Screen Time: A Parenting Conundrum

First world parenting problem: Screen time! When I was a kid, my parents were mostly worried that if I sat too close to the TV, I would ruin my eyesight. There wasn’t a lot on to watch and plenty of commercials to inspire moving on to a new activity. But how quickly it changed! Video […]

Sibling Rivalry: Avoid Being the Judge and Jury

The kids are having fun together, laughing and playing. And then, just like that, they are not. Crying and yelling ensues with tattling soon to follow. How these situations are handled can determine how often they occur. Really. Children often escalate a situation in order for a parent to get involved. One child blames, the […]

Bullying

It’s National Bullying Prevention Month. The Oxford dictionary says a bully is a person who uses strength or power to harm or intimidate those who are weaker. As concerned adults, our challenge is to see not just the individual situations, but the whole picture. We all agree that we need to do our best to […]

The Opioid Epidemic: Impact on Our Children

Our kids are at risk. A young brain starts with the basic instinct to seek pleasure and avoid pain. That’s it. If the process of developing executive functions to think through consequences and plan long term is interfered with early on, it is far less likely it is for those executive functions to develop properly. […]