Kitchen Education

Cooking is a great way to explore the world around you. 

• Talk about taste with your children: caster sugar and salt look similar, but do they taste the same? Smell the vanilla essence and then the vinegar, then taste them both.
• If you ever bake cookies, invest in cookie cutters that are shaped like letters of the alphabet, or use a knife to cut out your own letter shapes. You can also roll snakes from the dough and form them into letters and numbers. 
• Weighing and measuring cake ingredients is a fun way to learn the basics of maths: is a teaspoon more than a tablespoon? It looks larger, now let’s check. A teaspoon is 5 ml, while a tablespoon is 12.5 ml. Which is more, 5 or 12.5? 
•  Which looks more, 100g of sugar or 100g of flour? Which one weighs more? 
• How long is 20 minutes (the time it usually takes to bake muffins)? Can we manage to wash the dishes and clean the floor in that time? What time is it now and what time do the muffins need to be taken out of the oven? 
• Take 20 raisins out of their bag. Put 13 of them into the batter. Can you guess how many are left in your hand? 
• What is a square? Cut the ham for the pizza topping into squares. What’s a cube? Cut the cheese into cubes. 
• You can also start teaching logic and consequence: we have one measuring cup, shall we first measure the flour or the milk? What do you think will happen if we pour flour into a cup that’s still wet from the milk? And, of course, what will happen to the muffins if we don’t take them out of the oven when the timer goes off? 
• Why are some foods are “everyday foods” and others “treats”?

This way of learning is particularly important to tactile and kinesthetic children. Is your child tactile or kinesthetic? Find out. 

Fun Maths and Logic Problems

Children whose learning style is analytic should have a lot of fun with these problems.

1. An old puzzle. A flying goose met a flock of geese in the air and said: "Hello, hundred geese!" The leader of the flock answered to him: "There is not a hundred of us. If there were as many of us as there are and as many more and half many more and quarter as many more and you, goose, also flew with us, then there would be hundred of us." How many geese were there in the flock?
2. Three ducks and two ducklings weigh 32 kg. Four ducks and three ducklings weigh 44kg. All ducks weigh the same and all ducklings weigh the same. What is the weight of two ducks and one duckling?
3. There are three houses one is red one is blue band one is white. If the red house is to the left of the house in the middle and the blue house is to the right to the house in the middle where is the white house?
4. Uncle Henry was driving to Halifax when he spotted a big green gorilla on the side of the road. He screeched to a stop, jumped out of his car. He saw the outline of a number on the gorilla. He couldn't quite see the number, but he knew it was a 4 digit number. And:
   1) He remembered seeing a number 1.2) In the hundred's place he remembers the number is 3 times the number in the thousand's place.
   3) He said the number in the one's place is 4 times the number in the ten's place.
   4) Finally he said the number 2 is sitting in the thousand's place.
   What is the number?
5. Some octopuses, some fish and a few mermaids were happily frolicking in a rock pool. Altogether there were 38 arms, 24 eyes and 8 tails all swimming in the pool.
   How many mermaids were there?  
   
   
   Children whose learning style is holistic might prefer these problems: 
   
   
   • You are in a cabin and it is pitch black. You have one match on you. Which do you light first, the newspaper, the lamp, the candle or the fire?
   • Imagine you are in a room, no doors or windows or anything, how do you get out?   
   • A boy and a doctor was fishing.The boy is the doctor's son but the doctor is not the boy's father. Who is the doctor?
   • What happens only in the middle of each month, in all of the seasons, except summer and happens only in the night, never in the day?

How sequential and simultaneous thinkers use computers to learn

Schools all over the world are doing it: making tablet computers compulsory for students, ordering smart boards, redesigning classrooms into e-learning centres. It’s cool. It’s trendy. It simulates the future workplace. But is it for everybody?  

When it comes to internal information processing, learners will always use either sequential/analytic or impulsive/holistic brain processing and will either need to reflect or think simultaneously about the learning content. Therefore, online-learning situations and course organisation need to take these style differences into account. 

Generally speaking, people with a sequential/analytic dominance are linear thinkers who like facts, details and logic. They want their learning materials neat and organised, and they will read them from the beginning to the end, without skipping around. They learn step-by-step, prefer logical and analytic arguments and focus on details and facts. To cater to their needs, the online-learning package should:

1. Make frequent use of keywords. 
2.  Make use of lists and bullet points. 
3.  Explain all procedures to be used. 
4.  Detail all the assignments and objectives. 
5. Underline important facts and arrange them in sequence. 
6. Proceed step-by-step through detailed information. 
7. Have a facility to assess the student’s progress frequently. 
8.  Provide instant and regular feedback on the student’s progress.

