Whole Child Development
It’s easy for me to rattle of a list of book recommendations to parents with young kids. For their kids, that is. Books for grown ups take me a bit longer to get through! To be quite honest, I really enjoy reading, and because of that, I’ve looked at it for too long as a privilege. A leisure activity. Something to do when I get all my work done. (Like that ever happens!)
This is our favorite version of the summer slide!
If you haven’t already seen the catch phrase everywhere lately, you soon will. From the headlines and pin titles, it appears people are working to avoid “summer slide” like it was the next pandemic. So what are the facts about the summer slide and what’s the best approach for you and your school age kids? [Read more…]
It’s graduation season. Odds are fair that, whether it was a preschool graduation or a elementary school promotion or the long and arduous university or high school ceremony, you’ve seen a bit of pomp and circumstance during this past month or so.
Father’s Day is Sunday. Are you ready? My boys and I picked up my husband’s present yesterday afternoon and before dinner they had each dropped enough hints that we finally decided to enjoy the gift giving portion of the holiday a little early!
Advice is never hard to find. Good advice? Well, that may take a little more looking.
Consider, for example, the many suggestions to simply “live in the here and now” and to “do what makes YOU happy”. There are certainly times and circumstances when these little gems are just what the doctor ordered. But as pervasive, overriding guiding principles, we may be well on our way to missing the mark.
For as much wisdom as there is in the zen-like suggestion to live in the moment, there is something powerful — and necessary — in teaching our children to see beyond that. The term used in academic literature to describe this ability to imagine and value life beyond the hear and now is future orientation. In one study, the review of data from 850 at-risk teens showed a direct correlation between positive future orientation and lower levels of violence in the teenage years. [Read more…]
No one wants to be accused of raising a spoiled brat, but gratitude doesn’t usually come naturally. So this months’ question asks, how do we get our kids to feel gratitude and show good manners?
When my husband and I were dating and newly married, we made a lot of camping trips to the national parks near our home. I clearly remember one day, while hiking in the Narrows we passed a family hiking, the husband with a toddler in a backpack carrier. We looked and each other and said we’d be that family.
Then we had kids.
I’m sharing a little sneak peak into my newest ebook, Positive Parenting: The Basics.
I often write about the importance of giving children choices. They are struggling with a need to feel powerful in a world that often makes them feel powerless. Being able to take control and make their own choices gives them that powerful feeling, meaning they feel less compelled to seek out power in negative ways like tantrums or fighting.
Children also need to be offered choices to give them practice making decisions and experience handling consequences as life skills. Giving children choices is important. But it is also important to recognize that as adults, we need to be clear in setting the boundaries for those choices. [Read more…]
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