Proudly Hosting Nigel Latta

Say Nigel Latta to any parent in New Zealand, and they'll smile. We all love the common-sense approach to parenting this renowned psychologist offers in his books and, even more famously, in his TV appearances. You just have to be intrigued by anything called "The Politically Incorrect Parenting Show". The contents won't disappoint. It lets you off the hook when your parenting style is human instead of textbook. It tells you it's ok to discipline your kids if they don't want to do their homework. It's a parent's best friend.

Here is an excerpt from the book "Politically Incorrect Parenting: Before Your Kids Drive You Crazy, Read This!" about the art of communication (reprinted here with the author's permission):

The effective use of punctuation underlies all good parenting. In fact, I would say that there are some types of punctuation that have no place at all in parent-teenager communication.

Perhaps the worst offender is the humble comma. This simple punctuation device is responsible for more conflict between parents and their teenage children than any other. Whilst it might seem extreme, my advice would be to declare your home a comma-free zone. The comma will only bring trouble, and if you are wise you will have none of it. The rule of thumb is that anything which comes after the comma is nagging. Anything after a comma is simply going on about things.

The full-stop, on the other hand, is your friend. The full-stop can prevent many arguments. It can be used liberally with little fear. Question marks are a little like salt, in that a little salt is usually helpful, whereas a lot of salt ruins just about every meal. Salt and question marks should both be used in moderation. In general, you will want to deploy a fill-stop as soon as you can. If you have a choice between a comma and a full-stop, always go for the latter.

Mothers tend to have far more difficulty with this basic (…). Commas come naturally to mothers that they are often unable to tell when they are using them. Mothers also take more convincing about the need to limit the use of question marks. Mothers often thing the best follow-up for one question mark is another question mark. Fathers are more full-stop oriented.”
 
Bad Punctuation:

“No, you can’t go to your friends place tonight, and before you ask me why, let me tell you, because if you were to speak a little more nicely to me and your father, and show us just a modicum of common courtesy, then I might have let you go, but you’re the one who decided to be rude, so you’re the one who can stay home, and if you want someone to blame for that, then don’t blame me, because I’m not the one who doesn’t think about anyone else in this family, although you probably don’t even notice the fact that I do lots of things for you that I never get any thanks for, like your washing, and cooking all the meals, and keeping this place clean, and ….”
 
How to fix that:
“No, you can’t go to your friend’s place tonight.”

Here's that link to the book again: "Politically Incorrect Parenting".
And here's Nigel's website.

Teach Your Teen To Drive With Learning Styles

Did you know that car crashes cause the most deaths among the USA teenagers?

Learning to drive is a lot like learning to walk. At first, you fall over. You think you'll never be able to master it. It's stressful, it's frustrating, it may even be dangerous. And then, one day, you realise you've got it. Driving feels like second nature, the car is an extension of your hands, your feet, and your head. You forget how steep the learning curve had been.

And that's just the thing. When you learn to drive, you have to learn a myriad of new skills, some of them counter-intuitive (like looking in the rear view mirror when driving forward), all of them difficult yet vitally important to your safety as well as the safety of those around you.

Some people learn these skills faster than others. It's all to do with a person's individual Learning Style. If your teens are a holistic processor, they'll probably get the hang of it all more easily: operating the clutch with the left foot while applying the accelerator with the right foot while changing gears with one hand and steering with the other and flicking the indicator with their imaginary third hand. If they're analytic, however, they might ace the Learner's License yet struggle to drive a manual car.

What other Learning Style Elements might help your teen learn to drive? Being visual, auditory and tactile will help, together with not needing mobility when concentrating.

Check here to see whether learning to drive will come easily to your teen. Also check what other elements can help them in their journey, like their optimal time of day, temperature, noise level, etc.

Learning Styles the Teenage Way

Teens don’t have it easy these days. At school, they have to achieve if they want to get into a good university: and that often means achievement in exams, sports as well as in the arts. At home, they have to deal with people they knew their entire lives on a totally new level. They are given more freedom and more responsibility, they are told to act their age and get told off when they do.

Hormones, peer pressure and so much to learn every day. Wouldn’t it be awesome to have some help?

Help is here in a tool called LSA SWIFT (Learning Style Analysis SWIFT). Aimed especially at teens, it shows what makes them tick:

·        at home

·        at school

·        on the sports field.

It helps them:

·        communicate

·        accept themselves

·        understand others.

LSA SWIFT. Shorter. Cooler. Smarter.

Troubled Teens and Learning Styles

It's not often that a popular fiction book, a thriller, deals with the thorny issue of parental responsibilities during their charges' teenage years. Harlan Coben, a New York Times bestselling author, has recently produced two such novels: Hold Tight and Caught.

