Archive for the ‘Guest Posts’ Category

Working for yourself is exciting, it’s flexible and it’s incredibly rewarding. Many people dream about becoming their own boss. They dream of building their own schedule and having something independent for themselves at the same time. Self-employment comes with responsibilities that feel very overwhelming without the right habits. It doesn’t matter whether you’re freelancing, you’re running an online business, creating content or you’re offering specialised services. Building a routine with your business makes the experience much more enjoyable and much smoother. Here are 4 tips for making self-employment feel more manageable and sustainable.

Image source: Pexels

1. Get organised early. One of the biggest adjustments that you have to work in when you’re working for yourself is realizing that you are responsible for everything. Scheduling invoices, customer communication, running your taxes and payments all fall onto your shoulders. This is why organization becomes incredibly important from the beginning. Setting up systems early can save you a huge amount of stress later. This may include using calendars, budgeting tools, spreadsheets or specialist services like a merchant account for webcam professionals if your business requires secure payment processing in a specialised industry.The more organised your systems, the easier it becomes to focus on the actual work you’re doing. Even small habits such as keeping folders tidy or setting reminders can make daily life feel far less chaotic.

2. Add boundaries between work and home. When you work for yourself, it can become very easy to feel like you’re always on. Without clear boundaries, work may slowly take over your evenings, weekends, and your personal time. Creating structure can help to prevent that burnout. This doesn’t mean your schedule needs to be rigid, but having general work hours often helps to maintain a healthy balance. If possible, create a dedicated workspace, even if it’s just a small desk or the corner of a room. When you physically separate work from relaxation spaces, you can help your brain to switch off. More easily at the end of the day.Taking breaks is also important. Many self-employed people feel guilty about resting, but constant overworking rarely leads to better long-term results.

3. Don’t rely on motivation. Staying consistent even when your motivation drops is the way that you can stay productive. Some days you may feel highly motivated, but other days everything feels harder, and that’s completely normal. You need to build consistency rather than relying entirely on motivation. Simple routines often help more than waiting to feel inspired. Starting work at roughly the same time every day, setting small goals to break into, and chunking up those larger tasks into small ones can all help to maintain momentum. Progress doesn’t always need to be huge to be meaningful. Small, consistent effort often leads to stronger long term growth than occasional bursts of intense productivity.

4. Keep learning and adapting. Businesses change quickly, especially online industries and freelance work. Staying open to learning new skills can help to keep your business competitive and adaptable over time. This could include improving marketing knowledge, learning better customer service strategies, exploring new tools, or developing additional income streams. You never need to become an expert in everything overnight. Gradual improvement is going to be what helps you to build. Working for yourself often involves learning as you go, and that’s perfectly fine.

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You Don’t Have to Be Religious to Embrace the Christmas Season
by Elizabeth Reed will help you focus on the real meaning of the season regardless of your religious beliefs. There is a good message here, especially for children who can often be more concerned with what they are going to get than what they might do for others.

Beyond Jesus

• The holiday season is more than just celebrating the birth of Jesus. It’s more than participating in one of the biggest shopping excursions of the year. It’s about togetherness with friends and family and appreciating what you have as a whole. It’s not what you should want thanks to commercials or religious icons. The Christmas season can be embraced by others from all walks of life for reasons other than religious significance.

Family and Friends

• From the end of October, the spirit of the holidays wafts in the air like the smell of a freshly cooked spice apple pie. It is the time of year when you want to surround yourself with those you love and appreciate them for who they are. Anyone regardless of spiritual beliefs can appreciate that aspect of the season. You don’t need to be any denomination of Christian or any other faith to embrace those who are dearest to you. Although this should be a year-round event, the holiday season seems to put more emphasis on this aspect of existence. Perhaps its the candles, music, festive decorations or a combination of all of them.

Fellow Humankind

• The holiday season also brings out the very best in humanity without a religious undertone. People who normally don’t bother with transients throughout the year find themselves donating money or handing those less fortunate a blanket in order to keep warmer through the winter. It is the embodiment of goodwill towards humankind. It’s the one time of the year when those belonging to higher social groups are more likely to lend a hand to those in need. It is the spirit of giving to the world that is embraced – not the religious belief structure that is tied to the holiday. You find yourself giving gifts to complete strangers because they look like they could use a friend.

