Link-o-Mat

Pebbles' "sleep plan" is going pretty good so far. Our first goal has been mainly to focus on getting her to bed earlier and that has been much easier than I expected. In fact tonight is the second night that she got to bed around 8, quite an improvement from her usual 9:30 and even more so from the occasional 10:45 she was giving us before. Believe me, having three or four hours of no-kid time in the evening feels pretty friggin' good, even if I did spend most of it doing housework.

We are not supposed to assess our progress until we have been following the plan for 10 days, so we'll see how it goes. Her going to sleep earlier has mostly been the result of me not encouraging as long an afternoon nap as she used to take. Which in turn has been made possible by making sure she gets a chance at a decent morning nap. In the past she would often miss her morning nap, because we were at the gym or other places at that time, and then be so tired in the afternoon that she'd conk out for 3 solid hours.

Anyway, boring, right? I'll leave you with a few links to occupy yourself while I obsess over sleep schedules.

-- If my kid was behaving like this after three solid years of parent coaching, I'd want my money back.

-- A sad and freaky reminder that China's one-child policy is not just a happy adoptive-baby-producing machine.

-- This recent Time magazine cover story about how America's school system is failing its smartest kids is pretty good. Several points have me thinking:

1) It presents evidence that high-IQ kids who are allowed to skip grades do much better socially and academically than those who aren't, despite most school systems' reluctance to do so. Teachers told my parents that I easily could have skipped ahead, but that they recommended against it for social reasons. Because I was having such a grand time socially where I was.

2) One quote calls sending a kid who reads well to kindergarten "emotional torture." Gosh, Nutmeg, please forgive me if I end up torturing you emotionally in this way. I think you'll survive it, though.

3) It describes a disdain in public education for giftedness that I felt acutely on some of my school tours. And it explains how No Child Left Behind has made things worse for gifted kids.


-- Po Bronson, the most famous member of the writer's group I used to sup with in San Francisco, wrote this about the danger of telling your kids that they're smart. So far, Nutmeg doesn't know that she is. But the trouble with being smart is, you tend to listen to everything and figure out what's going on. A mom who was babysitting for the girls this weekend just mentioned Nutmeg's verbal skills and apparent intelligence. I never know what to say. "We know"? "Thank you"? "Hmm, we'll have to get that looked at"?

-- Breastfeeding doesn't protect against allergies or asthma, according to a new study. But they're not talking about food allergies.