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Teaching pedestrian safety to kids

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Street sign with kids crossing

Pedestrian safety is one of the most basic but essential skills that you will teach your children in their lives. Teaching your children the rules of the road will ensure that you can have some peace of mind when your kids are outside the house. This is a big problem — Parachute Canada, a non-profit organization which is dedicated to stopping accident-related deaths reported in 2008 that “child pedestrian injuries were the leading cause of injury-related death” for Canadian kids under 14. In a PDF document, they’ve made available has some great tips on how to prevent these injuries through proper education. You can download it here:

http://www.parachutecanada.org/downloads/injurytopics/ChildPed_Report_07:08.pdf

With this in mind, we’ll be dedicating today’s post to teaching pedestrian safety to kids.

Go beyond the basics when teaching pedestrian safety to kids

Sometimes kids don’t get much pedestrian safety education beyond recognizing stoplight signals and learning to look both ways before crossing the road. While the above road safety skills are a great way to start, it’s not uncommon for the learning about road rules to stop there. That is, until children start studying to drive in their teenage years. Need proof? Ask your kids or their friends to identify all the signs they see when you take them on a drive. There’s a good chance that there will be many gaps in their knowledge. We’d advise helping them learn as much as possible about road rules, even if your kids aren’t close to driving age yet. Awareness is a big factor in preventing pedestrian-vehicle accidents, and developing a working knowledge of road rules can only help.

Beyond looking both ways, what other traffic rules should kids know?

We’re going to assume that you’ve already taught your kids the most rudimentary traffic basics, such as going with — not against — the flow of traffic, and waiting for pedestrian signal lights. If you haven’t already, we’d advise you to get on it! However, this section is dedicated to teaching children more knowledge about the road that may not be taught so often.

Teach your children how to recognize the types of traffic stops

Can your child tell the difference between a three-way stop and a four-way stop? Which road (if any) are ‘through’ roads? What does a red blinking light mean? As a simple exercise, ask your kids to look around and count the stop signs at each intersection (especially the ones not facing them). This is a valuable skill that will help your kids anticipate where cars are coming from. We’d advise showing them the ‘rhythm’ of a four-way, so they can know which car’s turn it is to move forward. This will allow them to notice when something is wrong. Like, for instance, an unmindful driver who disobeys the stop regulations.

Teach kids how to recognize one-way roads

Unless you are a driver (which many kids aren’t), it’s not always obvious if a road is one-way or not. For example, Vancouver signage for one-road streets is often pretty small — a narrow white-on-black arrow tucked to the side of a street sign. To help kids understand the flow of traffic, explain to them the difference between white lane markers and yellow ones. For example, if they can’t see any yellow on a street, it’s probably one way.

Also, get your students to observe the direction of parked cars on the side of the road. That’s also often a good indicator of traffic flow. This skill will help kids pick a road that helps them travel with the flow of traffic.

Teach students to recognize hazard warnings

Children should know what every hazard warning looks like. This will help them anticipate when, and if, a car will go out of control. For instance, kids should recognize the sharp turn warning sign, so they can be mindful of the fact that some cars may swerve out of a lane if it’s going too fast. This will help children plan their routes to avoid danger, if necessary.

Regularly test your kids on road safety rules and regulations

Of course, the above regulations we listed are only suggestions to get you started. Don’t stop there! It would probably be wise to regularly ask your kids if they can recognize a particular sign when you go on a drive, walk or bike ride. If you detect any knowledge gaps, try giving your child an explanation.

Kids health: Preventing and treating carpal tunnel syndrome in kids

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Preventing and treating carpal tunnel syndrome in kids

Technology can be a wonderful tool for helping children learn. For example, with the help of the Internet, we can now access a wealth of information that was previously impossible to get a hold of. But there can be drawbacks to having technology. Health problems that were previously thought to be only present in adults are now starting to happen to younger people. Today, we’re going to be focusing on preventing carpal tunnel syndrome in kids.