Festivities

• Although there is a great deal of religion in the medium of Christmas, there is almost an equal balance of entertainment for those who don’t wish to involve themselves with religiousness. Some of the most memorable moments in people’s lives are those of Christmas parties either at home or in the office. It is the act of enjoying each others company that makes this time of the year special. Traditions can easily be created adding more to the atmosphere. None of it requires a religious aspect in order to be appreciated. Christmas is a celebration of life to many and not simply because of Jesus, but because the message that is being conveyed to those willing to participate. You don’t need to be holy to decorate the home in holly.

And To All A Good Night

• Although there is nothing wrong with having a religion and believing in other meanings for Christmas, the season doesn’t merely have to be for those who believe as you do. It doesn’t matter who or what the figure head is as long as the message is relatively the same. Not being of like-minded beliefs shouldn’t have a bearing on what the holiday season brings to everyone. Instead of being locked away and denying Christmas because of its religious affiliations, why not embrace the season for what it truly reflects – love, respect and harmonious balance between the people of this planet. Regardless of your religious tenancies, we are all still of the same species with similar desires and needs.

Elizabeth Reed

• Elizabeth is a freelance writer and a resident blogger at Livenanny.org. She particularly enjoys writing about parenting, childcare, health and wellness. In addition, she is an expert consultant on issues related to household management and kids. You can reach her at elizabeth.livenanny@gmail.com.

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Your Chosen Future: Identify the Ideal School Environment After Relocating by Emily Graham gives you the insights to make the best choices for your child’s future.

Your Chosen Future: How to Identify the Ideal School Environment After Relocating by Emily Graham

Relocating can be a whirlwind of emotions and tasks, and among the most crucial is ensuring your child’s continued educational and developmental success. Speaking directly to you, this guide from Dr. Doug Green aims to simplify this often-overwhelming process. Embrace this journey confidently, knowing you have the insights to make the best choices for your child’s future.

Prioritizing Individual Attention

Regarding early education, your child’s level of individual care is paramount. Schools and daycares where educators can devote more time to each child often provide a more nurturing and effective learning environment. This focused attention enhances educational outcomes and fosters a stronger emotional and social connection between teacher and student.

Tailoring to Your Child’s Unique Blueprint

Your child is wonderfully unique, with specific needs, interests, and a learning style all their own. Finding an educational setting that recognizes, celebrates, and caters to these individual traits is essential. Institutions that offer a variety of programs or specialized approaches can be especially beneficial in nurturing your child’s specific talents and interests.

Aligning with Educational Values

Understanding the curriculum and educational philosophy of a potential school or daycare is critical. This alignment ensures that your chosen institution meets and exceeds your expectations for your child’s education. Whether focusing on STEM, arts, language immersion, or a specific educational philosophy like Montessori or Waldorf, the right fit will resonate with your family’s educational values.

The Intersection of Home and School

Your living location significantly impacts your school or daycare options. Investing time in researching neighborhoods with reputable schools can pay dividends in your child’s educational journey. Utilize online resources to understand the local real estate market, school districts, and the associated home prices. This dual approach of house hunting and school searching ensures a harmonious balance between your living situation and your child’s educational environment.

The Power of Personal Visits

There’s no substitute for experiencing a school or daycare environment firsthand. Personal visits offer invaluable insights into the daily operations, the demeanor of staff and students, and the overall atmosphere. Observing interactions, asking questions, and witnessing the school culture in action provides a clear and tangible sense of whether it’s the right place for your child.

Early Bird Advantage

Starting your search well in advance of your move is a strategic advantage. This early initiation allows for thorough research, contemplation, and decision-making without the pressure of looming deadlines.

Early planning also allows you to be on waiting lists if necessary, ensuring that you don’t miss out on preferred institutions due to time constraints. Additionally, this proactive approach enables you to align your family’s schedule and logistics with the school’s calendar, helping smooth the transition for your child and the rest of your family.

