Children's Education in Crisis, Staying Connected, Grit, Hobbies During Quarantine, Letters Against Depression, Spring Cleaning

Children’s Education During Crisis (0:00:00) With schools closing across the nation, many of us are now quarantined with our kids for the foreseeable future. Whether that be a blessing or an added challenge for you, many are stuck wondering how their little ones are going to stay up-to-date with their learning. Save the Children, a non-profit organization devoted to helping children during a crisis, has been working hard during the virus to make sure that children in the US are staying educated during social distancing. Joining us today is Betsy Zorio, the Vice President of their US Programs and Advocacy section, here with us to discuss their mission and how we can keep our children educated during this pandemic. Staying Connected During Quarantine (0:16:08) Isn’t it exhausting telling our kids to get off their phones and actually interact with people all the time? It can feel like an uphill battle as not only our kids, but we find ourselves spending more and more time looking at screens. But what if we could turn the tide of this war and use phones to actually help the family stay more connected rather than separated? To help us out we invited Sarah Kimmel, a family tech expert and digital parenting coach. She founded Family Tech LLC to help families understand and manage the technology in their homes. Grit (0:33:05) We all have goals in life. Teachers want to improve their student’s lives. Cadets at West Point want to outshine their peers. Sales reps want to earn as much money in commissions as possible. Some of these individuals reach high measures of success while others struggle, drop out, and fail. What do they have that others don’t? Dr. Angela Duckworth found just one characteristic as a significant predictor of success: grit. Dr. Duckworth joins us on the show today. She’s a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She's a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and CEO of the education nonprofit Character Lab.  Hobbies During Quarantine (0:50:34) Right now, many of us are stuck at home practicing social distancing and trying to make sure we get out of this pandemic safe and healthy. At first it was great to catch up on some new movies and shows on Netflix, but if you’re like me, you might be getting bored of watching things. So, for those of us who are burnt out from streaming movies for hours, what are some fun hobbies we can pick up during this outbreak? We’ve invited Elizabeth Segran, author of the upcoming book “ The Rocket Years,” to share her ideas for staying entertained and also to discuss why developing hobbies is such an essential skill at any age! Letters Against Depression (1:04:17) Mental illness is extremely prevalent in our society. About 16 million American adults suffer from clinical depression. An even larger number experience situational depression at some point in their lives. We’re doing better at talking about it now than ever before. But when it gets personal, and we’re the ones experiencing depression, it’s a lot harder to talk about. Sometimes, we just feel alone, like there’s no one that can relate to the pain that we feel. Letters Against Depression is a nonprofit organization that connects people living with depression and mental illness through handwritten letters. Here to tell us all about it is Robert Mason, founder of Letters Against Depression. Spring Cleaning and COVID-19 (1:24:24) Spring cleaning has taken on a whole new meaning this year in the wake of COVID-19. In addition to the typical organizing and tidying up, we are also focusing on the hygiene and cleanliness of our homes. By going the extra mile to make everything sanitary, we can feel confident that our living space is safe and healthy. Here to give us some tips for how we can go about spring cleaning this season is Kait Schulhof. Kait is a cleaning expert and founder of the blog “ A Clean Bee”.