What causes carpal tunnel syndrome in kids?

Carpal tunnel syndrome is an injury that often results from doing repetitive tasks with your hands over long periods of time. There’s an area in your wrist called the carpal tunnel, and overworking your hands can cause the neighbouring median nerve to swell and put pressure on the carpal tunnel. The symptoms include numbness, a feeling of pins and needles in your hands, and pain.

Good examples of activities where carpal tunnel would be high risk are playing piano, hammering nails, performing surgery, and — you guessed it — typing on a keyboard, phone or tablet. Previously, keyboarding was the domain of clerical workers, but now that just about everyone has a computer, carpal tunnel is becoming a more common problem. Children are starting to use computers at younger and younger ages, so it stands to reason that there could be a greater risk of kids getting carpal tunnel syndrome.

Preventing carpal tunnel syndrome in kids

At its worst, carpal tunnel syndrome can require surgery to fix. But don’t panic! More often than not, carpal tunnel syndrome in kids can be either treated or prevented with relative ease.

As the old adage goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. So we’d recommend teaching children at an early age how to use a keyboard properly.

  1. Carpal tunnel syndrome is often caused by awkward positioning of the hands — typing while having your wrists bent is an absolute no-no. This constricts the nerves in your wrists and makes them prone to injury. As a rule of thumb, WebMD says that your hands should not be lower than your wrists.
  2. Look at your child’s work space. There are many factors that can cause your child to strain his or her wrists. For example, look at the height of your child’s desk and chair. A workspace too low or high can cause awkward hand positions.
  3. Pay attention to good posture. If your child’s shoulders are hunched and tensed, that can affect their typing position. You would also do well to examine if bad posture is resulting from an awkward workspace (for example, desks and chairs that are too high, low or far apart) or if your child just needs a few pointers on how to sit and type properly — for instance, don’t slouch, keep your back straight, etc.
  4. Study keyboarding ergonomics. In a nutshell, this is basically the practice of finding the most efficient way to position yourself and your computer when working. There are plenty of resources you can find. Cornell University has one example.

Treating carpal tunnel syndrome in kids

Carpal tunnel syndrome can be anything from inconvenient to crippling. We recommend checking in  with your kids regularly to see how they are feeling. Are they experiencing pins and needles when typing? Mayoclinic.org recommends that you stop your kids and ice their hands. Schedule frequent breaks, preferably before pain starts to set in. And it’s best to explain to your children that a minimum amount of effort is needed when typing. Carpal tunnel is often exacerbated when banging hard on a keyboard, the above mayoclinic.org article says.

Beyond scheduling breaks and icing, wearing a splint at night can help relieve carpal tunnel syndrome in kids. That’s because it forces wrists to stay in a straight position for a prolonged period of time. This gives inflamed nerves time to recover.

Be vigilant — carpal tunnel syndrome often strikes slowly

Students, especially younger children, will have a hard time self-monitoring because carpal tunnel syndrome symptoms do not happen suddenly. They are a cumulative effect of days, months and years of stress. So it would be wise to regularly check your kids’ posture. Ask them if they are feeling any discomfort in their wrists. And make children take regular breaks from keyboarding.

Focused math lesson: Teaching kids math with cars

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Teaching kids math with cars

One of the things that we love to do at School is Easy Tutoring is make seemingly abstract concepts accessible to children. It’s a shame many students complain their schooling is useless in the ‘real’ world, because ‘book learning’ can often be very practical. Sometimes it just takes the right approach to show children how their academics can be used to inform many real-life decisions. We’ve done this approach in the past by showing how you can teach math when bowling or how baseball can be a great way to learn statistics. Now we’re applying this method to something new — we’re teaching kids math with cars.

Looking at the speedometer is a great tool for teaching kids math with cars

The speedometer may be the most obvious way you can start teaching kids math with cars. It would probably be best to first explain what a speedometer is to your students and how it functions. The next step would be to try doing some basic arithmetic drills with cars regarding speed. This can be the fun part — you can make it a game!

