A Simple Tip to Make Learning Easier

Although eating breakfast daily is important for health reasons, it also helps students learn more, get better grades and even have a better shot at winning more free cash for college. What kids eat at breakfast matters. A sugary cereal, breakfast bar or blender smoothie masquerading as healthy food just won’t work.

Each meal should contain different types of nutrients. Protein is an important one as it enhances concentration, learning and memory. In other words, eating protein makes it easier to understand what students are learning and to remember it. How much protein they need varies by age, body weight, gender and amount of exercise they get in a day.

One food that's simple to make is eggs. One egg will provides 14% of the daily recommended amount of protein. They’re easiest to add to breakfast of all the different kinds of foods that contain protein (fish, lentils, chicken, black beans and others). They can even be made in advance.

Here’s how:

1.   Decide how many days each week you want to add an egg to your breakfast and multiply that number by how many people will be eating them. The more eggs, the bigger the saucepan you need.

2.   Place them in a single layer in the pan. Put enough cold water into the pan to cover the eggs with one inch of water. (The greater the number of eggs, the more water needed.)

3.   Turn the heat up to high, and let the water come to a boil.

4.   Turn the heat off, and let the pan sit on the hot burner for ten to twelve minutes. (It’s okay to cook them longer. It just makes the yolk harder.)

5.   Use the lid to hold the eggs in the pan, and pour out the water into the sink. Run cold water over the eggs to stop them from cooking.

6.   After they’ve cooled off, you can put them in a bowl and keep them in the refrigerator.

7.   Peel and eat one each morning along with your cereal or other breakfast foods.

This isn’t the only way to add protein to your breakfast, but it’s the easiest way and is very low cost. Don’t forget to add a wholesome (low sugar) cereal or oatmeal, a piece of fresh fruit and a glass of milk (if not lactose intolerant), and you have a complete breakfast.

It may seem like a waste of time to eat breakfast each morning, but the brain needs food to function properly. So do students.

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE. It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no cost to you.

Photo Credit: Google Images

What Is Unique to Education?

Why Should School Be Fun?

Why Should Parents Be Patient?

How Does Hard Work Pay Off?

Where to Find Help with Free College

Even if you have a great idea for a book, and there’s an enormous market for the subject, nothing will happen unless you learn marketing. Before I began writing Free College, I started this blog, RoadToFreeCollege.com, and joined Twitter, @ElizaWallace27. Once my book was available on Amazon, several people took notice. Their interviews, guest blog posts, and advice have been beneficial. I was lucky to meet Rick Lite, @stressfreepub, who owns stressfreebookmarketing.com while I was on Twitter.

Rick is an expert in marketing, something I need in order to help millions of people pay for college without needing student loans. His useful tips have already pointed me in the right direction several times. Recently, Rick interviewed me for his newsletter. His questions were concise and probing. You’ll learn how I came to write Free College, some of the feedback I’ve had from readers so far, and much more. I'm quite grateful for the opportunity, and for the help I've received from Rick. 

To read the interview, just click: HERE.

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE. It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no cost to you.

Photo Credit: Rick Lite

Once a Child is Introduced to the Library, He is Never Alone

Keep This in Mind When Taking a Risk

Wise Words as True Today as They Were in The Past

Healthy Kids Tip #11

My Interview with the Boomer Business Coach

The first person to approach me for an interview after I published my book, Free College, was Melodieann Whiteley, host of the Boomer Business Coach Blog. Although she’s a successful businesswoman, her immediate interest was from the perspective of a grandmother. She knows college is far more expensive now than it was in the past. Often students take out several college loans, and end up with staggering debt. She didn’t want her children or grandchildren to suffer this fate.

I’ve placed a link to the interview we did for her blog right after this paragraph. Just click on it to be taken directly there. After you've finished reading, come back, and check out my book, Free College. It’s on Amazon. You can take a look, and buy it by clicking on the image of the book cover in the upper right hand corner of this page. I hope you read it, learn the defining habits of successful scholarships winners, and avoid college loans altogether.

To read "Free College? Yes, says Elizabeth Wallace" on Melodieann's blog click: HERE. 

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE. It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no cost to you.

Photo Credit: Cover Design by Bruce Berglund, Berglund Advertising Design

Why Is Persistence Important?

How Can You Tell if Someone Has Truly Succeeded?

