1. Collecting stamps, coins, and even baseball cards stirs a child's interest in history, and at the same time builds categorizing and organizing skills. He can use a divided shoebox or plastic organizer to sort and store his collection.

2. Give your child reasons to READ. If she is an animal lover, find nature stories; a budding baseball fan, sports biographies; a space fan, science fiction and aeronautics books.

3. Give your child a bag filled with ten to twenty-five of the same household item (toothpicks, popsicle sticks, spools, etc.) and using only these, encourage her to design something.

4. Play "Name That Tune." The first player hums or whistles the first measures of a familiar song, and the other players try to guess what it is. The winner gets to think of and perform the next tune.

5. Make a Memory Tray on which you place six objects, such as a hairbrush, quarter, fork, toy truck, candle, and dog bone. Have your child look at them, studying closely for forty-five to sixty seconds. With the tray removed, he closes his eyes and tries to "see" the objects in his mind's eye and name as many as he can. Subtract or add an object and repeat the game, or ask what is missing or new. Increase the number of objects up to twenty, depending on age.

6. Hang a map of the world on the wall so your child can find the countries and states where news events take place. Use colored tacks to mark these "hot spots in the news" and place small pictures where family, friends, or pen pals live.

7. Have your child make a map of your neighborhood and mark friends' homes, landmarks, and North, South, East, and West directions.

8. Provide a soft, stuffed globe as a throw pillow for your child's bed. As she looks at it or leans on it, she can learn where many countries are.

9. Teach your child to use a compass. Make a treasure map for him by writing simple directions such as, "Go south two steps, east five steps, north ten big steps." At the end of the trail, hide a "treasure", like a certificate good for an ice cream cone or fun activity.

10. Let your child be the navigator on the next family car trip. Give him a yellow highlighter to trace the route you plan to follow. He can circle cities where you plan to stop to spend the night and put a big star on your destination.

11. One night each month serve food from a different culture or country. Have your child locate the country on the globe or world map, and after dinner, read together about it in an encyclopedia.

12. Suggest your child act out a favorite story.