For example, ask your children to look at the speed limits for each area you are in. When you want to go on the highway, tell your students to look at the speedometer, then look at the signs indicating maximum speed. Ask your kids to tell you how much faster you have to go to get up to speed on the highway. This can be a great exercise in real-life applications of arithmetic.

Then you can lay it out as a math equation:

How much faster we need to go = speed limit – current speed

So in other words, let’s use this example:

30 = 80 (typical highway speed limit) – 50 (typical city speed limit)

You can also make a game out of slowing down. For example, if you are coming off a city road and entering a school zone, ask your students how much slower you need to be to drive safely.

Look out the window of your car, and you can even teach children simplified physics

If you are so inclined, you can even teach one of the most basic parts of the theory of relativity. While going in depth into this topic may be asking a little too much from children, you can give them a little taste about what relativity is all about.

At its simplest, relativity means that everything is moving at a speed relative to something else, and observations can differ depending on how fast you are going. This For Dummies article gives the example of two spaceships. This may be a little too complicated for children, but you can teach a similar — albeit simpler — lesson by looking at cars on a road.

For example, let’s pretend you’re driving down a road and you are going 50 kilometers per hour. Let’s say there is a vehicle in a lane beside you going 50 kilometers per hour as well. You can point out that relative to your car, the other vehicle is travelling at zero kilometers per hour. Show your students that it looks like the vehicle is standing still right beside your car when they’ve matched speeds.

In simple math, it’s

The speed of the other driver – your speed = relative speed

So 50 – 50 = 0

As another example, if you are travelling 50 kilometres per hour and another car is travelling at 60, it will look as if the other car is racing ahead at 10 kilometres per hour.

In this case, it’s 60 – 50 = 10

Teaching kids math with cars can make the subject ‘real’!

The most important thing about these focused math lessons is making ‘book learning’ relevant to ‘real life.’ See if you can find other parallels between driving and math (there are lots). For example, you can teach kids math with cars by examining tire pressure, gas prices and engine sizes. Have fun with it!

See related posts on our education blog:

Parents beware: prescription drugs are being sold at school

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Prescription drugs being sold at school

It’s no secret drugs and alcohol sometimes find their way into school grounds. Most parents are aware of the fact that children, particularly high school students, will encounter substances such as marijuana and booze. However, authorities have begun to notice a newer trend — prescription drugs are being sold at school to students now as well.

Which prescription drugs are being sold to students?

While it’s unclear exactly how many times people sell prescription drugs in schools, canadadrugfree.org says 450,000 Canadian kids have taken medication not prescribed to them. One particular type of drug frequently exchanged is the medication used to treat attention deficit hyperactive disorder, or ADHD, according to insideADHD.org. Students have been caught selling and buying drugs such as adderall and ritalin.

Why are prescription drugs sold to students at school?

Drugs used to treat ADHD are favoured particularly in college campuses because they act as performance enhancers that increase mental focus and productivity, according to HerCampus.com. The article says some students believe they study better with adderall and ritalin, which isn’t a surprise considering these stimulants are designed to help people focus. It’s little wonder the use of these drugs is highest in the most academically competitive universities.

And this is not a small problem — The Daily Beast reports two-thirds of college students are offered either adderall or a similar drug by their senior year. This is not without consequence. The Partnership to End Addiction says that between 2005 and 2010 emergency room visits related to people abusing ADHD medications almost tripled.

Problems arise when students take adderall without professional guidance

It’s good to keep in mind there is nothing inherently wrong with adderall and ritalin — when used properly, these stimulants can be effective tools to help people with legitimate mental health problems function.

But when used without proper medical supervision, there can be negative consequences. These drugs are designed to calm people with ADHD by increasing the amount of dopamine in their brain. But people who do not have attention deficit problems could end up with too much dopamine in their system after ingesting the drug. That’s because these medications are designed to compensate for people who inherently have less dopamine than usual.

