Smart Stuff instills love of learning in students of all ages

By Eva Hofmann

From infancy through adulthood, humans are endowed with an innate desire to learn and can thrive in the right educational setting. Smart Stuff Learning Center & Language Academy, 736 W. 43rd St., provides just such a setting. True to its motto—“let us bring out the Smart Stuff in you”—the facility offers a stimulating, encouraging environment that makes learning fun. 

Open since March 2007, Smart Stuff is co-owned by Michael McNamara and his wife, Carla Longo-McNamara. A former bilingual kindergarten teacher with the Chicago Public School (CPS) system, Longo-McNamara saw the need in the community for a place that offered a positive environment for learners of all ages.

            For starters, the Mommy and Me classes give parents a chance to bond with their 18- to 36-month-olds over stimulating activities designed to help get toddlers socialized and set the stage for a life of learning. Equally important for parents of this age group is the opportunity to network. “There are a lot of parents who don’t work full time outside the home, and they need a place to bring their kids and to connect with other parents,” said Longo-McNamara. 

In fact, Longo-McNamara brings her two-year-old daughter, Cyla Lauren McNamara, to work with her. “I’ve wanted to do this since I was a teenager, but having Cyla inspired me,” said Longo-McNamara. “I started all the planning for Smart Stuff when I was pregnant. I realized there were no places in the neighborhood that offered a parent-tot program.”

When those tots get a little older and are out of diapers, Smart Stuff offers the Smart Tots program. Open to children ages three to five, Smart Tots meets three days a week for 80 minutes. Besides providing the basics, Smart Tots offers preschoolers a chance to interact and express their feelings. “They need a way to develop their attention spans without the TV or other at-home distractions,” said Longo-McNamara. “Kids at this age are balls of energy, but they need to start learning how to focus. If a child can’t sit for 40 minutes, they won’t be able to learn how to read.”

Smart Tots offers the exposure to numbers, letters, and colors that children need at ages three to five. Children also learn about raising their hands and saying things out loud. Also included are numbers, math, science, the alphabet, reading, writing, vocabulary, and listening comprehension. In addition, science units include lessons about farm, city, and forest animals. “We also have a little Spanish program that we incorporate into the lessons,” said Longo-McNamara. 

The Smart Tots curriculum follows CPS’s mandated learning goals to ensure children are prepared for kindergarten and first grade. “This kind of early education really goes a long way,” said Longo-McNamara.

“I teach the Smart Tots class and can really relate to these little ones,” she added. “One of my staff members, Victoria Nowicki, does a lot of the tutoring and is currently working on her master’s degree. She and I have known each other since we were three years old. We were in preschool together, so we look at these children in the Smart Tots program and reminisce about how we were.”

Longo-McNamara told about one of her Smart Tots, who started the program in June. “When she first came in, she did very little speaking, interaction, or expression,” she said. “But now you would never know she was the same girl. She’s communicating and making inferences on stories. That’s a big thing.”

Early childhood education offers a real advantage that can prevent students from falling behind later. Smart Stuff also has a solution for school-aged students who are having problems: one-on-one and small-group tutoring.

            “A lot of kids in both the public schools and the parochial schools are falling behind,” said Longo-McNamara. “They try to catch up but get overwhelmed. The teachers want to help, but they have to deal with overcrowded classrooms.

“Parents are overwhelmed, too,” she continued. “Many of them work all day and then try to help the kids with their homework at night. This leads to tension and arguments, power struggles, and bad feelings between the parents and the children. It’s much easier and more productive when parents bring their kids here to be tutored.”

The response to Smart Stuff from neighborhood parents and students has been extremely positive. The students, at varying levels of ability, have come to know each other and get along well. Longo-McNamara tailors the tutoring programs around each student’s needs. “I’m not in this to get a lot of students,” she said. “I’d rather have a small client base and have students stay with us. We can get to know them and respond as their needs change.”

One second grader in the tutoring program came to Smart Stuff in September. “Even though he was a slow learner, he is such a nice kid,” Longo-McNamara said, noting his classmates at his school were taunting him. “When he came to us he hated school and was getting zeros on his spelling tests,” she continued. “Now he’s getting As. He’s raising his hand in class, and he’s not worried anymore.”

Experiences like that make it all worthwhile for Longo-McNamara. “Parents tell us their kids don’t put up a fight about coming here,” she explained. “They are here every session, and they can’t wait. Just recently, one of the kids told me she wishes she could come here every day.”

            Smart Stuff also offers ACT preparation courses. “We go through it from top to bottom,” said Longo-McNamara. “If there’s any part of the ACT they don’t understand, we tutor them in it.”

It also addresses reading comprehension. “Reading skills are very low right now,” said Longo-McNamara. “If you can’t read, it goes across the board. It affects every subject and affects writing ability."

To address these issues, Longo-McNamara just hired a reading specialist, Jennifer Bowen, who has a master’s degree and teaches at the high school level. “She’s going to be a great asset to our facility,” said Longo-McNamara.

            Smart Stuff also offers is a Spanish language program and will launch a Mandarin Chinese program as a summer class. “The teacher I have works for the Chinese Consulate and has a lot of experience translating,” Longo-McNamara explained. “There are so many different ways to communicate in China, but the Mandarin dialect is the one that is used for business, which is why we chose it.”

The Spanish program is designed to engage children of all ages. Taught one-on-one or in a small-group environment, the curriculum aligns with all national and state standards and includes basics such as reading, writing, and science units.

            Some school-aged learners who come to Smart Stuff are native Spanish speakers, and while there is no specific English program for them, Smart Stuff helps them with regular tutoring and materials for second-language learners.

At age 27, Longo-McNamara is not much older than the learners in her tutoring program, and she thinks that may be one factor in their positive responses. “I’ve been working with kids since I was 17, when I went to the Reading America program at the College of DuPage,” she said. “I knew then that this was what I wanted to do.” 

A lifelong Bridgeport resident, Longo-McNamara has her own success story to tell. “My grandfather owned a grocery store in the neighborhood, so my goal was to be in business by myself,” she said. “He never had an education, and he was adamant about me going to college, but I almost quit high school because it was so hard for me. He died when I was 16, and I remembered the promise I made him that I would go to college, and that’s what got me through.

“Being an almost-dropout and turning things around has helped me understand what kids—especially inner-city kids—are going through,” she continued. “I want all kids to know that they have to make education the number one priority if they want to achieve anything in life.”

To find out more about Smart Stuff, call (773) 475-7615 or (773) 966-7206 or log on to www.smartstuffedu.com.