Home Schooling Your Children - Easier than you think

Posted on March 21, 2007
Filed Under Trading Education | Leave a Comment

Home schooling used to have a bad image. When we think of homeschooling, we often picture with fundamental right wingers, antisocial weirdos, or people too scared to let their children attend public school. This image has been improving over the last several years. New curricula for home schooling has come out, each provides a clearer path for learning. There have been many success stories of students that have come from home schooling environments.


On the other side of the fence, the quality of public schooling (in America at least) has been on a dramatic decline the last several years. Standardized test scores are down, gang violence is up, and that’s not even considering the school shootings. This all contributes to an increasing lack of confidence in the public education system.


Many parents are finding they can better teach their children at home. Using personalized home schooling curriculum, parents are able to give their children a better education right in their own home. Many of the children who are schooled at home are getting excellent scores on standardized tests, with many achieving perfect scores. The quality of education is only one reason many parents are going towards homeschooling.


Parents have also found that home schooling is a cheaper alternative to expensive private schools. There is a student teacher ratio they can’t be beat in public or private school. Overall, many parents say they like them relaxed learning atmosphere, and the ability to better control their students workload. There is also generally less peer pressure, and parents can keep an eye on their children better than if they were off at school.


Much of the improvement in the image of homeschooling can be attributed to the Internet. Online homeschooling options provide more than learning or teaching aids for home schooling families. Internet-based curriculum helps parents improve the general state of the education they are providing, as it can help the parents in areas where they may be weaker as teachers.


The Internet also helps overcome one of the main drawbacks to home schooling, and that is the lack of socialization. Many online homeschooling programs offer group meetings or seminars where home school students can meet and work together on projects.


If it’s so great, why don’t more parents home school their children? There are a number of reasons. Many parents just don’t have time to teach their children, and some don’t feel qualified. Many families need both parents as breadwinners just to make ends meet.


While home schooling is shedding its iconoclastic image, whether or not to home school your children is a family decision. You will still need to hire teachers in such areas as driver education to be in compliance with state law, but most parents who are fairly intelligent and literate can use the helps found on the Internet, in books, or in home schooling support groups to provide an excellent education for their children.


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Taking Penny Stock Risks

Posted on March 21, 2007
Filed Under Stock Market | Leave a Comment

The term micro cap stocks generally refers to any stocks that trade outside the major stock exchanges and is taken as ‘deprecatory’. The major stock exchanges would include: NASDAQ, AMEX, or NYSE. The term Penny stock is also often used interchangeably with small caps and nano caps. The title of penny stock however should be determined by the share price rather than the listing service or market capitalization.

Penny stocks often have market caps lower than $500 million. This makes it highly speculative for those who trade low volumes ‘over the counter’. Some believe that penny stocks are difficult to sell once purchased because of the difficulty in locating quotes on particular penny stocks. Investors in these stocks are expected to understand that the loss of their entire investment is a viable risk.

Despite the risks involved, penny stocks are attractive to new investors because of the low initial price and the possibility of quick payouts of up to 100 percent in some circumstances. Just as there is the potential of high profits, that potential comes with the risk of substantial losses.

Penny stocks are considered high-risk investments. As a result investors should be aware that these stocks have a limited amount of liquidity and fraud in addition to a lack of financial reporting.

Penny stocks have fewer shareholders. This makes them less liquid than stocks of larger companies. It also means that it will buy and sell less shares. The fact that less shares are traded generally results in unpredictable stock prices. This can either make the prices rise sharply or suddenly decline. The lack of liquidity within this market leaves it wide open to exploitations by market makers, management, and other parties.

These stocks can also be difficult to sell quickly as some days there simply are no buyers.

Another reason for this lack of liquidity is the minimal listing requirements for smaller market listings as compared to NASDAQ or NYSE. Companies that have fallen below requirements for the larger exchanges have the opportunity to get listed on the OTCBB or Pink Sheets.

If you are comparing Pink Sheets to the major exchanges you might want to take note of the fact that Pink Sheets have very few regulatory requirements for those being listed. In other words, there is little protection in place for shareholders by way of accounting standards, notifications of ownerships of shares, etc.

These things combined make small cap stocks very attractive tools for fraud. This does not at all mean that all stocks listed on the OTCBB are untrustworthy, it simply means that you should keep your eyes open when making deals on this market

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Learn How to Perform Simple Magic Tricks

Posted on March 14, 2007
Filed Under Trading General | Leave a Comment

Some magic tricks are very easy to learn and perform in social gatherings like parties. Such tricks require only common items such as matchboxes, bowls, coins and the like. Most tricks require some kind of pre-arrangement, but some can be done without any preparation.

One such easy trick is the “Ice Baby” trick. You pour some water into a bowl, say some magic words and turn it upside down and lo and behold, ice cubes fall from the bowl. This trick can be performed by placing a sponge and ice cubes in the bowl beforehand so that the sponge absorbs the water that is poured into the bowl and the ice cubes fall out.

The jumping rubber band trick is a popular trick that needs no previous arrangements. A rubber band is wrapped around your little finger and ring finger. When you stretch the rubber band, insert your little, ring, middle and first finger into it and open your fingers again, the rubber band mysteriously jumps to the first and middle fingers.

Coin vanishing tricks are among the most popular magic tricks. A variety of coin vanishing tricks are prevalent the world over. A coin is placed on the table and when you pick it up and say the magic words and hey presto, it disappears! What you should keep in mind while performing this trick is that when you cover the coin with your hand and slide it to edge of the table to pick it up, you should push it onto your lap and then pretend that the coin is still in your hand. After that you say the magic words and open your hand, and the coin has disappeared from your hand.

Another interesting coin trick requires a glass, a sheet of colored paper, a handkerchief and a coin. The audience is shown the coin and an upturned glass kept on a sheet of colored sheet of paper. You put a handkerchief over the glass and move it over. When the handkerchief is removed the coin has disappeared. This trick involves a certain amount of pre-planning. A circle the size of the rim and of the same color of the sheet is taped to the glass so that it blends with the colored paper. Thus when the glass is moved over, the circle hides the coin from view and the coin appears to have disappeared.

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Getting Your Bachelor Degree Online

Posted on March 13, 2007
Filed Under Trading Education | Leave a Comment

Are you an adult who left school before finishing your bachelor degree? Have you thought about going back, but are not sure how to fit it in with your life and your adult responsibilities? As an adult, returning to school can be difficult in many ways. Time commitments, my family and financial responsibilities, and other activities make it hard to find the time or the money to go back to school. To make it even more difficult, as we age our brains function differently, and traditional ls may not work as well on us as they did when we were younger.

Learn more about getting your bachelor degree online by reading the rest of this article.

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