The bottom line — people who abuse the drug may experience less focus and more restlessness, along with some possible side effects that you can find listed at addictionhope.com.

What parents can do to prevent to prevent prescription drug abuse

Parents would do well to educate their children on the effects of prescription drug abuse in schools. One of the most common fallacies is that prescription drugs are ‘safe,’ because they are given by doctors. According to the Daily Beast article we mentioned above, 81 per cent of students think using prescription drugs without a doctor’s approval or guidance is not dangerous. And while some side effects aren’t serious, there is always a chance of getting a more severe reaction to a drug like adderall. Some examples from the addictionhope.com article we mentioned above include paranoia and even seizures. So be proactive — make sure you dispel notions that a drug is completely safe just because it can be prescribed.

How to teach kids playground safety

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kids playground safety

It’s just about every parent’s worst nightmare — you let your children go out and enjoy the playground, you turn your head for a second and one of your kids has hurt themselves. The Canadian Paediatric Society says at least 29,000 children under 15 are forced to go to the emergency room for playground injuries each year. Now we don’t want you to be too alarmed — this only accounts for less than one per cent of children in Canada, but it’s still a good idea to teach kids playground safety.

Establish clear boundaries for children on the playground

According to a CBC news report, the number of playground injuries has been increasing steadily over the years. While it’s still unclear exactly what is causing this trend, some experts in the above report believe it has to do with playground design. Equipment for different age groups is sometimes grouped closely together. So for example, a 5-year-old may be tempted to use monkey bars designed for 10 to 12-year-olds. Since it’s probable that the bars will be higher and more difficult to climb, the 5-year-old has an increased chance of getting hurt on the playground.

Get involved in playground design and safety— go to school parental advisory meetings

One possible way to address this problem would be to get involved in the playground design process. If a school has announced that it will be building a new playground, participating in parental advisory meetings can be a good start. Voice your opinion and ask schools to increase distance between equipment meant for older kids and equipment meant for younger children.

However, if a school has already built a playground with older kids’ equipment close to the younger children’s play area, that may not be an option. In this case, you’ll simply have to teach kids safety on the playground by showing them which toys are appropriate for their age and which aren’t. Go to the school playground on a weekend and point it out to your children.

Showing proper play techniques is a great way to teach kids playground safety

A lot of playground injuries can be prevented by teaching children proper playground conduct in a jungle-gym type of area, or even in general play spaces. While many kids are capable of figuring out how to behave themselves in a playground, it’s best to go over these seemingly common-sense rules to be extra safe. The Alberta Health Services website has a great guide which gives some good pointers:

Some examples include:

  • Waiting  your turn
  • No pushing, shoving or tripping
  • Keep ropes and scarves away from playground equipment and fences
  • Keep clear of moving things
  • Hold on with both hands when swinging or climbing
  • Only one person on the slide at a time
  • Slide down feet first and sitting up

Pay special attention to how your kids use equipment like playground nets or monkey bars. A study published in Paediatric Child Health says falling from equipment is the main cause of playground injuries.

Stay vigilant when your child is on the playground

There are some occasions when a parent can find something inherently dangerous in a playground. Whether it’s a broken swing or broken glass, you’d do well to report it to local authorities. If you don’t know where to start, Safe Kids Canada is a great place to go. Call them at 1-888-SAFE-TIPS, 1-888-723-3847.

Focused science lesson: teaching kids about salmon controversies during the B.C. salmon run

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Teaching kids about salmon controversies

The annual salmon run has either started or will be starting in many parts of British Columbia. These fish will be travelling to reach their breeding grounds. This is a great opportunity to teach students about the B.C. salmon run, and the issues surrounding salmon. Learning about this event can educate kids on the province’s ecosystem, global warming and the environment. It can also introduce kids to the idea of political debate. It can show how governments can step in to interfere in the lives of their subjects, in a way that is tangible to kids.

