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When we consign our children to public schools, we feel satisfied that they are receiving ‘quality education’. But, are we really getting our money are worth? More importantly, are the children gaining anything from this kind of a learning procedure?

Socialization is hailed as one of the greatest advantage of schools. This is the place where the child picks up the rudiments of social skills that help him survive. But in truth, a regular school-going child can interact only with his peers. He may bully younger children or fear older ones. He does not know how to behave with an adult. This is because in the school environment he interacts only with his peers. A homeschooling environment brings in a more natural social environment.

A regular school going child cannot read literature. He cannot keep silent or think in depth about any one thing. The artificial busyness imposed upon him by the school disallows quiet contemplation. Rowdy and destructive behaviour, as seen among peers, is more noticeable in school-goers.

There is little long-standing knowledge among regular school goers because most things are learnt for the exam. There is no correlation of facts with life. The child may know a lot, but understands very little. This is where the homeschoolers beat the regular school goers. Ultimately, homeschoolers emerge more adept at facing the outside world.

Financing homeschooling

When people talk about teaching their children from home in the absence of any definite or structured curriculum, it is perhaps natural to think that homeschooling is cheap. But this is far from the truth. Although homeschooling does not stick to any particular text, this is perhaps more of a bane than a boon, when it comes to finance.

When you need to make sure that your children receives state-of-the-art education so that they can compete with regular school goers, expenses will naturally mount. The actual cost of educating a child at home is surprisingly high. Up-to-date textbooks, course materials, a library, computing equipment, lighting, specially designed furniture all cost money. In this case, the cost may be slightly lesser when it comes to homeschooling the second child. Add to this any additional tuition cost for tutors who come to teach subjects that cannot be handled by parents, like higher-level math or science. The total cost can be a bit mind boggling.

If you take another important factor into consideration, homeschooling costs may effective triple. The need for having one of the parents tied to the house and fully dedicated to providing education deprives the family of a second earning member. The average homeschooling teacher is usually a lady with a college degree. This means that she can easily bring home a pay of $35,000 or more. It is also interesting to note that most families that have more than 2 children do not opt for homeschooling at all.

But, there are those who have been successful in carrying out homeschooling at low rates. This is dependent on the size of the family, the support group, and the type of materials used and the availability of the material. When successive children can reuse the materials, cost goes down. Much of the course material can be got from vendors of homeschooling materials. A membership in a public library, theatre, concerts, ballets and other cultural events also help in cutting costs. Sometimes, it is even possible to barter expertise. For instance, the mother of an 8-year old gives dancing classes, and her daughter receives drawing classes for free. Support groups allow you to divide the cost of field trips, science projects and fairs.

Whatever the cost, advocates of homeschooling say that the benefits far outweigh these considerations. When you are able to decide what knowledge your child receives and when he or she should be taught and to what extent, it gives you a lot of freedom and a lot of power. Both the children as well as the parents benefit from this mutually enriching experience.

Uchenna Ani-Okoye is an internet marketing advisor and co founder of Free Affiliate Programs

For more information and resource links on homeschooling visit: Online Homeschooling

As more and more of the business marketing companies are turning to the online sector for promotion, more and more SEO and internet marketing cowboys are popping up onto the scene. Making it harder for not only small businesses but a selection of the larger businesses to actually work out the good from the ugly. So I have put together a few tips which may help in eliminating this problem.

Firstly you should check to see how long a company has been around. If they have been around for say 5 years or more, then you know that they must be doing something right. Also a great tip is to check how many employees they have because a company with only 1 employee that has been around for 5 years is quite an easy achievement. But if infact they have 10 or 20 employees, each would have to get a wage therefore the company would have to be bringing in legitimate money to last 5 years.

Next I would ask them to show me some results of any previous clients they have worked with, if they come up with an excuse such as we can’t as we don’t list our clients results, then I would be quite precautious. Also ask to speak to some of the clients directly to maybe get a few good references.

A lot of SEO companies promise the world and fail to deliver, or they just lye to you from the beginning. You should never believe an SEO company that guarantees results within 30 or 60 days nobody can guarantee anything, what a legitimate SEO company can do is apply there knowledge both onsite and offsite to improve overall rankings and drive targeted traffic and conversions into a website.

You should be on the look out for companies that want you to sign a long lasting contract, as if you do this you may have to pay the company month in and month out, while they are not doing anything to help your sites rankings. Finally you should try to discuss what the steps will be with an SEO company, SEO is not a quick win solution, it cannot be completed within a day or two, it should be an ongoing process for the rest of your websites life. You should beware of companies that promise too much as they may be breaking the search engines guidelines which will ultimately result in your sites demise.

Specialists in SEO, Search Engine Optimisation and Web Design

Your friends and family members might enjoy getting funny T shirts for birthday and holiday presents. There is a great selection of humorous shirts on the Internet or in stores. There are a few things you need to think about when you select comical shirts for your loved ones.

1. Consider what kind of humor your loved one likes. One friend might like dark humor with a touch of cynicism. Another might like whimsical characters and sayings about the ironies of life. You might know someone who likes to focus on political satire. Whatever the person finds funny, you will probably find that type of humor on a shirt.

