Category Archive:
Children’s basic needs

On The Road To Reading

understanding how children learn to read

Car seat manufacturers announced changing their installation instructions because the reading level was too difficult for over half of their customers in the United States. How high was that reading level? A fifth grade level. As a young mother, I had a knot in my stomach when reading this kind of article, along with a […]


Words Can Hurt, Too

Words can hurt too

Name-calling seems to be a juvenile behavior that unfortunately can continue until adulthood. Research shows that name-calling negatively affects our perception of the victim of name-calling. Doesn’t that appear to be valid? Once we hear something negative about a person, true or untrue, we tend to remember that assertion, even though we may know the […]


Stopping Biting

stopping biting

Most biting in young children occurs between the ages of fourteen to thirty-six months.  At this age biting is more connected to oral and language development.  Biting in the four-year-old may be about developmental delays in impulse control, social skills or meeting situational expectations. The younger child learning to speak as well as to control […]


My Amygdala Made Me Do It!

My Amygdala Made Me Do It

Learning to control impulses is an important task for our children, and all of us, to learn. Until our children learn to control urges to hit, kick, punch, pinch, bite, spit, name call and more, we’ll see all those behaviors emerge when life becomes overwhelming. How is self-control established? Let’s look at the young child’s […]


The Night Night Nasties

night night nasties

Bedtime battles. Trying to get our children to sleep when and where we would like appears as one of the top parenting issues time after time. Once we understand the big picture, plan and patiently execute the plan, we’ll be able to get those much needed nights of rest. Seeing the big picture of what […]


Wants Versus Needs

wants vs needs

To live is to consume. The first definition of consume is “to eat, drink or ingest.” Consumption is about taking care of hunger and thirst. The second definition is “to buy.” The third is “to use up.” Modern consuming is more about buying than eating or using things up. Advertising is a huge business to […]


Preventing Tantrums

preventing trantrums

Benjamin Franklin coined the phrase, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure,” in regards to fire prevention. If you’ve ever experienced a full fledged tantrum, you see how this advice might apply to tantrums. What we need is preventative parenting, the art of being able to say “yes” more often while gaining […]


Understanding Core Emotions

understanding core emotions

In her book, Animals Make Us Human, Temple Grandin asks the question: What does an animal need to be happy? Grandin lists five freedoms animals should have when in an intensive animal production situation: Freedom from hunger and thirst Freedom from discomfort Freedom from pain, injury or disease Freedom to express normal behavior Freedom from fear […]


Laugh And The World Laughs With You

laugh and the world laughs with you

Some of the good news about parenting is that you can use your sense of humor. And it may be best if you can learn to look with humor at some of the predicaments you will find yourself. The young child under the age of six years is a literal learner and doesn’t get jokes […]


When We Belong, We’re Important

when we belong we're important

We all need to feel like we belong. And the most important place we need to feel like we belong is in our families. It is from our family relationships that we build relationships within our schools, our churches, our neighborhoods and our communities…and beyond. According to Rudolph Dreikurs and Alfred Adler our children are […]