The Hallmark of Excellence: Accreditation

Accreditation is a benchmark for quality in education. Schools and daycares that have earned this recognition have met rigorous standards, which offers reassurance of their commitment to excellence. Reading reviews from other parents can also provide honest and invaluable insights into these institutions’ reputations and real-world performance.
Moreover, engaging with local community forums or social media groups where current parents discuss their experiences can give you a deeper, more nuanced understanding of each school’s culture and community. Needless today, this can help you make a well-informed decision.

Final Thoughts

As you embark on this crucial chapter of finding a new home and the perfect educational setting for your child, remember that this journey is about creating a harmonious balance between where you live and where your child learns and grows. With careful planning, research, and a clear understanding of your child’s needs, you can make informed decisions that will positively shape their future. And that’s all you can ask of yourself!

Would you like to read more helpful content or learn about my consulting services? Visit DrDougGreen.com today!

Emily Graham
Emily is the creator of MightyMoms.net. She believes being a mom is one of the hardest jobs around and wanted to create a support system for moms from all walks of life. On her site, she offers a wide range of info tailored for busy moms — from how to reduce stress to creative ways to spend time together as a family. You can email her at emilygraham@mightymoms.net. She lives in Arizona.

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Encouraging Kids Towards Independent Learning by Ken Myers explores the idea that in today’s world, many businesses are looking to hire individuals who have experience as well as an education. In some instances, experience is the more important. For several decades we were taught that a college degree means a better life. As we march further into the 21st century, it is becoming more of an old fashioned way of thinking. While education and knowledge are still important, you need to know what you’re doing before anyone will consider hiring you. With a parent’s help, a child can gain valuable experience and become an independent learner without several years of college that a degree demands.

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Exams-Free Education: Benefits and Drawbacks by Michelle Brooks takes on the idea that standardized testing not only isn’t needed but has a negative impact on learning. She joins a growing field who think it’s time to move on and in the process improve learning for all students.

Introduction

• Some time ago, the words “exams-free education” might have sounded like total gibberish. But education is changing, new approaches and methods emerge, and exams-free training gets more attention. For example, Finland, which is famous for its high-quality school system, has only one mandated standardized test. So, is the exams-free education a thing? Is it worth implementing or at least trying out? Let’s explore the benefits and drawbacks of exams-free education to find out.

Benefits of Exams-Free Education — Emphasis on Active Learning

• First of all, it is crucial to make a distinction between active and passive learning. Active learning means that all students are engaged in the educational process, which can take lots of forms (writing, problem-solving, reflecting). The main goal is to make sure that all students are working and studying simultaneously. On the other hand, passive learning means that students receive information from the teacher, try to memorize it and reciprocate later. Is not it surprisingly similar to exams?
• Yes, the exams follow the same approach. And the consequences can be dire as students will not be able to study independently. What does it mean? All sorts of things: for example, students will not know how to find credible sources when it comes to writing essays. Learners may not be able to find, understand, and summarize information effectively as they got used to passive learning.
• So, it is a detrimental practice. Students have to learn actively, so they will be able to study independently. It is a skill which proves invaluable, especially while studying at college.

Exams-Free Education Offers More Feedback

• Sir Ken Robinson, a renowned educator and author of this famous TED Talk, warns: standardized exams are too judgmental and do not offer enough feedback. It is not an efficient educational practice, especially for learners who struggle with studies and want to get better.
• Think about it this way. The only feedback the students get after the exam is a grade — for example, A, B or C. But it is only a letter which does not help them improve, especially if a person constantly receives bad grades. And, which is the most important, people tend to live up to the grades they used to receive subconsciously. So, if the student continually has F, one will most likely keep getting this grade.
• Exams-free education focuses on descriptive real-time feedback, not a judgmental one. First of all, if students work together, they can give and receive feedback instantaneously. Also, the teacher’s role will not be boiled down to simply placing a letter on a piece of paper. Instead, the educator can communicate with students and help them get better.

