It’s almost back-to-school time in the metro Austin, Texas, area, home to the upscale and pet-friendly Renaissance at North Bend apartment community (not to mention the Congress Avenue Bridge bats!).
But first…..
National Book Lovers Day Is August 9
While there’s no bad day to love a book, you’ll be in good company if you celebrate this particular passion with fellow bibliophiles on National Book Lovers Day Saturday, August 9, 2005. And, yes, all kinds of books count—traditional, audio, manga, ebooks—all of them!
The Renaissance North Bend team asked the * Idea Specialists™ * for some of their thoughts on other ways to mark the occasion. Of course their first suggestion was checking out the Spicewood Springs Branch of the Austin Public Library.
They also reminded us that book clubs are a great way to get to know your neighbors. The clubhouse lounge would be a great place to meet if the group gets big enough, while you might enjoy hosting something smaller in your stylish Renaissance North Bend living room.
Or, maybe you prefer to read with a group but not “with” a group. In that case, you can always read something from a national book club, like the ones of Reese Witherspoon, Jenna Bush Hager, and the reader who started it all—Oprah Winfrey!
Back To School: Pimples, Pencils & Patience
The Idea Specialists™ asked some of the young people in their lives to tell them the most important things teens and their parents need to have as they get ready to go back to school.
First suggestion: A bottle of Mario Badescu Drying Lotion, because for most kids, pimples are just a fact of life at some point. A 1-ounce bottle goes a looooooong way!
Next, a box of BIC ReVolution Xtra Life Mechanical Pencils. Yep, the members of Generation Z still use pencils at a school! “It’s mainly for math,” says one 16-year-old.
Finally? Patience. Patience, patience, patience. Because teens are going through a lot, and it really is hard for them to imagine that the adults in their lives were once young. As Parenting Teens & Tweens puts it, “It’s a tough time for everyone, but it is also a time when your teen really needs you to keep it together. So much of their behavior results from the push and pull they feel between holding onto their childhood while at the same time wanting to move toward adulthood.”
Their guidance, in a nutshell?
- Listen more/talk less.
- Don’t take things too personally.
- Identify specific triggers.
- Set boundaries.
Also, the Center for Parent and Tenn Communication has a good article about helping teens develop patience.
Hey ChatGPT, Do My Homework!
No matter if the kids in your life attend public, private, or parochial school—or if they’re home schooled—chances are they’ve already used some form of what is called “generative AI (artificial intelligence)” to help them with an in-class assignment or their homework. In a nutshell, teens and college students are turning to tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity, as well as Otter.ai for note-taking and Grammarly for writing assistance. (How do we know? We asked Google AI, LOL.)
We also asked Google AI to explain “humanizers” to us, because—according to several teenagers we know—it’s best to use something like ChatGPT along with technology that will make, say, the ChatGPT essay on The Constitution of the United States, sound more like it was written by a human being than a machine. Some examples are QuillBot, Writesonic, , Ahrefs, Prepostseo, and Decopy AI.
The Center for Digital Thriving has some great questions to ask for starting conversations with your kids about AI, including: What kinds of uses do you think should be allowed in school, and, has your school or any of your teachers set any rules about using it?
Communication is key!
* The Idea Specialists™ *
The Idea Specialists™ is a group of design and inspiration professionals with a focus on communications for the luxury apartment home industry, as well as custom lifestyle planning and more.
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