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Following on from our article on improving your child’s maths skills through play, we thought we would put together our top ten ways to help improve your child’s reading ability. Without good reading skills, it is hard to get good academic achievements therefore it is in your child’s interests to try and make them a good reader. Below is our top ten tips for helping improve your child’s reading skills.

1. Regular times
Studies show that regularly reading aloud to children produces significant gains in their reading comprehensions, vocabulary and decoding of words. Therefore, try and set aside some time every day to read together – spending time together should hopefully inspire them to read independently too.  Read more... (654 words, estimated 2:37 mins reading time)

It’s a good idea to keep maths fun for kids – the best way is to teach them so they don’t even realise they are learning and practicing their maths. Here are our top ten fun ways for kids to practise their maths at home:

1. Food shopping
Get your child to add up or guess the amount that your shopping bill comes to. If they are within a particular percentage (perhaps 10%) of the actual total, award them a prize. If you are paying with cash, ask your child to work out how much change you should receive, and then get them to count the change you receive to verify it is the correct amount.  Read more... (493 words, estimated 1:58 mins reading time)

Do you ever find your mind wandering when you are performing certain tasks? Do you ever wish that you have more concentration or a longer attention span? There are many things that affect our attention spans however with a little practice, it is easy to increase your attention span to help you focus better.

Sleep  Read more... (502 words, estimated 2:00 mins reading time)

They are names you see on a regular basis, but do you actually know how the founders came up with their company names?

Adobe

Founder John Warnock named his company after the Adobe Creek which ran behind his house.

Apache

Apache’s founders started out by applying patches to NCSA’s httpd demon. They name it “A Patchy” server and Apache was born.

Apple

Apple was the favourite fruit of Steve Jobs. He was 3 months late in filing a name for his company and told his colleagues he would call his company Apple Computers if they did not come up with a better name before the end of the day.  Read more... (630 words, estimated 2:31 mins reading time)

Sometimes, you need or want to learn a subject fast. There are several strategies you can employ to help you get a good overall grasp of a subject, and you might surprise yourself how quickly you can acquire new knowledge or skills. So, here are the six steps you need to help learn a subject quickly:

Information Overload
Most times when people are trying to learn something new, they go through the material slowly and logically often re-reading sections and highlighting phrases until they know the material inside and out. This approach does work well however boredom has a tendancy to strike.  Read more... (656 words, estimated 2:37 mins reading time)

If you are looking to create or change your garden on the cheap, here are five factors that you have to have to succeed in creating a truly frugal, yet wonderful garden:

Flexibility
The frugal gardener must be flexible. Your master plan cannot be set in concrete. Sometimes, the greatest gardens come around through a series of happy accidents. Someone may gift you some flower cuttings or plants, and although they may not have been in your original plan, they may make fantastic additions.

Physical Fitness
This is a must for any gardener, frugal or not! There’s alwasy digging, bending and reaching to be done.  Read more... (325 words, estimated 1:18 mins reading time)