How Can You Stop Yourself from Freaking Out?

How Do We Create a Positive Environment?

What Does Raising Healthy Kids Have to Do with Free College?

Recently I received a message from a doctor friend I met on Twitter. We follow each other, and share an interest in improving our health, and that of others. Here’s what she wrote, “You have a lot of good tips for making eating healthy easier. You should share them on a blog,” Dr. Kristie Leong.

Another friend, one I’ve known offline for several years, sent me this message shortly thereafter, “I agree with Kristie. Your healthy eating tips go well with your theme of helping kids do well in school and earn scholarships,” Deborah Dian.

I respect both of these ladies, but didn’t want to start a second blog. As an alternative, I’ve added a page of simple ways to raise healthy kids to my roadtofreecollege.com blog. I’ve titled the page, Raising Healthy Kids. I add tips to the page to encourage children to eat right and stay fit, so they’ll be able to follow the sixteen defining habits of successful scholarship winners and earn lots of free cash for college.

Every so often, I’ll write an entire blog post about one of the tips. I’ll go more in depth, and show parents what they can do to help their children stay healthy by eating right, sleeping enough and staying fit. There will also be suggestions of ways parents can build their children’s self-esteem, which is so vital to success in school, college and beyond. I’ve included some of the tips I’ve posted already below.

Easy Tips:

Adding one more veg to dinner, and reducing the size of your meat portion is a simple change every family can make to improve health.  

We should all adopt a physical activity we enjoy. It could be a sport, hiking, dancing, swimming, or something else. Share it with your kids, so they'll grow up with this healthy habit. 

Look at lists of healthy plant slant foods and recipes, and make your shopping list from the foods they contain. @BlueZones post them often on Facebook and Twitter. 

Let kids pick one new veg at the supermarket or Farmer's Market to try each week. They're more likely to try a "special" food they selected. 

Write down everything you ate and drank and hour before you had digestive issues. Do this for your kids too. Playing detective helps identify food allergies and intolerances. 

Recently I learned exercise keeps our arteries flexible, which is a good thing. That’s reason enough to make sure your kids get up and move around the house or outside every thirty minutes or so. No more playing video games without breaks. 

Gardening is a great family tradition to establish. Teaching kids where food comes from makes them more likely to eat their vegetables.

Poor health is a good reason to stop buying foods that contribute to it. Filling up your shopping list with healthy fruit, vegetables, beans and whole grains leaves little room for junk.

Did you know pistachios contain resveratrol, just like red wine? So your kids can snack on pistachios while you enjoy a glass of your favorite cabernet. You'll both benefit from this healthy compound, which fights damage to our bodies on a cellular level.

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE. It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no cost to you.

Photo Credit: Google Images

How Teachers Help Students Avoid Needing College Loans

When I first started teaching, few of the students who graduated from the school where I worked went on to college. This included my foreign language students. I knew for them to do well after high school graduation, something had to change. I started slipping reasons for going to college into our conversations. A hint here, a hint there, the idea eventually took hold.

I started putting up a poster each January and encouraged all seniors to list their post-graduation plans for everyone to see. This had a positive impact on all of my students. After a couple of years of doing this, I noticed all my seniors listed college as their destination. As college prices increased to absurd levels, I began informing my students of ways to avoid college debt. Some students were better at this than others. I wondered what they did that made the difference.

After doing a great deal of research, I put together a questionnaire. I distributed it widely and also solicited comments. It became clear those who received the most scholarship money had several habits in common. I wrote my book, Free College using this information. In addition to listing the sixteen successful strategies, I explain them and the results I saw for each. I suggest ways families could adopt them as well. The families and/or students who were better at practicing these habits received more scholarship money than those who only followed some of them. Those who completed them all received Full-Ride Scholarships.

I feel it’s vital to make this information public. I want it known by families everywhere. This way, everyone will be aware of what to do to avoid college loans. College debt is difficult to pay off, and becomes a monster that follows students for years, if not for life. My book is available on Amazon, click on the book cover in the top right corner of this page, to buy it now. If you have Pre-K through High School students in your life, my book will show you how they can graduate from college debt free. 

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE . It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

 

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases, at no additional cost to you.

Photo: My book cover

How Do People See Past Your Words?

