I fell in love with poetry as a child. I loved reading it and having it read to me. And as I got older I loved learning what the poems meant. Now I am a published poet. My guest today, Susan Day, an expert on grand-parenting and author of the soon to be released book, The Top 10 Things Happy Grandparents Never Regret Doing!, writes about how important it is to teach children to memorize, read aloud, and write poetry. Please welcome Susan Day to Choices. The Importance of Teaching Children Poetry by Susan Day By studying poetry, memorizing and learning how to create poems, children can increase their language skills immensely. When studying poetry children are required to remember the words, and the rhythm or meter, in which the poem is meant to be said. This skill actually plays a powerful part on a child's ability to learn and recall information from a wide range of subject areas. Sadly, many classrooms underestimated what an important learning tool poetry is. A poem might be … [Read more...]
Aunt Helen – always in our hearts
My beautiful and glamorous Aunt Helen died peacefully last evening at age ninety-seven. She had a wonderful life with dynamic Uncle Charlie (unfortunately he left us many years ago and way too soon), her five children, and many grandchildren and great grandchildren. I always loved her calm elegance and looked to her as a role model. We will miss this woman who was fabulous in every way, and we are thrilled to have had her in our lives for so long. Here she is at age eighteen - when everyone thought she looked like the movie star, Hedy LaMar. And since she was a part of my life for all of my life, I remember that she looked this way well into her 20s, 30s, 40s, and 50s. And a more recent photo. As you can see, she was still beautiful in her old age. … [Read more...]