Impulsive/holistic processors, in contrast, aren’t interested in details. Instead, they need to know the overall picture and the reasons behind a project. They tend to use their intuition or feelings rather than rationalise about a problem. Their computer-based learning should:

1. Relate the lesson to the students’ experience. 
2. Use practical examples. 
3. Provide an overview of the concepts. 
4.  Make use of mind-maps. 
5.  Make use of summaries. 
6. Allow the students to discover the facts by themselves. 
7. Allow the students to map, graph or illustrate the material. 
8. Give positive feedback, even for small achievements.

What is your child's preferred way of learning? Find out.

Learning From Mistakes

“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
― Albert Einstein

 “We learn from failure, not from success!”
― Bram Stoker, Dracula

“The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again in a different way.”
― Dale Carnegie

“The hardest mistakes to learn from are those that lack consequence.”
― Jasper Sole

“We are products of our past, but we don't have to be prisoners of it.”
― Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for? 

“Good advice is not often served in our favorite flavor.”
― Tim Fargo

“When you find your path, you must not be afraid. You need to have sufficient courage to make mistakes. Disappointment, defeat, and despair are the tools God uses to show us the way.”
― Paulo Coelho, Brida 

The Worry Buster

(by Graham McGregor, from his booklet How To Make 2014 The Best Year Ever)

An interesting survey was done a few years ago on what the average person worries about. The survey found that forty percent of what people worry about never happens. And thirty percent of what people worry about had already happened so you couldn’t do anything about it. Twelve percent of what the average person worries about is what others say about you, which most of the time is untrue. Finally, according to this survey, ten percent of worry deals with your health and worrying will only make that worse!

That leaves about eight percent of the things that are considered to be real problems… and worry will not do any good with these either!

In other words, we worry about a lot of things that are not going to happen or have already happened. In the wonderful book “How to stop worrying and start living” by Dale Carnegie there is an excellent technique to handle worry.

It’s called the ‘Worry Buster’ and it has four simple steps:

1. Define in writing exactly what you are worried about. In medicine there is a saying that accurate diagnosis is 50% of the cure. So write down exactly what you are worried about. For example “I am worried about my job.” Or “I am worried about a business client I have who is slow paying their invoice.”
2. Define in writing the Worst Possible Outcome (W.P.O.) of this worry. If you have concerns about your job, the worst possible outcome is that you lose this job. If you have concerns about a business client being slow to pay their invoice the worst possible outcome is that you never get paid.
3. Decide mentally to accept the worst possible outcome should it occur. This will mentally relieve a lot of stress. Ask yourself will this outcome kill me? Will losing your job kill you? Will not getting paid kill you? In most cases the answer is no. (Asking this simple question allows you to put your worry in perspective.)
4. Take action immediately to make sure the worst possible outcome doesn’t occur. Action is the antidote for worry. If you are worried about your job, talk to someone in your organisation who can give you more accurate information about your concerns.

If you are worried about a client not paying you, perhaps you could make time to go and talk with them face to face and voice your concerns. Maybe you could offer them an installment plan to pay their invoice if they are in financial difficulty.

Another useful strategy to eliminate worry is the ten year question. This is a great question to ask whenever you experience a major setback of any sort. “Ten years from now will this really matter?” This puts everything in perspective fast! If I were to ask you what you were worried and concerned about on this day 12 months ago most people wouldn’t have a clue. This goes to show that much of what we think is terrible today is usually not that important even a year later. Ten years is even longer.

Use the Worry Buster technique on any worry you have right now. It’s an excellent tool to eliminate worry quickly. And the more worries you eliminate the happier you will feel.

Easter in Style

If your Working Style is tactile with a non-preference for mobility, chances are high that you may enjoy dabbling in various crafts from time to time.

Easter is a perfect time for crafts. Depending on the part of the world you live in and your cultural background, you may want to try your hand at painting eggs, making palm crosses, knitting fluffy yellow chickens and designing the world's best treasure hunts for those yummy chocolate treats.

More often than not, you will have a festive meal with a creatively decorated table. Have a look at our photos for some ideas. And have a very happy Easter - in Style.

Free Group Profiles

All teachers know how important it is to get to know the learning styles prevalent in their class. But teachers don't always have enough time to read every single student's LSA profile in detail, what with 28-35 children in an average classroom. That's why here, at Creative Learning, we've updated our free group profiles to summarise every class's learning needs in one easy-to-understand report.

Say goodbye to unruly behaviour and blank looks. Find out what your class needs and enjoy a more stress-free learning environment. Simply purchase the LSA profiles for every student, let them complete the questionnaire online (they love this part), then run a group profile on the results. As easy as 1, 2, 3!

Start here.