Brain Rules For Baby: How to Raise a Smart & Happy Child from 0 to 5

Many of you know that I have spent the last few months working with my friends at Pear Press promoting a groundbreaking new book written by a jolly scientist named Dr. John Medina.

His new book, Brain Rules For Baby: How to Raise a Smart & Happy Child from 0 to 5 is coming out on Tuesday, October 12th throughout the US, and I could not be more excited for parents everywhere, and particularly early learning educators, to grab a hold of the many insights in this book.

Why are some babies easy and others fussy— and how do you get an easy one?  What’s the single most important thing you can do during pregnancy?  What does watching TV do to a baby’s brain?  Scientists know.

In his New York Times bestseller Brain Rules, Dr. John Medina showed us how our brains really work—and why we ought to redesign our workplaces and schools around these rules.  Now, in Brain Rules for Baby, he shares what the latest science says about how to raise smart and happy children.

One of the surprises: The best way to get your children into the college of their choice?  Put down the book and love your spouse!

Brain Rules for Baby bridges the gap between what scientists know and what parents practice.  Through fascinating and funny stories, Medina, a molecular biologist and dad, unravels how the brain develops from the womb through the early years.

Some topics discussed include:

• Where nature ends and nurture begins
• Why men should do more household chores
• What you do when emotions run hot affects how your baby turns out, because babies need to feel safe above all
• TV is harmful for children under 2
• Your child’s ability to relate to others predicts her future math performance
• Smart and happy are inseparable. Pursuing your child’s intellectual success at the expense of his happiness achieves neither
• Praising effort is better than praising intelligence
• The best predictor of academic performance is not IQ. It’s self-control

What you do right now—before pregnancy, during pregnancy, and through the first five years— will affect your children for the rest of their lives, and Brain Rules for Baby is an indispensable guide on the great adventure known as parenting.

Join the (growing) abolitionist movement in Seattle

For more information on how to join the abolitionist movement in Seattle, join Seattle Against Slavery on March 15th at a general public meeting.

6 pm Network | 6:30 pm meeting begins ’til 8:30 pm

• SAS Update
  
• “Understanding Youth in Prostitution” by Guest Speaker, Leslie Briner, MSW
• Panel Discussion with Leslie Briner, Sheila Houston (Director of New Horizon Ministries’ Late Night Outreach), Hope Brian (a Seattle public defender), Lisa Etter Carlson (Member of Awake Church)
  
• Legislative Advocacy Training
• SAS Fundraising Plans to introduce SAS’ “Seattle Cares Project” for Dedicated Trafficking Survivors Shelters #1 & 2 Plans

Bonus: first 25 people gets free book of “Renting Lacy” by Linda Smith of Shared Hope International

UW Hillel

4745 17th Ave. NE*

Seattle 98105

*35 parking spaces along alley + back parking lot, otherwise street parking

Register for this meeting here: http://seattleagainstslavery.eventbrite.com/

NO NEED TO PRINT TICKET TO COME TO THIS EVENT/MEETING.

Questions? Email me or SAS at seattleagainstslavery [at] live [dot] com

to the great men all around me

Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;–

Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

A Psalm of Life (excerpt), Henry Longfellow Wadsworth

Best. Wedding Advice. Ever.

We’ve all been to one.  Many of us have been involved in one.  And many more of you have planned, hosted, enjoyed, (survived), and celebrated your own.  As I now stand at the outset of my own engagement, I am like a sponge ready to soak up the collective wedding wisdom that abounds in my community.  Tell us what we need to know!

Post in comments.  Post on our Facebook walls.  Send us emails.  Call us.  Tweet us.  Do whatever you must, just don’t keep your experience, advice, and counsel to yourself!

Conferencing

This past weekend was full of more conferencing than I’ve been involved with in a long time.  The 2009 Pacific Northwest Microfinance Conference was visited by an all star lineup of practitioners from some of the leading microfinance organizations in the world, including Kiva.org, WorldVision, Esperanza International, and Agros.

Just down the street was the Freedom Initiative’s UNBOUND Anti-Human Trafficking Conference, a great breakthrough in unifying Seattle’s many abolitionists in a meaningful weekend spearheaded by the student-led Freedom Initiative.  I was honored to lead a workshop on the topic: Social Entrepreneurship and the Abolitionist Movement, and my presentation is posted online at HERE.

Speaking of which, to present the content for the workshop, I did a last-minute switch from Microsoft PowerPoint to www.Prezi.com, and I must say I have never been more impressed with a free, web-based app than I have with Prezi.  It has completely changed how I will share presentations from now on.  Check it out!

Unbound Conference

On May 8-9 in Seattle, the Freedom Initiative is hosting the 1st Annual Unbound Conference.  It’s been a privilege to work with this alliance of students who are passionate about seeing justice in the streets of Seattle and an end to human trafficking in our own neighborhood.  Register before April 24th and join us as we bring together artists, musicians, non-profit leaders, and experts on modern-day slavery to raise awareness and empower people to become advocates for the victims of human trafficking.

