Jumpstart has announced that Llama, Llama, Red Pajama by Anna Dewdney will be this year’s choice for the Read for the Record event! Each year, Jumpstart brings awareness to the crisis in early education by having children and adults participate in the world’s largest shared reading experience.

National Teacher Appreciation Week is recognized every year in the month of May. As defined by the dictionary, a teacher or to teach “is a person who imparts knowledge or skill through instruction”. However, we at FasTracKids know that a teacher is much more.

Magnificent educational opportunities can be discovered inside a building that, from the outside, wouldn’t seem to captivate a child’s imagination. Some of the FasTracKids staff visited the Denver Museum of Nature and Science to gain perspective on how kids are staying engaged outside the classroom. While museums wouldn’t necessarily be the first place you would think of for a day of discovery and education for a child, those museums geared toward children accomplish exactly that.

Public speaking can be one of the biggest challenges in a person’s life. The ability to stand in front of a crowd while talking confidently about a subject can leave the speaker feeling rattled and insecure. This fear of public speaking, called glossophobia, is affecting an estimated 75% of the population. Many of these people that feel some level of anxiety while speaking in front of others can learn to manage it. In order to manage it, there needs to be constant practice and repetition in how to get your point across in a clear manner.

There has been research done on the benefits of playing classical music for young children, even for children in-utero. This is called the “Mozart effect”. Although some evidence of this effect is controversial, there have been findings in the past year that even further support music for children.

Several weeks ago, we blogged about how tech savvy young children in this millennium have become.  Many 2-year-old children know how to navigate an IPad to find their favorite cartoons and videos without assistance.  We know our children are growing up in a technological age, but the precision and agility they show in mastering their techno world is truly amazing.