How to get into Second Life without really trying
Selby Evans is Thinkerer Melville in Second Life
While preteens may be able to read the content of the Thinkerer, they will generally not be able to translate it into concrete actions. To use these materials with your preteen, try out some of the tools yourself. Look for items that work for you. Don’t expect to sell what you don’t believe in. Not to your children, anyway.
When you have some candidate tools, pick one to show to your child. You will probably see some problems that you really want to fix. Leave them till later. Look for an easy problem .
Don’t climb mountains till you have done the hills first.
Pick one tool that applies to this easy problem. For an example, starting is a common problem. The Start Buttons are the tool that fits. Print out the Start Button page. You probably don’t need any of these items, but you can pretend. Especially if you can remember when you were in school.
Watch (or arrange) for times when you could pretend to use the Start Buttons (for yourself) in front of the child. If possible, do this with jobs the child wants you to do. Name the problem (here, Getting Started) in front of the child.
Treat the problem as a common task of growing up. Like learning to tie your shoelaces. People aren’t just naturally able to get started on things they need to do. It takes practice.
To use the Start Button page, pick a line at random, read it aloud, and ask yourself aloud how you could apply it to the job at hand. Let your child see and hear this talk. If the child offers a suggestion, try to use it. Or ask the child to pick a line for you and read it.
When the child is familiar with the tool, watch for that easy problem you were going to fix. When you see it, name it and wonder aloud if the tool would help at this point. In our example, you would offer to help the child apply a Start Button to the problem. Let the child pick a line. Give the child help as necessary to figure out the concrete actions that the line might suggest. As needed, let the child pick another line.
Tools important to preteens
Winning with Cuepons
How to make a Thinkerer's Kit
A convenient way to show children how to work with problems.
Semi-Structured Brainstorming
Quest Questions: Print these. When your child asks for help on
homework, look over these questions for one that you want to ask.
Vulcan Quest
Un Quest
Mulling Team Quest
Networker Quest
Empath Quest
Engineer Quest
Storyboarder Quest