Do you find that most people, whether it’s your kids or your employees, get defensive when you give them feedback? Have you struggled with how to give positive feedback in a way that it will actually be received? If so, then you’re in luck. You’re about to learn a secret technique, not taught in schools, to giving constructive criticism that will actually get you the outcomes you desire.
By learning this technique, you WILL be able to change your kids, significant other, employees, and even crabby old family members in positive ways.
Are you ready to learn the secret technique for giving feedback that actually works and doesn’t burn bridges? For a limited time, unlock the secret with 3 easy payments of… just kidding.
The secret to giving good feedback is called… the hamburger method.
The hamburger method for giving feedback goes like this:
Good
Bad
Good
You were expecting something more profound or difficult? Fortunately, that’s it. The hamburger method means that before giving any constructive criticism, you first say something nice. And after giving any constructive feedback, say something nice again.
Let’s walk through an example, and then explain why it works.
Imagine you have an 8 year old son that’s left a big mess in your kitchen.
If you’re like most parents, when you see the mess you get angry and shout, “Clean up your mess Bobby. I told you before. Come clean this up. You’re such a slob. If you leave it like this again you’re grounded”. Sound familiar?
When children receive this kind of “feedback”, they feel criticized and judged. They often become defensive and negative. Verbal abuse causes adrenaline and other stress compounds to be released in the child’s blood stream and they enter fight or flight mode. Neither party ends up happy or receptive.
But now that you know about the hamburger method, you won’t make that mistake. You’ll say something like this instead: “Hi Bobby. Thanks for the great job getting ready this morning. You’re a great kid. I love you. Could I give you a little feedback? You left a mess in the kitchen. Would you mind cleaning it up, and making sure to leave it clean after every use? It’s important we all do our part to have a nice home. Thanks son. I really appreciate you. You’re a wonderful boy. Thank you for helping.”
That certainly felt like a softer way to handle the situation. Let’s walk through the parts of the hamburger method that make this work.
The Compliment Bun
Whenever you give someone a compliment, they become more soft and receptive to feedback. People want to hear more compliments about themselves so after just one compliment they start to listen. The old saying is true, “flattery gets you everywhere.”
Next time you’re trying to give someone feedback, start by giving a compliment.
If you can’t think of a compliment, then you should definitely NOT jump to the feedback patty. If you can’t see someone through a lens of appreciation, it means you’re looking at them the wrong way. Your perspective is negative and incorrect, and you need to soften up before taking any action. Until you can look at someone through eyes of love and appreciation, do not give negative feedback.
The Feedback Patty
After the first compliment bun, try to make it clear that you’re about to give feedback. If you’re not sure exactly what to say, you can literally just say, “Can I give you some feedback?” This obvious and clear framing helps people become receptive to what you have to say next.
The Context Condiments
After giving the feedback, be sure to explain WHY the child should follow the feedback, how it will benefit them, and why you’re giving it. Don’t just issue a blind command. Explain why it’s a good command.
For example, after asking a child to clean up their mess, you can explain to them that good people clean up after themselves, and you want them to grow up to be a great person, and we are all expected to leave things better than we found them, etc… Explaining why is like putting ketchup on your feedback patty. It makes it go down easier.
The Compliment Bun Again
Don’t forget, hamburgers have two buns. Sometimes feedback is tough to swallow, even when people are receptive. It’s important to wash down feedback with some more appreciation and compliments.
In short, don’t skip the buns.
Bon Appétit
Thanks for reading Smart Parenting Blog. Let us know if the hamburger method works for you – @SmartParentBlog
PS.
If you’re curious, I learned about the hamburger method while taking a course on Emotional Intelligence as a Product Manager at Google, and have been using it for years. Some people online also call it the “sandwich method.” You can learn a lot more by reading the Search Inside Yourself book that roughly matches the course.
Do you want to earn more money for your household? Whether you’re a mom, dad, teenager, or grandparent, you can actually make money online working from home. This article will show you 16 legitimate ways to make money from home, working either part time or full time. We hope you find a great job you’ll enjoy.
1. Website testing
Expected earnings: up to $30 / hour
Companies rely on online user testing to improve their website designs, marketing materials, and user flows. Being a website tester is one of the easiest and most enjoyable ways to earn money from home. All you’ll need is a laptop or desktop computer with a camera and microphone.
UserTesting, one of the most reputable testing services
When you sign up to be a website tester, you’ll go through a brief screening process before each test to determine if you are the target demographic. During the test, you’ll be given a task like “View this website and tell me what you think it does”. Your screen and audio are recorded while you complete the task. Companies will often test new designs and pages they are experimenting with.