First things first: where can you watch the B.C. salmon run?

You can watch the salmon run up close and personal at any spawning stream in the province. During the run, salmon travel up B.C.’s rivers to find the original place where they were birthed. This is a process called natal homing. Once salmon arrive at their destination, they dig a small nest called a redd and lay their eggs.

Spawning streams and the rivers leading up to them are often the best place to get a look at the salmon run. But if you don’t have access to a spawning stream, there are also plenty of hatcheries that you can visit. Take a look at this government list to figure out the stream, river or hatchery closest to you.

Fish ladders are also a great place to observe salmon. They are passageways that mimic rivers. These structures are built in areas where dams or other facilities have prevented salmon from accessing their spawning grounds. Think of it like a highway, but for salmon! Hell’s Gate in Boston Bar , B.C. (near Hope) has one you can check out while also taking a ride on the airtram.

But what if you want to watch salmon runs in other parts of Canada?

The same principles apply. Both Pacific and Atlantic salmon go back to their birthplace to spawn. Spawning streams, hatcheries and fish ladders are the best places to view the run, regardless of where you are in Canada. Salmon Atlas has a fantastic collection of maps that show where you can watch the fish.

Teaching the importance of salmon in our history, culture and food system

It’s important for kids to know that salmon isn’t always as available as we want it to be for a food source. And usually, our human behaviour is at the centre of this problem. This has caused multiple political discussions, especially when salmon populations decline significantly. Historically, government regulations have had to control our fishing habits. In fact, that’s what salmon hatcheries are for! When you visit a hatchery, make sure your kids know it’s not just a zoo or museum, but that it has a real purpose – to keep us fed!

But salmon is not likely to fall out of our diets soon. Salmon essential to First Nations culture, and our government sees that as an important practice to protect, despite the disputes it has caused. Ask your kids how they feel about conflict over fishing. Do they know why First Nation people are allowed some rights that other Canadians aren’t? What’s their take on this? Try not to induce opinions, but see what your kids or students might say. It can help you learn about their thought processes.

Aside from that, salmon farms are another way of producing fish, which may be hard to imagine after watching such strong fish freely swim upriver. Some kids may have heard about this term, “wild salmon.” What does that mean? Why do restaurants and grocery stores need to point out that a salmon is “wild” in order for you to want to buy it? This is another controversial topic that kids can be introduced to. While a health debate may be premature, an understanding of our food supply system can help draw a fuller picture for kids who may not yet know how a salmon dinner landed on their plate one evening!

Teach students about the B.C. salmon run’s relationship to the ecosystem

Learning about the salmon run is crucial to learning about how British Columbia’s environment works. For example, many predators depend on the salmon run as a source of food. Bears can often be seen waiting at a river to snatch the fish. If children are interested in learning about this, the BBC has a great video clip they can check out. Eagles spend a lot of time perched in the trees, looking for carcasses to eat because the fish die after they spawn, while seagulls or other birds hover together to eat eyeballs and other parts. The dead salmon contribute to the nitrogen cycle of the surrounding area. Their bodies fertilize the trees help allow rich foliage to grow.

How the salmon run relates to global warming

You can even use the salmon run as an educational tool to show the effects of global warming. According to the State of Salmon in Watersheds report, higher temperature caused by climate change can hurt the salmon run. Water temperature becomes warmer and salmon get more stressed under these conditions. It’s easier for them to die on the journey, and CBC reports we are seeing that happen right now. Record droughts we’ve encountered this year are also lowering the river and stream levels, making it harder for the fish to swim.

Be proactive!

The value of teaching kids about the B.C. salmon run is that it has so many lessons attached to it. Students get to learn about the food chain, the nitrogen cycle and global warming at the same time! If kids show interest, take them to see a fish ladder, spawning stream or hatchery!