The goal of most baby music classes is to have parent and child bond through music-making. As parent and child connect using music, babies also enjoy other important benefits. A 2012 study out of McMaster University showed that babies who participated in music classes with their parents in the first year of life “smile more, communicate better and show earlier and more sophisticated brain responses to music.” Through hands-on music classes, infants are exposed to…
Healthy self esteem is one of the most important characteristics of child development. A child’s social, behavioral, and emotional health plays a crucial role in how they handle setbacks, peer pressure, and other challenges throughout life. Positive self esteem is also a factor in mental health, as cultivating confidence contributes to positive social behavior and works as a buffer when your child experiences stress and negative situations. Self esteem basically boils down to how children…
Does your child have difficulty focusing on an activity or seem impulsive in behavior? When symptoms are severe enough and cause ongoing problems in more than one area of your child’s life, it could be a sign of a neurobehavioral disorder, such as ADHD. Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder is a chronic condition that affects millions of children and often continues into adulthood. ADHD includes a combination of persistent problems, such as difficulty sustaining attention, hyperactivity, and impulsive…
The start of the school year brings a new schedule, additional activities, and budding demands on everyone’s time. Forget New Year’s Eve: the start of the school year is when parents often make resolutions to get organized! Getting ready for back to school may cause some stress in your life, but you don’t have to let school send your family life into chaos. Use these back to school organization ideas and tips to handle the…
If you are a parent, you’ve probably lost your temper with your kids and have yelled at them at some point. Parents are only human, after all, and kids can sometimes be really good at pushing our buttons and challenging us with behavior problems such as defiance and backtalk. Yelling and losing our cool, in other words, can sometimes happen. But if yelling is an all-too-frequent occurrence in your home, it may be time for…
Perhaps the only respite pandemic closures brought to to families was freedom from the constant misery of summer colds, complete with all the dripping noses, sneezes, and coughs. And statistics suggest we weren’t the only ones who had fewer colds last year: with daycares and in-person schools closed and widespread use of masks and hand sanitizer in most communities, cases of many seasonal respiratory infections went down, and flu cases dropped off a cliff. That…
The relationship between parent and child is central to building children’s self-motivation and stress tolerance, and how parents respond to kids when they are emotionally distressed can strengthen or strain that relationship. After the release of his bestselling book “The Self-Driven Child,” clinical neuropsychologist William Stixrud got a request: make it even easier for parents to apply the research in the book to motivate teens. So Stixrud and his co-author Ned Johnson wrote “What Do…
In her book “Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence,” Dr. Anna Lembke makes the case for how technology, with its promise of nonstop engagement and flashing lights, can be addictive. And while addiction may make one think of drugs or alcohol, activities like video games, social media apps, and sites like YouTube can also become unhealthy addictions. Lembke, a professor of psychiatry at Stanford University School of Medicine, says child tech addiction…
Families across the world have been troubled by the news and images from Russia’s invasion and the war in Ukraine. When our children turn to us to help them understand scary news, we might feel afraid of saying too much—or not enough—and so avoid a conversation that could be a powerful way to help children learn about themselves and the world. Here’s what a handful of child development experts say about what parents, teachers, and…
2021 featured an unprecedented number of weather disasters in the United States, including a deep freeze in Texas, bouts of scorching temperatures in the normally temperate Pacific Northwest, a continuation of severe wildfires in California, and historic flooding in the New York area from Hurricane Ida. Today’s children are likely to live through more severe weather events; one study estimates children who are currently 6 years old will experience, on average, three times the number…