Most websites tests last a maximum of 20 minutes and pay you $10 per session. Payments get sent to your PayPal account. You can realistically make several hundred dollars per month on a number of testing sites if you provide good feedback.
You’ll receive emails over time when there are new opportunities to test. You’ll want to act quickly when new testing opportunities arise because these slots fill up quickly.
Sign up for these legitimate User Testing Websites:
TestingTime – an option for international users. Earn up to € 50 per hour.
2. Freelancing
Expected earnings: $20 – $50 per hour
Freelancing means doing small projects for clients, either paid hourly or for specific milestones. Doing freelance work can greatly increase your income. Are you a stay at home mom with an English degree or a someone with excellent writing or copywriting skills?
Reputable sites like Upwork have thousands of employers looking to hire for all kinds of tasks from technology article writing to copywriting to illustration and graphic design. Get paid for every single article you write. Build a great reputation and you can turn this into a full-time job.
Try these great websites for find freelancing gigs:
Expected earnings: $40 / night to board a dog. $20 / walk
Many pet owners need someone to watch their pets while they travel or go to work. Rover.com and DogVacay.com are great sites that will allow you create your profile and set your prices. These services are especially great for stay at home moms who live in a populated area. You can earn money either boarding a dog in your home, or walking a dog. You can potentially earn hundreds of dollars per month.
4. Blogging
Expected returns: highly variable. Earn up to $25 per 1000 page views
While blogging takes a lot of time and effort, once you get the ball rolling, you can drive a lot of passive income for yourself and your family. How it works:
You research keywords that people search for on Google that don’t yet have great content. Try https://ahrefs.com/ for a great keyword research tool.
You buy a domain name and create a blog for it.
You create great content for your target keywords, promote your content on social media, and hustle to create backlinks. Backlinks are links on other blogs back to your site. The more backlinks you have, the more awesome Google thinks your content is.
Google crawls (ie. visits) your site and indexes it. Over time, your content will show up in search results.
Google sends you free traffic.
You monetize it with display ads, affiliate marketing, sponsored posts, and direct selling of digital and physical goods.
Many successful blogs earn tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars per month.
Popular blogging services include:
Blogger: free, owned by Google, but limited customization ability.
WordPress.com: $48 / year for a custom domain, great for newbies but expensive. To monetize your traffic and remove WordPress branding will cost $300 / year.
[RECOMMENDED]Host your own WordPress at Bluehost.com: $3.95 / month, easy setup, and lots of control over your blogs look and feel.
To be successful at blogging, you’ll need to work not just hard, but smart. Stay tuned for more great resources from us on being a successful blogger.
5. Tutoring
Expected earnings: $20 / hour
There’s a large demand in all parts of the world for great tutors. You can teach students at all levels from your home by becoming an online tutor on websites like Chegg Tutors.
6. Become a Virtual Assistant
Expected earnings: $16.50 / hour (median)
Virtual assistants (VAs) do everything from doing internet research to scheduling appointments, checking emails and making travel plans. High-end earners can command $50-$100 an hour. Here’s a list of 10 reputable virtual assistant websites:
Time Etc. – Get paid from $11 to $16 per hour to complete various tasks for clients.
Fancy Hands– This company hires virtual assistants to complete a variety of tasks. Most tasks pay anywhere between $2.50 to $7 per task and go up from there.
Zirtual – Unlike most other services, Zirtual Assistants are full time employees that work from 9AM–6PM each weekday. Starting base pay is $11/hr with opportunities for growth. Zirtual only hires in the US, but includes benefits like medical, dental, and vision insurance.
Lifebushido – This well-known company hires virtual assistants to work from home. You can work from 5 to 20 hours per week from anywhere in the world.
Assistant Match – Earn from $12 – $15 per hour with the potential to make up to $20-$25 per hour with graphic design experience.
Belay Solutions – This company hires executive virtual assistants that work remotely from home to provide assitance to one or two business clients at a time.
Office 88 – Join Office 88 to work as a virtual assistant from home on tasks like web design, graphic design, scheduling, office assistance, or translating/proofreading.
Virtual Office VA – This company hires virtual assistants that seek out real estate leads. You will contact the leads asking for information about the property. Starting pay is $9 to $10 an hour depending on experience. Pay is weekly.
Virtual Gal Friday– Apply as a work from home as a virtual assistant across a variety of task categories.
Upwork This a freelance site where you can also find virtual assistant jobs. Set up a profile, post your abilities, and search for new contracts all form the site. You can offer your services for a fixed hourly price, or for the completion of milestones you agree upon with your client.