More Attention to 21st-Century Skills

• Studying is a complicated process. But exams tend to reduce this complexity to a couple of test questions. This approach does not motivate students to explore the subject further. All they need to do is memorize information and provide the correct answer to the question. Moreover, exams pay little to no attention to so-called 21st-century skills. These are invaluable not only in college and school but also further in life. Think about creativity, critical thinking, and entrepreneurial thinking.
• These skills can not be measured by answering standard exam questions; still, they are of crucial importance. And so the examination system must change. For example, instead of standardized exams, teachers can introduce the project-based assessments. This type of evaluation can take different forms. Think about working on research projects, creating a blog, or even something as simple as making a poster.
• Such activities do not only allow students to go beyond standard exam questions but also help them in expressing creativity without fear of being judged. Still, exams-free education has its challenges and limitations, which are essential to consider.

Exams Do Help Study Better (If Used Effectively)

• Research proves that exams and preparing for them help students study better. How? Let’s go back to the process of memorizing and reciprocating the information. In some ways, it is similar to physical exercises. When people repeatedly train some muscle groups, they become stronger. The same goes for the memory: if students consistently try to memorize some information, chances are they will succeed. Thus, learners will be able to retrieve this information even after some time.
• But it is important not to boil this technique down to simply memorizing and retrieving. To get the most out of it, students can form the questions and try to come up with answers based on the information they have learned. This way, they will memorize information more efficiently.

Drawbacks of Exams-Free Education Exams-Free Education Is Not That Specific

• Exams have one significant benefit: they can accurately test students’ knowledge about a specific topic. For example, they determine whether students understood certain formulae or memorized historical dates. Exam-free education focuses on more broad ways of assessment, such as research projects. If so, it is hard to understand whether students picked up some specific knowledge or not.

Final Words

• Education is versatile, and it changes continuously, with new studying approaches appearing. This process is also flexible and can be modified depending on students’ needs and goals. If so, it wise to utilize both approaches and combine exam-free education with actual tests. The goal here is to understand which method works best in every situation and do not be restricted by old-school exam techniques.

Michelle Brooks

• Michelle is a freelance writer who works for EssayPro. She is from NY. Having several years of writing career behind, she can definitely state that some topics require more time and effort than others. She specializes in composing amazing essays. Mary knows for sure how important it is to develop your creativity to present exciting and engaging content. In this article, she shared some personal ideas supported by evidence on how to improve one’s creativity and learn to write extraordinarily about ordinary things. Her Twitter is @michellbrook23.

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Is Homeschooling the Answer? This is a guest post by Kelly Opferman who spells out some of the benefits of home schooling for students and parents. Due to things like standardized testing, bullying, and a one-size-fits-all system that most students face, many more parents are making the decision to home school their children. Kelly is a seasoned writer who at this time focuses on her car financing calculator site. Her educational background includes finance, teaching, and economics.

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Seven years ago I made a couple of visits to a hospital where a friend was waiting for a heart transplant. I saw first-hand that it was a grueling ordeal with no guarantees. He recently asked if he could do a guest post to encourage others to register as organ donors. Here is his touching, personal, and somewhat humorous account. For information about how to sign up for organ donation visit DMV.org.

My purpose in writing this piece is to facilitate awareness and persuade you to sign up as an organ donor. November 2020 will (God willing) mark my seventh year of continued life with a stranger’s donated heart. I know only that my donor was under 50 years old, bigger than me, and a two-hour LearJet flight from somewhere to Rochester, NY. I never wrote a thank you to my donor, as his heart was given to me with no conditions. I hope those who were in the family of any organ donor will accept my gratitude.

I feel better thinking that I am alive because of some family’s humanity. There is no cause and effect yet I somehow have to reconcile the seemingly opposing thoughts that I am alive because of someone else’s tragedy mitigated by their humanity. These families allow today’s medicine to continue lives that would otherwise be cut short.