Hold Tight delves into the delicate dilemma of "should you spy on your teen's Internet activities". Caught asks whether it's OK for teens to consume alcohol at home when it's against the law: if your child will go out and drink anyway, is it better for a parent to provide a safe haven of a beer keg at home.

Creative Learning doesn't have the answers to those questions, that's something every parent has to decide for themselves, having the full knowledge of their child.

What Creative Learning can do, however, is supplement your knowledge. Is your child likely to sneak out at night and go to a party, then accept a drive home from somebody who'd been drinking?

If their Learning Style has preferences in these areas:

• learning with peers
• noise
• kinesthetic input
• intake
• external motivation
• evening

as well as a non-preference in the following areas:

• responsibility
• conformity
• routine

chances are, they may be a little more unruly than is safe for them.

What is your teen's Learning Style. Find out today.

A Learning Style Profile of a Teenage Video Gamer

The Pros

• Video games improve your hand-eye coordination.
• They can teach you problem solving, quick thinking, logistics, mapping, spacial manipulation and many other skills.
• Playing is more interactive than watching TV.

The Cons

• Video games eat up the time that might otherwise be spent doing active stuff outdoors.
• Even if you're playing in teams, gaming is not a social activity.
• For certain personality types, violent games may lead to violent behaviour in real life.
• It's an addictive pastime.

Of course, a teenager whose learning style is kinesthetic and social-groups is less likely to become addicted to gaming than a teenager who is a loner, concentrates best when sitting still, has a combination visual-tactile learning style with a high persistence component. To determine your teen's learning style, start here.

Learning Styles and Using Google

There's a joke making its rounds on email lately, "Living without a Cell Phone". It's all about how hard our childhood's been compared to that of our children. One of the points it makes is the ease with which today's school children can access information online, whereas anybody over 30 still remembers having to go to the library and look it up in the card catalogue, request the book, wait two weeks, fetch the book....

It sounds like Generation Y and Z is living in Utopia and they "don't know how good they've got it". However, a recent study by Otago University (New Zealand) reveals a somewhat different picture. Although school children in developed countries today have easy access to the Internet and they know how to load up Google, what they don't know is how to squeeze information out of it.

Their failure to conduct online research (even when the topic was well-defined, such as, find out how the kiwi bird got its name) is attributed to a number of reasons:

• mistyping
• inability to phrase the search properly
• inability to filter out relevant hits
• incomprehension of what they're reading.

All valid theories, of course. Nevertheless, Creative Learning would like to add another hypothesis to the mix: that of the children's learning style.

To use a computer effectively, a child should have certain learning style strengths, such as visual (words), visual (external), tactile, working well alone. In addition, to perform a meaningful Google search, a child needs a balance of analytic and holistic processing skills, the ability to sit still and the ability to work in an unstructured way.

Can your child cope with finding relevant information online? To determine your child's learning style, start here.

Teenagers, Sleep and Learning Styles

At Creative Learning, we've noticed an interesting shift in Learning Style Preferences when it comes to the Time of Day element (read more about the LSA Pyramid and its elements). Two interesting shifts, to be precise.

The first shift occurs around the time a child enters puberty (typically 11-13):

• Early Morning preferences become Late Morning or Afternoon preferences
• Late Morning preferences become Afternoon or Evening preferences.

The second shift occurs later in life, any time between 22 and 40:

• Evening preferences become Afternoon preferences
• Afternoon preferences become Late Morning preferences.

We have scientific backing, too! Research reports in the medical journal Pediatrics (2005) quote scientific evidence of a biological reason: teenage sleep rhythm actually becomes different between the age 13 and 22. The change means that a teenager's performance and achievement peak in the afternoon.

This means when your child enters their teens, it's not good enough to rely on an old LSA report done three years prior. They need a new one.

Learning Styles and a Gifted Teenager

Being a gifted learner is often a challenge, particularly when the education system doesn't match their abilities.

Because schoolwork comes so easily to them, sitting in class and doing repetitive homework may be boring. Depending on his or her Learning Style, as well as on the teacher’s attitude, a gifted teenager will most likely choose a way to pass the time by:
- moving about, even when not allowed to
- reading their own book (usually advanced for their age) during class
- playing the fool
- being insubordinate
- daydreaming.

Alternatively, they may fake or even develop headaches or stomach aches (psychosomatic illnesses) in order to avoid school altogether.

Furthermore, some children and teenagers may hide their true talents in an attempt to fit in with their peers (if their Learning Style shows a preference for pairs, peers and/or team learning). They may underachieve on purpose, or fail to reach their academic potential because they are not motivated at school (if their Learning Style shows the need for internal motivation).

If left in a classroom with a generalized curriculum, the gifted child will not progress to realize their full potential. They will feel neglected and understimulated. Gifted children need special programs to flourish and to develop their abilities.

Gifted children who feel supported and understood will have an easier time reaching their full potential. Determining their Learning Style is the first step.

