original guru!

All the best quotes come from Dr Seuss--he's a guru.

My favorite little tidbit…the one I hold near and dear to my heart? “A person’s a person…no matter how small.” What about you? Do you have a favorite quote from Dr. Seuss? Let us know in the comments.

You can order this print via Momo Prints on Etsy. 


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How to Help First-Generation College Students Succeed

This article from the Greater Good Science Center discusses the impact of academic mentoring, engagement and community building on first-generation college students. Research now shows that it’s the social emotional aspects of college life that can be challenging for these students, who don’t have a model of academic success to draw on once they are away at school.

How to Help First-Generation College Students Succeed.

 

image from greatergood.berkeley.edu/


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Hemingway on the Writing Life

Writing, at its best, is a lonely life.~~Ernest Hemingway.

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 What do you think–does writing have to be a solitary pursuit? 

 


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How to be a Scholar. 6 Steps to Encourage Critical Thinking

As we get to the end of the semester and school year, we are expecting our students to demonstrate higher order thinking skills, or Critical Thinking. I like this infographic from Learning Commons at the University of British Columbia.

Critical Thinking Toolkit

Thanks to its simple flow chart style, students can use it to clearly reflect on their own thinking. Students need to constantly question their own process, and those of others. They need to ask questions about the text they read, test possibilities, and allow for new discoveries.

Higher order thinking skills (HOTS) push our students beyond simple responses and elevate them to scholars and critics in their own right. Part of what’s vital in education is for students to learn to trust their own voice, while still questioning their thinking. What strategies do you use in your classroom to encourage critical thinking?

 


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No Net Around the Future. Simple Ways to Help Students Soar to Their Potential

Students Need the Power of Belief to Soar to Their Potential

Teachers. It’s hard. We ask a lot of you. We ask you to keep getting up in the morning and showing up in that classroom and bringing your A Game.

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We ask you to notice the students who need the extra help and notice the students who need the extra challenge. And to do it with a smile and a magical “Mary Poppins” like presence in a classroom. Do all that but do it with fairly little community support and for not that much financial compensation, either. But do it all the same

because

Every

Student

Needs a Hero.

Keep helping our students realize that their potential is unlimited. They can soar and achieve any dream as long as they have someone in their lives that supports them. Our goal at College Ready is simply to let all students know, regardless of socio-economic background, there’s no net around their future.

They can soar to unlimited heights.


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Empathy in Education: 3 Simple Steps

Here’s a simple and easy to understand definition of Empathy:

See…Listen…Feel

Put yourself in someone else’s shoes. We all need this reminder… children and adults, alike.

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When kids understand and practice empathy, bullying decreases, in the classroom and online. Community and compassion increases. We need more of that–that’s the good stuff.

Take some time to help the young people in your life understand what empathy really is. And don’t just tell, but show. Some simple suggestions: start a random acts of kindness campaign on campus, have older kids serve as “buddies” to the younger students, collect pennies for peace, or suggest another easy community service project that gets the whole school involved. Kids helping kids is a constructive way to foster empathy and watch it grow. Kids-Helping-Kids[1]

Best way to teach empathy–show empathy. Best way to affect change, not only in our classrooms, but in the world…be the change.

xo~Lisa, aka: The Happy Teacher


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Hot and Passionate …

“White hot and passionate is the only thing to be.” Roald Dahl

Creativity and Connection in the Classroom

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85% of college-educated professionals say creative thinking is critical for problem solving in their career.

Here’s what else they had to say on why creativity is such an important factor in our classrooms, in our careers, and in our everyday lives, as well:

Creativity and Connection in the Classroom

The study interviewed 1000 college-educated professionals who were employed full-time, 25+ years of age. See source “Creativity and Education: Why it Matters,” by Adobe.