Medicine is part science and part art. Every prominent religion endorses organ donation as an expression of charity. My religious upbringing teaches me that we are made in our creator’s image. I believe, however, that God would not go out of His way to look like me. My only other way to trust this truth is believing that our Creator’s “image” is exemplified creativity and is reflected by our diversity. Medicine has created organ transplants. I believe Jesus forgives plastic surgeons. By now you might have figured out that I’m taking advantage of the fact that someone gave me the chance to return to my life with no conditions; even though more than one of my employer’s 360 evaluations point out that I‘m some kind of wise-ass.

Greatful and the “Grateful Dead”

I registered as an organ donor after an appeal between songs by Phil Lesh of “The Grateful Dead” when he thanked his donor for his extra time to keep playing music and he would be Grateful to sigh anyone’s donor card. This was in 2003 on a tour with Willy Nelson & Moe and featured Joan Osborne singing lead for the Dead. After Jerry Garcia’s death, Joan sang lead on songs that revived songs on hiatus traditionally sung by deceased bandmates Garcia and Pigpen McKernan. She gave more than these songs a second life for me. Dr. Doug Green & I trade music that we like back & forth but he is not like me, as I’m a self-described recovering DeadHead with no musical talent and Doug can actually play music.

When I first saw a New York State organ donor license plate that said Donate Life, pass it on I thought wow. They left that door wide-open knowing people like me are out there and we like to goose Murphy’s law. Inspiration and Phil Lesh’s appeal turned into a DeadHead’s inside gesture versus an offsetting socially mitigating statement. My license plate reads Donate life, pass it on, 420 4U become an organ donor; or translated, donate life, pass it on, “High Time” for you to become an organ donor. 420 is code for International Cannabis Day.

Legend says 420 evolved from the time of day two friends partook. This grew through their network of friends. Eventually, 420 was the time of day before any jam band concert fans got high. Thus my interpretation of “high time.” Why keep this for jam band fans only. Your awareness of 420 Day shows the next level of acceptance of this custom. National Holiday!? This plate using 420 for “high time” would not be acceptable in California. New York won’t let you even swear in pig Latin on a plate but they missed this one. Even though I might spend more time every year in my Florida condo, I remain a New York resident. I’m proud that I had that NY license plate years before my health deteriorated and I needed a transplant.

New Life, New Heart

In my new life with a new heart, the greatest change I have made is to allow the effects of an artist to fully wash over me and engage all of the emotions I honestly feel. It’s no coincidence that so many traits like persistence, guts, love, and humanity have heart as a synonym. I am even more grateful that after my transplant I was able to be there and reciprocate & support my wife, Carol when she went through a health ordeal that included life-saving emergency surgeries.

Here’s how a transplant candidate went from a rejected heart transplant candidate to a transplant patient who walked the 200 yards back to the hospital’s transplant ward from the ICU within 36 hours of waking up from successful transplant surgery. Most transplant recipients spend a week or more recovering in the ICU. Every day since at some random time I suddenly experience profound gratitude to my unknown donor and his family. I hope this continues every day I continue to live.

To quote country outlaw Ray Wylie Hubbard, “any day when my gratitude exceeds my expectations I’m having a good day.” This sounds like something you learn in rehab. He once described a woman as “tougher than rehab”. He also, in turn, quotes his grandmother in his song Conversation With the Devil saying “some folks are saved because they see the light, others are saved because they feel the heat.” Incidentally, if I never got my transplant my tombstone would have read “It just doesn’t seem like Hell without You”. My friends & family who know me wouldn’t take offense. Thanks for reading and please sign up to become a donor and share this with your network.

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Is ADHD an epidemic? I don’t believe so. But drug use has more than doubled in five years in Finland. Worrying! Pasi Sahlberg, author of Finnish Lessons

It’s clear to me that ADHD is over-diagnosed and over-medicated in the United States. We are using drugs to make the students conform to an obsolete classroom environment rather than changing the environments to meet the needs of the students. Too many teachers want kids medicated so they can sit still and focus on boring stuff. Thanks to Melissa Hathaway we have a super guest post on the matter. If you are looking for a no nonsense take on the problem, you won’t be disappointed.

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