Teenagers and Learning Styles - Who’s the boss?

There is more to learning than school and university:
some things you learn are useful, such as reading and writing
some things you learn are fun, like a sport or a new game
some things you learn can save lives - including your own life.

What skills don’t you have that could potentially save a life?
First aid?
Survival swimming?
Snow rescue basics?
Safe driving?

A research experiment in Toronto aimed at teaching teens about the risks of driving, confirmed that while teenagers learnt well, they also forgot quickly.

I bet the researchers did not use Learning Style Analysis in their experiment, or the teens would have scored much better!

Learning styles will show you how you can master any life skill: be it driving, squash, paintball, bridge, oil painting, speaking Japanese or effective communication.

What life skills or life-saving skills do you want to get this year? Make it easy on yourself with this super-easy 2step process:
Ask yourself: what is my Learning Style?
Find out.

Teenage Learning Styles and Computers

Computers are cool. You probably use one every day to play games, talk to your friends or do homework research.
However, some types or learners benefit from computer learning (also known as online learning or e-learning) more than others.
Check out your Learning Style report. If you have a preference or a strong preference in 4 or more of the below elements of the LSA Pyramid:
· VISUAL (external)
· VISUAL (words)
· TACTILE (touching)
· MOBILITY (stationary)
· SOCIAL GROUPINGS: ALONE
· TIME OF DAY: evening
· KINESTHETIC (internal),
then you learn well using a computer (education games, Internet research, etc.)

Be aware, however, that not all information you find on the Internet may be correct, unless it comes from a trustworthy site (a government website, Wikipedia, etc.)

You may also enjoy socialising on the Internet. Although this point may seem painfully obvious, keep in mind that not everybody in cyberspace is who they say they are, even if you’ve been emailing and chatting for months. Please allow your parents to discuss the topic of Internet safety with you.

Teenage Learning Styles and Halloween

Did you know that...
... your Learning Style affects the way you will party this Halloween?

Really?

Really!

Learning styles have an influence on your life outside of school, too. They shape the way you connect with your friends and the way you ask your parents to extend your curfew for Halloween.

Your Learning Style will determine what type of party you will organise, and whether you will do the organising or fall in with other people’s plans.

Even things like music, how many crisps you’ll eat and how long you’ll dance will be controlled, to a degree, by your Learning Style.

Spooky, isn’t it?
This Halloween, ask yourself who is in control of your life: you or your Learning Style.
Find out.

Teenagers learn well to live well

There is more to learning than school and university:

• some things you learn are useful, such as reading and writing
• some things you learn are fun, like a sport or a new game
• some things you learn can save lives - including your own life.
  

What skills don’t you have that could potentially save a life?

• First aid?
• Survival swimming?
• Snow rescue basics?
• Safe driving?
  
  A research experiment in Toronto aimed at teaching teens about the risks of driving, confirmed that while teenagers learnt well, they also forgot quickly.
  
  I bet the researchers did not use Learning Style Analysis in their experiment, or the teens would have scored much better!
  
  Learning styles will show you how you can master any life skill: be it driving, squash, paintball, bridge, oil painting, speaking Japanese or effective communication.
  
  What life skills or life-saving skills do you want to get this year? Make it easy on yourself with this super-easy 2step process:

1. Ask yourself: what is my Learning Style?
2. Find out.
   
   
   
   

Learning Styles and Teenagers: Your Future Job

Because some jobs require shift work...
Because some jobs mean working under stress...
Because some jobs are better suited to visual people, while other jobs require moving around...

... you can use your Learning Style report for your career planning.

Learning styles will show you how to communicate, plan your work, manage your time and handle deadlines.

The report also contains recommendations as to which careers may or may not be suitable for you. For example, if you can’t stand routine, your profile will say: “As you love change, and enjoy trying out new things, you hardly ever do the same thing the same way twice. It is important that you take into account your strong need for variety and your love of change when you consider future career planning.”
While at school, you will probably do most tasks and projects alone or with a chosen friend. Work, however, is different. Some of the time, you will be expected to be part of a team, working with people you may not know very well, or not like very much, or whose Learning Style is radically different from yours. And some of the time you will need to work alone. No choice, no arguments.
It is also important to check your attitude with respect to:
responsibility,
conformity,
perseverance, and
motivation
before you decide to accept a specific job offer.

Remember, it is even more important in the current economic crisis that you choose a job that matches your Learning and Working Style. If you’re a mismatch, you will not hold the job for long and, what’s worse, your record will be blemished forever... when it’s not even your fault.

What is your Learning Style? Find out.

Learning Styles and Teen Relationships

Opposites Attract!

Calling all teenagers! You’ve probably heard that men are from Mars and women are from Venus. Although this is a broad generalisation, there is some merit to the argument that women solve their problems by talking while men retreat to their cave.

