Games That Make You Smarter

Parenting Like I Know What I’m Doing

graduation — Since several people have asked the same questions about the parenting book Maria and I wrote, and about our Family Textbook. I thought I’d answer them all at once in a blog post. What’s the name of your book? Parenting Like I Know What I’m Doing. We thought we might […]

8 Questions about our Parenting Book & Family Textbook

February 26, 2018 in AnnMaria / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by AnnMaria De Mars

After many, many requests, Maria and I are doing a parenting book and you’ll be able to download it here. Why, you ask? Well, one of the major reasons I am in Chile is to learn more about marketing at one of the premier start-up accelerators in the world. Several […]

Why We’re Doing a Parenting Book

February 24, 2018 in AnnMaria / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by AnnMaria De Mars

When my oldest daughter was 2.5 years old, she decided to learn the alphabet and had me drill her on flashcards until she got it down. Differentiating Z and S was the biggest challenge, but once she had that down then she was off. We never worried about her doing […]

How I Know Blended Learning Works

February 22, 2018 in Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by Maria Burns Ortiz

water garden and wilshire offices — Anyone who runs a startup will tell you it borders on being life-consuming. There’s no 9-to-5, You’re constantly working on building your company, including evenings and weekends and those times you wake up in the middle of the night realizing you need to email someone back and that you still […]

Taking My Work Home With Me – To The Extreme

October 4, 2017 in Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing / Start-up Diaries by Maria Burns Ortiz

Game o — Maybe you’ve seen it as a meme or on a t-shirt on a random guy at the mall, it reads: Whenever I see that, I always want to say, “You probably did use algebra, it’s just that in real-life, no one says, ‘Oh, now this is the part of the […]

The Importance of Real-World Application in Education

August 21, 2017 in Education: Innovation and STEM / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by Maria Burns Ortiz

We just launched a Kickstarter campaign for our upcoming bilingual games series, AzTech Games! (Back us please!) After weeks of planning and pulling together the video/determining rewards/lining up rollout/putting together the project page, now the real work begins. Doing a Kickstarter is kind of like having a baby. You spend and […]

Why We’re Doing Another Kickstarter

August 10, 2017 in 7GenGames / Educational Games / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing / Start-up Diaries by Maria Burns Ortiz

Angie — It’s not easy being the parent of an adolescent under any circumstances. Parents want to protect and care for their children. Youth want to experience life, to become young adults. This conflict is even greater when the child has a disability. Parents often see their child as vulnerable because of […]

Parenting Adolescents with Disabilities

August 1, 2017 in AnnMaria / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by AnnMaria De Mars

Julia and Austin, amused — I must have struck a chord with my previous post on helping (encouraging/ coercing) your adolescent to get a first job. I thought I provided some practical advice but received several emails asking for more. So, being the full service organization we are, here is my follow-up post with more suggestions […]

Parenting Productive Adolescents: Advice Needed

July 15, 2017 in AnnMaria / Education: Innovation and STEM / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by AnnMaria De Mars

Julia holding shopping bag — It’s not easy being the parent of an adolescent under any circumstances. Parents want to protect and care for their children. Youth want to experience life, to become young adults. If you find the transition to adulthood easy, your family is the lucky exception. In the next few posts, I’ll offer […]

Parenting Adolescents: Get a Job, Kid

July 3, 2017 in AnnMaria / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by AnnMaria De Mars

Kid playing making camp — Today, I saw the umpteenth tweet that linked to another article with a variation of a “Getting Girls to Like Math” post, and for the love of God, enough is enough. I am so tired of hearing how girls don’t like math. Or how they don’t gravitate toward it. Or don’t […]

Stop Telling Girls They Don’t Like Math

June 14, 2017 in Education: Innovation and STEM / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing by Maria Burns Ortiz

boy yelling — Why is the child in this picture yelling? And, is it a problem? Is it his problem or someone else’s? He is yelling because he wants his mother to hear him over the sound of the other children playing, and his mother is several yards away. It may drive his […]

Behavior Problems that Get Children What They Want (and what ...

June 9, 2017 in Educational Resources / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing / Special Education by AnnMaria De Mars

child bathing — Although our site has a section, “Educational Resources”, it’s obvious, but not always acknowledged, that teachers aren’t the only educators. Always true, but particularly if you have a child with a disability, parents and siblings can be crucial in the education of their family member. Where do we start? There […]

Families and Disability: Behavior Problems of Young Children

June 8, 2017 in AnnMaria / Educational Resources / Parenting Like I Know What I'm Doing / Special Education by AnnMaria De Mars