Parents often concentrate on whether their kids can get the right answers when considering if a child is ready for school and learning at home. However, experts in early education usually point out that the act of questioning is a valuable learning skill in itself. When a child voices a thought, asks the reason for…
Weeknight dinners are usually more stressful for families than people realize. Mum or Dad might still be dealing with work, the kids are likely tired and wanting food, there’s probably homework left to do, and everyone is often emotionally exhausted by the time you get to the table. And, in lots of families, the problem…
Adults frequently ask kids to be patient, but experts in how children grow say patience isn’t something that’s just there. It builds up over time. A little kid who can’t wait, frequently speaks before they should, or gets upset if they don’t get what they want immediately isn’t necessarily a bad kid. More likely, they’re…
Lots of families start with rules about phones and tablets in the bedroom when they want to improve how much time everyone spends on devices, and those rules can certainly help. However, problems with family and screens usually start much earlier in the day, in the places where people are looking at screens the most….
Parents are often in the position of repeating the same phrases during normal daily life. You need to get shoes on, the toys must be put away, it’s time for homework, or everyone has to be out of the door. While these lots of repeats seem essential at the time, people who specialize in how…
Families tend to load a lot of feeling onto important occasions. We often think of holidays, vacations, birthday parties, and special plans as the things our kids will remember forever. And while these things are good, experts on family relationships say that doing something over and over actually builds a different type of value. A…
Lots of parents would like to help their kids learn at home, but are nervous about making their children’s lives into one long series of lessons, being told what they did wrong, and feeling stressed. Experts in how children grow and in early learning say that children’s natural desire to know things thrives best when…
People usually think family stress comes from who everyone is, how they’re feeling, or simply not having enough hours in the day, yet family experts who work with daily patterns find that stress also increases when all the things you do regularly aren’t organized. It’s not typically that things are incredibly hard every day for…
People often think of independence as something a child just has at a certain age, but those who study how children grow say it happens over time. Little kids don’t go from needing everything done for them to being sure of themselves all at once. Instead they slowly become more independent by doing things over…
Families run into surprisingly lots of arguments about screens, more than they usually think, and this is particularly true as phones, tablets, and TVs are now a normal part of things at school, for fun, for keeping in touch, and for relaxing. Lots of families aren’t in trouble because they have no rules about screen…