How Your Child Learns Best Brain-Friendly Strategies You Can Use to Ignite Your

Child’s Learning and Increase School Success

CONTENTS
Foreword by Goldie Hawn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv
How to Use This Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .xxi
PART I: Building Better Brains
Chapter 1: The Science behind Better Learning . . . . . . . .3
Chapter 2: Your Child’s Learning Strengths:
Discovering Intelligence and
Learning Styles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
PART II: Reading
Chapter 3: Laying the Foundation for Reading Success
(Ages 3–8) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Chapter 4: Strategies for Oral Reading Success
(Ages 4–8) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Chapter 5: Building and Enriching Vocabulary
(Ages 7–11) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Chapter 6: Reading Comprehension
(Ages 7–11) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
Chapter 7: Reading Motivation Strategies
(Ages 7–11) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
Chapter 8: Test Preparation Strategies:
Vocabulary and Reading Comprehension
(Ages 7–12) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
PART III: Math
Chapter 9: Your Child Can Thrive
Despite a Failing Math System (All Ages) . . . 111
Chapter 10: Targeting Your Child’s
Math Readiness Level (All Ages) . . . . . . . . 127
Chapter 11: Brain-Based Solutions for
Math Challenges (All Ages) . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Chapter 12: Building Math Mastery: Key Topics
(All Ages) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
Chapter 13: Math Motivation Strategies (All Ages) . . . . 175
Chapter 14: Test Preparation Strategies: Math (All Ages) 195
PART IV: Social Studies and Science
Chapter 15: Igniting Interest in Science and
Social Studies (All Ages) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201
Chapter 16: Social Studies beyond the Classroom
(All Ages) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217
Chapter 17: Science beyond the Classroom
(All Ages) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Chapter 18: Strengthen Study Skills in
Science and Social Studies (Ages 8–12) . . . . 237
Chapter 19: Long-Term Report and Project Planning
in Science and History (Ages 8–12) . . . . . . 251
Chapter 20: Brain-Friendly Strategies for
Test Preparation (All Ages) . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275
Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
About the Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 307
FOREWORD
Dr. Judy Willis is a trailblazer. Speaking as a mother and grandmother,
she is also my hero! I met Judy when I read her article on the neuroscience
of joyful learning. I was overjoyed to know there was someone
in the fi eld of education who was addressing the importance of creating
a more joyful classroom. I called her straight away. A vibrant voice
resounded in my ear, and we discovered a great commonality.
I am the founder of the Hawn Foundation, which is dedicated to
creating a more mindful approach to learning. Mindfulness supports
more joy and self-awareness. Our mission also includes helping teachers,
children, and parents learn more about how the brain functions. We have
brought physical education into our schools—why not mental education?
Dr. Judy Willis has taken the reins and is one of the pioneering
forces who supports new and exciting ways to help parents understand
and be a part of helping their children learn in a fun and exciting way.
This book, parent-friendly and without brain-speak jargon, is fi lled
with specifi c enjoyable activities including games, investigation, and
interest-based enrichments that will increase your child’s connections to
what he or she learns at school. Dr. Willis’s book is what parents have
been searching for and need now more than ever.
As I see it, our children are little seedlings, all different, all full of
budding potential. The educational system today unfortunately does
not teach the child; it teaches the child to test. The beauty of this book is
that now, you as a parent can help individualize school subjects for your
child, because you can make the subjects come alive through everyday
experiences, whether waiting in the local grocery store line or on journeys
to exotic places together on the Internet.
I recall that when my children were in primary school, I became
increasingly alarmed that their early education was leaving them behind,
and they were getting lost in the process. Their talents and individuality
were being repressed by rote memorization and the stress related to the
fear of potential failure. I took a deep breath, went to the principal, and
told her that my children weren’t having any fun in school, that they
dreaded it, and that I was seeing stress-related symptoms. I suggested
she bring more personalization and subjectivity to their learning in
order for them to connect more deeply to subjects and engender deeper,
more lasting understanding and retention. She heard my frustration and
was receptive to my ideas, and she began to change some strategies. One
great example of her new direction was an English project that involved
children photographing their families and then writing about it.
I knew nothing about neurology and how the brain worked. I didn’t
have a Judy Willis book on my bookshelf that I could reference to
understand how children’s little brains worked—much less my own. I
have since learned so many important facts about brain development
from her. By learning the basics of brain function (and it’s not diffi cult),
we pick up a magic wand that empowers us to help our children.
With technology moving so fast—cell phones, computer games, and
MP3 players, not to mention the untamed media— it is more and more
challenging for our children to focus for long periods of time. How
does this constant input of static affect the brain? How do our children
process all this information? How can they learn when there is an
overload of incoming noise? How can we best help them? In this book,
Judy leads us through the amazing, fantastic, magical brain in ways that
illuminate us.
Judy speaks tirelessly all over the world to teachers, school superintendents,
and policymakers. She is recognized as one of the leading
experts in brain-friendly learning. She shows us how to help our children
truly learn and remember facts, as opposed to simple rote memorization,
which is like sand that disappears from a squeezed palm.
At last, we parents have a reference book to enlighten our own brains
and help guide us in assisting our children’s growth and fl owering.
In closing, may I say that Judy is a vibrant, curious, brilliant woman
who is passionate in her pursuit of new ways to help children learn
joyfully. Through this book, she is offering us the gift of insight. Dive in
fearlessly. You will fi nd a treasure trove of wonder. You will experience a
lot of “a-ha” moments, and it may change the way you see your children
forever.
Thank you, Judy, for continuing to inspire and teach.
—Goldie Hawn
Judy Willis is now on the board of the Hawn Foundation.