2. Think about the person’s pet peeves. People like to make fun of things they are unhappy about. If your family member is annoyed because she has to pay too much in taxes, she might enjoy a funny T shirt that makes light of the taxation system. For a person that is irritated by people who are obsessed with physical fitness, there are T shirts that make fun of health fanatics.

3. Reflect on the gift recipient’s ability to take a joke. If that person is overly sensitive or easily offended, it will have a bearing on the kind of funny T shirts you will buy for him or her. Look at the choices and imagine how that person will feel upon looking at the shirt. Decide if you can see the person wearing the shirt proudly.

4. Understand how well your friend or family member responds to adult humor. You would not want to give a funny T shirt about explicit subjects to someone who wants to keep the humor G rated. Many people will thoroughly enjoy a T shirt that caters to their naughty side. Just make sure before you give such a T shirt that the person has the capacity to find amusement in those words and images.

5. Take the time to learn about your loved one’s political leanings. People who support one political candidate might like a shirt making fun of the opposing candidate. Those who are affiliated with liberal politics might want to poke fun at conservatives. Finding the right political message will allow you to buy them a shirt that is right up their alley.

6. Find out about causes your friend supports. Someone who concentrates on efforts to reduce greenhouse gases or save endangered species can find wittiness in funny T shirts that make a point about nature. On the other hand, if your friend supports a cause, it might not be a good idea to choose a shirt that makes fun of the ideas they hold dear.

Perhaps the most important thing you can do once you have selected your gift is to choose an appropriate time to offer it. Some occasions are just too serious for anyone to appreciate the jokes on funny T shirts. If you choose the right shirt and the best time to give it, your loved one will always be pleased.

Ron Subs works with Sonic Shack as a public relations consultant, more information about vintage T shirts can be found at www.vintagetshirtstore.com

Do you want to change your leadership style? Perhaps you’ve discovered something in particular that you want to do, or do differently.

And this, of course, is the problem. You want to change something you do, but the folks in the office just aren’t expecting you to change anything. They don’t WANT you to change anything.

Also, some people around you may be suspicious or cynical. Not all of them, maybe, but enough to make it tricky to change.

So no matter how enthusiastic or motivated you might be to make a change, all of the ‘noise’ around you makes you reluctant, or resistant, to change. The pain of change seems worse than the gain of change.

So you stop even thinking about change. And soon you’re as cynical and suspicious as all the rest. And nothing ever changes.

If this sluggish feeling is familiar to you, then what you’re experiencing is the heavy inertia of ‘the way things work round here’. It’s the power of the status quo to weigh heavy on you and stop you from changing anything.

How can you start the change process? What you urgently need to do is find ways over or round the inertia. And the questions to ask are these:

1. When is it easier to change my leadership style?
2. What will help me to change my leadership style?

First, it’s easier to change your leadership style when you take a new job or a new role in another department. In a new role, you can set out your plans for the new team and you can change the way you manage or lead the team. This is, of course, because no one knows you from your previous role. They don’t know the old boss.

You can also change your leadership style at the start of every new project. Every beginning is an opportunity to restart or relaunch your leadership style.

Of course, you may still have tricky issues to deal with - people asking ‘why the sudden change?’ - so there is something else you need to do: create a Leadership Manifesto to overcome inertia

A Leadership Manifesto will make it easier for you to change your leadership style.
The Manifesto - like a manifesto for a political party - is an outline sketch of what you’re trying to do. And, importantly, it’s also a sketch of HOW you’re planning to do it.

Drafting and actually discussing a one-page leadership manifesto with your team is a great way of getting people moving anyway, and the idea of a manifesto helps people focus round what you’re trying to achieve.

Now your manifesto could address any of the issues you feel are important for the team to address. Here are just three suggestions:

1. Collaborative goal setting versus boss-centred goal setting. You may want to work with people to help them set goals or you may wish to give people targets based on your understanding of their skills and performance in the past.

2. Cross-business collaboration versus cross-business competition. You may want to explore why you believe you should be collaborating with other teams in the business or why you should be competing internally with them.

3. Day-to-day constructive feedback versus end-of-year appraisals. You may wish to create a more open atmosphere and attitude towards ‘live’ performance management. You might want to create an atmosphere where it is acceptable to give practical and constructive feedback. The alternative is waiting for the end-of-year appraisal which is way too late to be useful.

I find that the concept of a leadership manifesto is very flexible and you can use it anyway that suits you. For example, you could with your team develop a change manifesto. Get the team to create their own manifesto for the way things work round here. Invite them to think about, if they were in charge, what would they change?

And finally, make sure that part of your Leadership Manifesto is about making it easy for others to make changes in their role. Give your team permission to change, too. That’s part of your developmental role, which should also be in the Manifesto.

Having an open and understood Leadership Manifesto is all part of building your personal leadership brand. Your openness on what people can expect from you helps them to trust you more, so that when the going gets tough, they know they can rely on you to lead them well.

If you want the leadership success you deserve, get the leadership training you deserve. Download more free articles and leadership training videos from Steven Sonsino, an international business school professor and author of the Amazon bestseller “The Seven Failings of Really Useless Leaders”
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