In This Issue

• Happening Now: Private Tutoring, Summer School, Exam Prep and College Advisement
• Host a French Student: Build lifelong bonds you and your family will cherish. July 12-31. Hurry.
• Note from Dr. Linda: Celebrate the 4th of July
• Dr. Al’s Science Corner: How to Measure the Weather
• School Success Tips for Kids: Playing with Words
• Family Fun: Build a Sand Castle that Lasts
• Now It’s Your Turn

Happening Now

Happening Now at StrongLearning.com

• One-to-one tutoring – all subjects, levels and grades.
• Exam prep for SAT, ACT, PSAT, ISEE, TACHS, COOP & SSAT in your home, at a convenient location near you or online. Private or in groups. No contracts.
• College Advisement –helping parents and college-bound students with college selection, essays, applications, and more

Registration for the following Small Group Courses offered by Strong Learning in Westchester and Putnam Counties, NY. Enrollment limited.

• SAT Prep course for the October & November tests beginning in July
• AP Preview courses to give AP students an advantage beginning in July
• Middle School Study Skills course to help with school success beginning in July
• High School Regents Prep courses for August Regents, beginning in July
• TACHS prep for October exam beginning in September
• Italian, Spanish, French or Chinese courses for any age beginning in July

Call Strong Learning today at 845-628-7910

Happening Now at DrLindasBlog.com

• Find news and updates about our events, online & offline
• Read articles – You’re welcome to reprint any article in full. Include my contact information.
  Great for a school or community newsletter, a blog or ezine.
• Email your comments, thoughts and observations about kids, school and learning. I love to
  hear from you!

Urgent Need for Host Families. Can you help? French high school students need a welcome on July 12th for 19 days. World Exchange, a non-profit exchange program, is urgently seeking host families. Interested families are invited to visit the World Exchange web site or call 1-800-444-EXCH (3924) and speak with Vera or Michael Sklaar to learn more about this opportunity.

Note from Dr. Linda

Hi Parents, Teachers and Friends:

4^th of July means cookouts, fireworks and no school. While families are celebrating our country’s independence, kids are celebrating their independence from school, after school activities and being totally over-scheduled. It’s time to do whatever they want.

But as I was scheduling all my summer clients, I wondered how much freedom kids would really have over these two precious months. Each parent was trying to figure out how to schedule their appointments between their family vacations, their son’s nature camp, their daughter’s drama workshop, family visits, planned mountain hikes (with or without bikes), the week at the ocean, and summer camp.

Family schedules seemed to be just as overloaded as during the school months. One mother, frantically trying to find a free hour, said “I think I overbooked her this summer.”

As I watched parents mull over their schedules, I wondered when these children have time to fantasize, to create their own play, time to do what kids do in their pursuit of happiness. It’s something to think about.

By the way, I’m writing this newsletter before I leave for a vacation in Vermont with my family because I’m living the same jam-packed summer you are.

This month’s newsletter not only offers another Dr. Al’s fun at home experiment you can do with your children to measure rainfall, it also offers fun educational activities for kids 6-16. Finally, it tells you how you can save that magnificent sand castle you will make with your kids at the beach.

Have a great summer and a fabulous 4^th of July.

Dr. Linda

From test taking to homework, from math to reading, twice a week, you’ll get short, effective tips to help your child learn. Sign up now and invite other parents to sign up. It’s my FREE gift to you and your children. Check out the bonuses you’ll get when you subscribe to the tips http://www.askdrlindasilbert.com/tips.html.

Dr. Al’s Science Corner

How to Measure Weather
Everybody likes to talk about the weather. Now you can make weather measurements too. It’s fun. It’s easy to measure outside temperature. Just place a thermometer outside, away from the direct sun.

It’s also easy to measure the amount of rainfall using a rain gauge that you make yourself. All you need is a can with straight sides and a plain rim, a wooden stick, and a ruler.

Place the can outside in a clearing away from buildings or trees. Prop it up with stones around the outside so it doesn’t blow over. Now, wait for the precipitation—the fancy word for rain.

Soon after the storm it is over, put the stick straight in the can. Remove the stick and use the ruler to measure the amount of rain. That’s all there is to it.

You may want to measure in both inches and centimeters. It’s a good way to become comfortable with both English and metric units.

Also, consider keeping a chart of the dates and amount of precipitation. Just for fun, make an additional column for the amount of precipitation the weather forecasters predicted. This way you can check up on how accurate the forecasts are.

So, when someone says to you, “How about that storm we had last night?” you’ll be able to say, “That was a doozy. 4 inches of rain!” And, you know it was 4 inches because you measured it yourself.

Besides learning about rain and about measuring in inches and centimeters, it also leads to family discussions about the need for rain, the need for clean water, and effects of water pollution.

School Success Tips for Kids: Play with Words

Going on vacation? Kids from 6 to 16 can play these word games in the car–or at home.

Make a Word Necklace: Cut index cards in half. Hold each card vertically and hole punch it at the top.

1. For young readers: write words with short vowels, long vowels, sight words, or from a particular word family. For example, all words in the word family all: all, ball, tall, call, etc. or ight: night, light, tight, or ound: found, sound, pound.
2. For intermediate readers: write new vocabulary words they find in books they’re reading or on line.
3. For teenagers: write vocabulary words that they’ll need on the SAT’s. The “Hot List” put out by the Princeton Review is a good source for words. Get the top 100 words or buy flashcards with the top 500 words.
4. For All: Lace the cards onto a shoelace or piece of yarn. Young children may prefer to wear as a necklace. Most will prefer to hang their words on their bedroom doorknob when they get home from the vacation.

Play Mad Libs: Did you have Mad Libs as a child? It’s the perfect way to learn parts of speech. Without ever having to do pages of drill looking for nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs, kids laugh their way through pages of silly outrageous stories while learning parts of speech. Check out Mad Libs here.

Family Fun: Build a Sand Castle that Lasts

How many years have you built sand castles and had to leave them at the beach? You remember the ones you made with your family.

Now it’s your children’s turn.

Find out how you can build a sand castle that will become a keepsake. Go to FamilyFun.com and find out what you need to do.

Now It’s Your Turn

Go over to Dr Linda’s Blog now and subscribe by email or RSS feed so you won’t miss anything. I love to hear from you. Let me know what you’d like to see in the next newsletter.

Thanks so much for all your emails, calls and comments. If one of my tips or articles has helped, please let me know and I’ll try to include it in as the next success story to share with my readers.

Wishing your children and all you loving and hard-working Moms and Dads, a happy and fun summer vacation.

I’ll have more fun summer learning activities that give kids a boost for back to school in the fall in your August Newsletter