I’ll be leading a conversation about how the injustices of the 21st century call for innovative, community-based solutions that look more like businesses than bureaucracies. Be a part of the conversation on how social entrepreneurs are collaborating to confront human trafficking through community-driven, technology-based innovations that are providing sustainable solutions across the globe.

The cost of registration is $10. All proceeds go to organizations providing services to victims of human trafficking. The $10 registration fee is not tax deductible.

If you have any questions about the conference, please contact registration@freedominitiative.org

Support your local startup

As an (aspiring) entrepreneur, I feel obligated to initiate some word-of-mouth advertising for some innovative companies that have truly changed the way I do things.  In the current climate of bailouts and rising unemployment, many have come to expect that a thriving business or employment is a fundamental, inalienable right, on par with that of free speech, life, and the pursuit of happiness.  However, the harsh reality of life is that if you aren’t adding value to someone or something, you are not truly “working.”  This is the essence of business, of capitalism, and of service– the exchange of adding-value for a return on investment (not necessarily monetarily though).  So often we forget this simple truth, and so I thought I’d promote several FREE online services I use that have added-value to my work, travel, and life.

Travel: Dopplr & Trip It

Travel continues to be a center piece to my work and life, and so early last year I turned to two online startups to help me get organized and network with community when traveling.  Dopplr is a beautiful service that combines the power of social networking with the usefulness of an online travel journal.  The design and interface of Dopplr are a joy to work with, creates my public profile and Facebook app, and they’ve just released my 2008  annual travel report, where Dopplr reports I took 26 trips in 2008, which added up to 105,995 km or 29% of the distance to the moon.  Furthermore, Dopplr calculates that my travels emitted 12,863 kg of CO2, and even allows me to purchase carbon offsets if my conscience were to compel me.  I felt as if it was quite a well traveled year until Dopplr posted President Obama’s travel profile here.  For real utility, however, I’ve turned to TripIt— a virtual travel assistant that automatically organizes your travel itinerary.  Oftentimes it’s as easy as forwarding a confirmation email to plans@tripit.com, and TripIt will automatically build your itinerary.

Personal Finance: Mint

Having been a longtime Quicken user until this year, perhaps the most profound service I’ve started working with is Mint.  Personal finance has finally been made easy with this beautifully designed and simple service nearly automates the entire budgeting and transaction tracking process, to where I now spend no more than 10 minutes a week managing my finances, investments, and budgeting.

Pointless Fun: Twitter

Like so many, I spent the last few years absolutely dumbfounded by the hype over the seemingly useless platform known as Twitter.  Although I’ve had my Twitter account for a while, very few of my friends and colleagues got into the micro-blogging concept in and of itself.  And so it wasn’t until Twitter synced up with my Facebook (and my social network) that it actually became useful.  I have no idea how they’ll ever monetize this, but in the meantime, I find it to be a remarkably addicting and fairly useful way to communicate brief messages to your community.

Productivity: Remember The Milk

Remember The Milk has become my go-to To Do list that I can access whether at home, the office, or on the road.  With a fast interface, and the ability to automatically load tasks while on the go by simply emailing my account, RTM has easily helped increase my productivity by 20% or more.  An honorable mention goes out to RescueTime for it’s service as well.

Efficiency: Xobni & Xoopit

Xobni (or “inbox” backwards) has changed the way I interface with the ubiquitous, yet stubborn, Outlook.  Armed with a powerful search engine, syncronization with LinkedIn, and a feature that automatically organizes email file attachments and contacts, Xobni is a highly recommended add-on for anyone that spends most of their day in front of a computer on Outlook.  Similarly, Xoopit has proven to be a moderately useful media search add-on for Gmail by making photos, videos, and other files more easily searchable and accessible.

Post a comment, a Facebook message on my wall, a tweet on Twitter, or an email with some of your favorite FREE, value-add services out there–

The Art of the Manly Beard

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Just in time for my 8-day old Thanksgiving Beard, one of my favorite new blogs, The Art of Manliness, informs us aspiring beard-growers how to do it with committment, style, and manliness.

Learning about life in the streets…

New Horizons Ministries (www.nhmin.org) was formed in 1978 in response to the growing problems of youth involved in street activity in downtown Seattle. As a multi-cultural organization, their mission is to be in relationship with young people who are homeless and living on the streets, serving, loving, and equipping them to leave street life. Their work has taken them to the darkest corners of Seattle, where literally hundreds of teens have been lured into lives of prostitution.

Come be a part of New Horizon’s training– designed to equip those who want to work with New Horizons or simply know more about the lives of youth living on the street. The training program is open to the public, and is also used by other service agencies throughout the city to train their volunteers and staff. The two all-day training sessions are:

Saturday, September 20th from 8:30am – 4:00pm
Saturday, September 27th from 8:30am – 5:30pm

Visit www.nhmin.org/news/training.asp for more details and come learn how to serve and impact the lives of young people in Seattle.

And miles to go before I sleep…

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there’s some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

— Robert Frost, 1874-1963