7. Examine search engines
Expected earnings: $13.50 / hour
A number of companies will pay you to evaluate search engines by conducting research on predefined search queries, analyzing them, and providing feedback for search engines. 3 reputable search engine evaluation companies are:
Expected earnings: highly variable. Earn 1% – 10% of revenue from products sold
If you already have a blog on something that interests you, turn it into a money maker.
Join an associate network like Amazon Affiliate or Google AdSense, choose products to promote, and advertise them on your content site. Whenever someone reads your blog or article, you get paid.
Rent your things
9. Rent Your Automobile
Expected earnings: Average car owner earns on Turo earn $600 / month
Does your car sit idle for days at a time? Rent it out. Turo, RelayRides and GetAround are great car rental services to check out.
10. Rent your parking space
Expected earnings: highly variable. Boston suburbs earn $2.75 / day, San Francisco earns $18 – $40 / day
If you don’t use your parking spot during your working hours, consider renting it out on Craigslist, or on one of the reputable parking rental websites below.
Just Park (U.K. and U.S.)
Just Park (formerly ParkatmyHouse) allows users to search for a space for any number of hours or days, book the space, and park.
To list your space, first you create a listing with an image and driving instructions if necessary. You can decide whether you want to allow instant bookings or want to manually approve requests. You can also set your availability schedule, plan a payment method and get started.
JustPark adds a 25% service fee on top of the rate you set (by day, week or month). JustPark advertises that the service is still 60% cheaper than on-street parking, with central London spots available for £8 ($12.50) per 24-hour period. Daily spots in San Francisco tend to be in the $18-40 range, while spots in Chicago go for less than $10 per day. Just Park focuses on the U.K., but also offers U.S. options in major metropolitan areas like San Francisco.
SPOT (U.S.)
The SPOT app for iOS offers “parking freedom” in a number of U.S. cities including Los Angeles, Miami, Boston, Chicago, Washington D.C., and San Francisco.
To use it, just upload information about your parking space, a photo, description and your price. Spots go for as low as $2.75 per day in some Boston areas, while more centrally located spots range up to $19 or so for a day. Set your parking spots availability and you’ll be earning extra money from your parking space in no time.
11. Rent Your Clothes Online
Expected earnings: highly variable. Some earn $50 per dress per day
If you have a closet full of clothes that you haven’t worn in a long time, rent them out. Reputable sites for renting your clothes include:
If your clothes don’t fit your lifestyle or body any more, and you can also sell them in a garage sale or online at sites like eBay.
12. Paid Surveys
Expected earnings: Up to $50 / month
There are a large number of websites that will pay for you to complete surveys. Yes, you can actually make money giving your two cents. We recommend trying out these reputable paid survey websites:
If you don’t want to have a garage sale, or you only have a few nice things to sell, consider posting your things on eBay, Craigslist, and Facebook marketplace.
On eBay, sometimes the bidding will help drive up the price on your goods. You may earn more than you expect.
14. Download and install consumer research apps
Expected earning: $50 / year
A lot of companies pay you for installing their apps. Moreover, you get paid for each month the apps are installed on your phone. These apps run in the background and collect data about your shopping habits. A little weird, but it’s free money, and the information is ultimately anonymized. Some of these sites include:
Nielsen Mobile Panel – From the people that run Nielsen TV ratings, the Nielsen mobile app rewards you for using your mobile device. You can earn up to $50 a year.
MobileXpression – Install this app and you’ll be eligible to win prizes each week. You get to play an instant rewards game by participating in market research.
15. Sell Lesson Plans
Expected earnings: highly variable
Have a soft corner for academic study? Sell your lesson plans, especially to new teachers or first-year teachers.
Teachers Pay Teachers is a market of educators, where you can sell and share your teaching resources. Over 300 teachers have become millionaires from the service.
16. Amazon Mechanical Turk
Expected earnings: $2 / hour (median) up to $7.25 / hour (top 4%)
Companies use Amazon Mechanical Turk to get humans to complete tons of microtasks that require human interaction. You can work from home with flexible hours, but your earnings may be lower than from other services above.
Here are some examples of tasks workers have completed:
See if a certain website is suitable for general audiences.
Find a product number from an image.
Rate search results for certain keywords.
See if two products are the same.
Label and categorize different products or images.
Describe the tone of an article.
Translate a paragraph from one language to another.