What You Should Do, If Your High School Doesn’t Have a College Counselor

Every high school where I’ve taught has had at least one counselor who was an expert in “all things college”. What do you do if your high school doesn’t have such a person? I recommend you take a look at Free $ For College For Dummies by David Rosen and Caryn Mladen. Click HERE  to get a copy.

It won’t help you become the ideal college scholarship applicant, like my book, Free College. It will, however, help you through the process of finding and applying for scholarships. It consists of twenty-four chapters containing important details you need to know. I wasn’t sure if my grandson’s high school in another state had an expert on campus to help him, so I sent him a copy of this book when he started his junior year.

The book is like having a mentor walk you through the process. It can’t nag you to complete forms on time, of course, but it does give you a timeline to follow. The first four chapters include an overview of the process of finding free money. It explains what you can expect and how to avoid scams, (yes, as we have seen on the news lately, there are con men out there).

The second section of the book helps you optimize what you can receive from the federal government. Although there’s more than $46 billion in grants and scholarships available annually, over $2.9 billion in free college federal grant money went unclaimed last year. Read these chapters carefully, so you don’t miss out. This section also helps you avoid problems with the Internal Revenue Service. There’s a right way and a wrong way to report money received, do it right, so you don’t have problems.

Section three goes into finding money from the state in which you live. Like with the feds, there are grants and scholarships available. Free cash for college exists on a local level too. This part of the book helps you go after this money.

Next, you’ll learn how to negotiate with colleges for a lower tuition. Just like with cars, it's possible to pay less than the sticker price. Plus, you can apply for merit, athletic and even international scholarships from the college itself. All of these, naturally, must be appropriate for your student. As with the recent college admission scandal, students and parents who try to scam the system end up in trouble, and might even go to jail.

Lots more scholarships can be unearthed from private and public organizations. The next section of the book explains how to find them. Some are obvious, like charitable and fraternal organizations, unions, and the military. The last section of this chapter includes a resource guide for finding more obscure scholarships.

The final four chapters of Free $ For College For Dummies explains what else you can do, as well as what you should avoid while looking for ways to pay for college. Whatever you do, avoid taking out student loans. They can't be forgiven in bankruptcy, will follow you everywhere, and often grow so large, you’ll never be able to pay them off. I know people in their seventies who have student loan repayments taken involuntarily from their monthly social security benefits. Whether you buy this book, or mine, do whatever you can to avoid student loan debt.

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE. It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no cost to you.

Photo Credit: Google Images

Thanksgiving Holiday Scholarship Challenge

Although many students want to go to college, few have the financial resources to do so without scholarships, grants or loans. I’m completely against loans, since they often destroy a graduate’s future. That leaves grants and scholarships, but they don’t magically appear. Someone has to apply for them.

When writing my book, Free College, I realized I didn’t complete many chapters without having a specific goal, including a time limit. Once I set this up, the chapters almost seemed to write themselves. This could be true for scholarship and grant applications too. I suggest setting up a routine for finding, filling out, and submitting college scholarship and grant forms.

To this end, I propose a challenge over the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday. For most students, this means four days. For others, it may be five days. Whichever is the case for you, pick the number of applications you wish to submit during this time. They will all be completed online, of course, so you don’t have to worry about offices being closed. My suggestion is a minimum of one per day, better yet would be to double or triple that number.

You’ll still have time for visiting with family and friends, watching football or the Twilight Zone Marathon, and eating lots of turkey or ham. Discuss your family’s travel plans with your parents in advance. Block this time out on a calendar (you can print templates online for free). Then block out your sleep schedule. You’ll do a terrible job if you’re sleep deprived.

You now know when you have free time for meeting this scholarship/grant application challenge. Use a red pen to outline the times you are allotting to find, complete and submit your applications. If you have already filed at least one, you know how much time you’ll need for each. The average student takes about an hour, after the first one.

Sure, vacations should be fun, but wouldn’t you dedicate ten hours of the 120 over the upcoming Thanksgiving holiday if doing so might result in being awarded thousands of dollars for college? Go ahead and do it. I dare you. 

You are reading from the blog, RoadtoFreeCollege.com, where we empower families with knowledge to navigate the path to higher education without the burden of excessive loans.

 

For more information, you’ll want my book, Free College, CLICK HERE. It teaches families how to help their kids become more successful in school, college, and life.

As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no cost to you.

Photo Credit: Google Images