Free The Book of New Family Traditions by Meg Cox Page B

history, and customs on the Internet or at the library.
    Show and Tell
    Part of the daily homework ritual should include a parental review of what’s been done. Some kids feel a sense of accomplishment if they can make a checkmark on the calendar when they finish, or add a sticker. Compliment perseverance as well as creativity. You might create a winding-down ritual of a warm bath, or a back rub, or end the day by reading aloud from a book your kids enjoy.
    Sunday Sundaes
    It’s important to set specific homework rituals for the weekends as well, so everything doesn’t get left till the last minute. One family gets together in the kitchen on Sunday nights for “make-your-own sundaes,” but only those with finished homework can come. You might have special treat food for weekend homework sessions: Instead of serving popcorn when you watch videos, save it for homework period.

Best Study Websites
Kids today have no idea how lucky they are to have such great online resources to help them study and do homework. But as we all know, not all web-based resources are reliable. Presumably, your kids’teachers are warning them about trusting Wikipedia and other sites as authoritative, but it’s also good to know about some study sites you can rely on.
One good resource is on the Microsoft website, the “Top 14 Websites for Students,” compiled by journalist and tech expert Marc Saltzman. Here you will find overall homework help sites he recommends like RefDesk.com and Fact Monster. But he also singles out specific sites for help in English, history, math, and science, such as Shakespeare-Online.com and Project Gutenberg. The latter is an archive of more than 36,000 free downloadable books, including most of the classic novels your kids will be assigned to read. Ulysses, anyone?
Find this master list at: www.Microsoft.com/athome/students/studentsites.aspx .

    Playing Hooky
    In general, I don’t advocate teaching kids to skip school. However, I know many families who allow it for one or two special days a year, and their kids haven’t turned into habitual truants.
    A Day with Mom
    Julie Stockler was allowed to play hooky one day a year when she was young and has passed that tradition on to her daughters. When she was young, she would use her day off to go shopping with her mother at a department store and eat lunch in the ladies’tearoom. Her girls prefer to go to the movies or skiing, but they also treasure the one-on-one time with her as much as the forbidden pleasure of skipping out on school.
    Surprise Kidnap
    One mother I know surprises her kids by “kidnapping” them from school one day a year. She pays attention to when tests and school field trips are scheduled and picks a day when they won’t miss much. The kids go off to school, their mother takes a shower and dresses, then shows up at school and surprises them. Once they get in the car, the lucky kid gets to decide how to spend the day.
    Sty Day
    A friend of mine used to skip work and take one mental health day a year with her daughter, when they would never get out of their pajamas. They watched television and ate junk food all day, never taking showers or washing the dishes. (This explains the name of their annual frolic, taken from the farm structure typically occupied by pigs.) No one would argue that this is educational, but it sure was a fun contrast to work and school, and it didn’t hurt the daughter, who later graduated from one of the country’s top law schools.
    Museum Days
    If you’ve ever been to a major museum like the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, which has one of the greatest dinosaur collections anywhere, you know how crowded it gets on weekends and school holidays. I started taking my son there when he was two years old, and it’s probably his happiest place on the planet. He’s learned so much and seen so many amazing exhibits, and I wanted to plant the idea early that this was a treat. Throughout grade school, I used