We hope this list of online jobs for moms, teenagers, and anyone looking to earn extra money was useful for you. Have any other suggestions for smart ways to earn money from home? Reach out to us @SmartParentBlog
Mastering multiplication is a critical milestone for every child, but getting a child to learn 144 new equations can seem daunting. Don’t worry. We’ve collected a great set of resources to make teaching multiplication easy and fun.
Note: Make sure your child has proficiency in addition before attempting to learn multiplication. If they can’t answer “What’s 8 + 8?” from memory quickly, then have them develop addition proficiency first. We recommend using Math Ace 1st Grade for iPad or iPhone.
1. Introduce multiplication as repeated addition
Before students can master multiplication tables, they need a solid understanding of what exactly multiplication is. Teach multiplication by first showing your child this short overview video explaining how multiplication is the same as repeated addition:
2. Fill out a printed multiplication table
A great way for kids to familiarize themselves with multiplication is for them to fill out a printed multiplication table by themselves. If a child is able to step count (going 2, 4, 6, 8, etc..), they can fill in adjacent squares in the table simply by counting.
Show your child how to fill in a few squares, and give them space to fill in the rest. Download a free Multiplication Table PDF here to get started:
Mad Minutes bring lots of excitement to multiplication mastery, but they do require parent or tutor attention. If you’re short on time, skip to #4.
To set up a “Mad Minute”, get out a piece of paper and write 10 different multiplication problems on it. Start with the easiest problems like 1×2. Then set a 1 minute timer with your phone. Tell your child that if they get all of the questions correct within 1 minute they get a treat. Then start the timer and have them answer all of the questions. “Mad Minutes” turn math practice into a game.
An example of a Mad minute for learning 6’s is below.
Watch to see if your child is counting with their fingers or getting hung up on any question. After the minute is over, grade the paper. Copy over any question they got wrong or took a long time on over to the next “Mad Minute” worksheet. Keeping doing “Mad Minutes” until all of the multiplication tables are mastered, which may take a few sittings.
Below is an example of a Mad Minute Annie Gama did with her son to practice “Adding 8’s”. As you can see, you can actually make “Mad Minutes” for addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. The technique is effective for all.
4. Use the Math Ace 3rd Grade App
Math Ace was founded by a parent who got so tired of writing and grading “Mad Minutes” that he actually built an app to do it for him. Now every child can practice Mad Minutes without parent or teacher attention.
Here’s how it works. Download Math Ace 3rd Grade for iPhone or iPad. The app contains… you guessed it: hundreds of one-minute math challenges, covering Common Core math standards. Have your child start with “Multiplying 0, 1, 2, and 3’s”, the first challenge in the list, and work their way down.
Students have one minute to answer as many questions as they can in order to earn a bronze, silver, or gold medal. Gold medals mean the student has proficiency over the skill.
Math Ace automatically adapts the sequence of questions to maximize learning, something paper worksheets can’t do. When students get questions wrong, or get hung up, those questions are repeated at ideal times to improve retention.
Unlike “Mad Minutes”, Math Ace requires no parent supervision. Kids are rewarded for doing math with turns in a jetpack free-play game. The more medals they earn, the higher they can fly into space. Parents can easily track their child’s progress by looking at their list of medals, and setting medal milestones.
Download Math Ace 3rd Grade here, or check out the other Ace Apps if you feel your child needs to improve their addition proficiency first.
We recommend 10 minutes of Math Ace a day for any child who has not yet mastered the Common Core math standards. Math Ace is free for 7 days, and $19.99 for 3 months after that, worth it given the convenience of the tool.
5. Learn shortcuts and multiplication strategies
Help your children develop more intuition around multiplication and reduce how much they need to memorize by watching this great multiplication video covering multiplication strategies:
Sometimes simply curating the best content for our children is better than reinventing the wheel.
6. Practice with Flashcards
Add more variety to your Math Practice with a deck of multiplication flashcards. Each flashcard has a question on one side, and the answer on the other. Grab a good flashcard deck on Amazon for pretty cheap:
Multiplication War is like the classic “War” card game, except each of the 52 cards in the deck has a multiplication problem on it. Your child and a friend can play together, each flipping over cards and solving them. The player with the highest card value wins both cards.
This card game is both fun and motivating, and helps students deepen their understanding and reasoning. Get Math War on Amazon:
If you already have a deck of cards handy, you can also use that instead. Just have each player flip 2 cards and multiply. The highest product keeps all 4 cards. Ace equals 1. Jack equals 10. Queen equals 11. And King equals 12.
We hope the 7 resources above proved useful for teaching multiplication. Let us know how it goes. Follow us on twitter: @SmartParentBlog
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