Learning styles will show you how to treat and talk to your romantic partner based on their specific learning style, to minimise misunderstandings and potential areas of conflict.

To avoid conflicts and misunderstandings in your romantic relationships, remember the following:
· If she tells you about her problem, listen. Really listen. Don’t interrupt, don’t ask questions, don’t offer solutions. Simply nod and make encouraging “mmmm” noises.
· If he’s particularly quiet, don’t assume it’s something you’ve done or that he’s about to break up with you. Most likely, he’s stressed or preoccupied about something. He may even have a headache. Let him be.
· If she asks you to do five things in one breath, ask her to repeat them slowly so that you can write them down.
· If he takes his time before making up his mind, don’t hurry him.
· If she’s looking particularly lovely, tell her. Don’t expect her to read your mind.
· If his car looks like a mess, think twice before offering to clean it out: he may genuinely need all the pieces of paper, tennis balls and pairs of shoes he drives around with.
· Communicate using your partner’s communication style: if they are visual, send them an SMS; if they are auditory, give them a call; if they like lists, then give them lists.
· Tell your partner what your preferred communication style is.

What is your Learning Style? Find out.

Learning Styles and Teens - Part 3

Learning Styles help teenagers in many areas. Too many people limit their practice of learning styles to school, homework and learning new things. While learning styles do help you achieve academic success, they can also:

· Improve your sports performance in a sport of your choice.
· Help you understand the way the opposite gender thinks.
· Decrease your stress levels.
· Show you how to manage time better.
· Make your parents understand you.

For example...

If your room is a mess, relax: you’re not alone. Most teenagers battle with their parents for the right to keep their rooms the way they like it.

But did you know that being messy could be more than a “teenage thing”? Whether you are organised or disorganised, tidy or messy, punctual or unable to keep track of time a biological (inherent and often inherited) function of your brain.

Perhaps you and your parents can strike a deal: you will keep the bathroom, kitchen and lounge tidy in exchange for them allowing your room to be as untidy as you please?

Your Learning Style report will tell you whether you are untidy by nature. It will also offer you tips on how to help you get organised.

What is your Learning Style? Find out.

Learning Styles Help Teenagers - Part 2

Teenagers - particularly those in Western societies - often face the following problems:
· Low self-esteem
· Lack of confidence
· Depression
· Burnout
· Insomnia
· Hyperactivity
· Apathy
· Feeling misunderstood
· Stress
· Underperformance in sports
· Academic underperformance
· Relationship issues
· Insubordinate behaviour.

Many of those can be solved almost overnight by analysing the teenager’s Learning Style and ensuring important communication takes place on their terms using their preferred Communication Style.

[Do you know your child’s communication style? It’s part of their Learning Style, available through the Learning Style Analysis (LSA) tool.]

Another great tool to solve feelings of low self-belief is the book “I Love Myself” by Angela Smith. It can be used to boost children’s morale from as early as 5 years of age. Read more about “I Love Myself” here.

If you are forced to learn in a way that’s contra-recommended in your Learning Style Report, you can experience stress, burnout, health problems and depression. What is your Learning Style?

Learning Styles Helping Teenagers

· What are the warning signs that your teenager needs help?
· Is your teenager in trouble?
· Are you overreacting?

Teenage years are tricky. They are filled with hormone swings and misunderstandings, with fear and with awe, with too much responsibility and too little freedom. (Or is that “too much freedom and too little responsibility”?)

What teenagers desperately need is:
· acceptance
· a sense of belonging
· communication channels
· being understood
· independence within the framework of loving guidance and support.

When talking to a teenager, make sure you use their individual communication style.
· If they are word-oriented, write them a message and if they are auditory, then talk.
· If they are right-brained, use anecdotes. If they are left-brained, use facts.
· If they are right-brained, start with an overview and the objective. If they are left-brained, start at the beginning.

[Do you know your teenager’s communication style? It’s part of their Learning Style, available through the Learning Style Analysis (LSA) tool.]

Most teenagers can be moody, rude, impossible to talk to and difficult to live with. Experts agree that if your teen grunts good-morning, leaves the house without breakfast and dirty laundry on the floor, bangs the door on the way back in and slouches in silence through dinner... then he or she is a normal teenager who “will grow out of it”.

So when do you start worrying that your “normal teen” is a “troubled teen”?
· When a sociable teen stops socialising and spends a lot of time alone.
· When a teenager who’s usually happy with hos or her company starts socialising excessively, particularly with friends you consider scary.
· When a quiet teen listens to loud music.
· When a loud teen is too quiet.
· In short, when the teen’s behaviour does not reflect their Learning Style.

Living in violation of your Learning Style can lead to stress, burnout, health problems and depression. Do you know your teen’s Learning Style?