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Help Your Toddler Share

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SharingRaising a toddler can be tough and challenging at times. If you have a toddler, I am sure you have heard the phrase “That’s mine”, quite often. Your toddler is not out of the normal, this is just a part of growing up. Even the most reasonable and well behaved toddlers will not want to share certain things of theirs.

Don’t be embarrassed when your friends come over with their children and your child doesn’t want to share. I am sure they have dealt with the same situation with their children more than once. Don’t blame yourself either for your child’s behavior. Simply take comfort with the fact that this is a part of your toddler’s development and they are on their way to growing up and moving to the next stage of life.

While this might be stressful to you, there are a few tips to help you with the situation:

Use The Distraction Method – With this method, you will distract your child with another toy. Or you can ask your child to come do something with you. You could ask them to help you clean something, play outside, etc., without making a big deal about sharing their toy.

Use The Walk Away Method – If your child is playing with someone else’s toy and refuses to give it up, pick up your child and walk away. This might cause your child to act out, but explain to them that the toy is not theirs. Take your child to a quiet corner and let them calm down. Explain to them that the toy is important to the other child, just like they have things that they don’t like sharing.

Use The Nip It In The Bud Method – When you have toddlers playing together, be sure to keep an eye and an ear out. As soon as you see or hear a bad situation about to happen, get in between them and break it up. Show your child something else they can do or play with to distract them. This will save some tears for your child before it happens. This is also something you will want to do if your child is playing nicely and the other child is picking on your little one. The last thing you want is two upset children.

If your child is playing nicely and another child is trying to take her things then distract that child. Find something similar or a close replacement to what your child has and offer it to them. Tell them how great it is, of course, but don’t overdo it or you’ll have two toddlers fighting over this new toy.
As your toddler grows, it will also grow out of this stage. This is when your child most likely won’t mind sharing and will enjoy the company of another child. Always be up front with your child and let him / her know what is going on. Let your kid know what is right and wrong. Distraction can be a big help when raising a toddler.

Image Source: [google.co.in]

 

Help For the Temper Tantrums

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temper tantrumFor those of you that have raised children you know that times can be tough when it comes to raising a toddler. Toddlers are full of energy and emotions. Dealing with toddlers can be tough especially when you are in public and your little one starts to throw a tantrum. A tantrum is not the sign of having a bad kid, but a way that they cope with their feelings and emotions. The best thing to do in this situation is to try to calm down your child before it gets out of hand. There are a few ways to help your toddler when he or she is acting up. Remember, this is an important stage of their life and they need you to help them learn to grow.

One of the first things you might do when a tantrum starts to arise is to ignore their behaviour. Sometimes ignoring them may seem impossible, especially if you are not at home. This seems to be a very effective way to stop these toddlers in their tracks. If you are at home, leave the room or move to another room. Your child will then see that what he / she is doing is not working and may stop. If your child is one that has a habit of breaking things or trying to inflict hurt on itself, be sure to keep an eye but do not let the child know you are watching. You will want to make sure your child is safe as it goes through this. If ignoring the problem doesn’t work you can try talking to the little one and explain how you feel about the way he /she is acting. You may think it is silly expressing your feelings to a toddler but it will help them express their feelings to you later in time.

You might also try to imitate your child. This could cause the tantrum to stop or it could make it worse. Doing this has been effective in distracting children enough to stop the tantrum in its tracks. If they throw themselves on the floor, do the same. They might just stop their tantrum and start laughing at you. They might think what you are doing looks silly and they may just stop doing it.

If your child acts up in a public place, be quick and try to take him / her to some place quiet. Tantrums can be very stressful in public and also can be embarrassing to some. Try to stay calm and let your child know that you are not ok with what is happening. Let your child know if he / she continue to act this way in front of everyone that certain privileges will be taken away. If the tantrum does not stop, it may be best just to take your child home and let them get the rest they need. It is okay to feel embarrassed or mad. Try different methods with your child and see which one works best. Remember that they are only a toddler once and they will eventually grow out of this stage.

Image Source: [google.co.in]

Fun With Fingerpaint

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Fingerpaint

When my child was a toddler, I remember her spending some of the most satisfying time with finger painting. It was the one time, when she would sit still for more than 40 seconds. And what’s more, she didn’t need me to be there for those few minutes at all.

Finger painting has been around for centuries, but its developmental effects on young children and toddlers were discovered only later. Without getting into too much detail about the research itself, I’ve found out a lot about how finger painting can benefit children right from the age of one. Today at ten years old, my daughter still finds self expression through painting.

 

Here are some of the most important benefits of finger painting that will give you every excuse to start your child on it.

 

  • The best thing about finger painting is the fact that the whole focus is on enjoying the process father than the end product, an important life lesson in itself.
  • Preschoolers learn about the world through their five senses of taste, smell, touch, hearing and sight. Finger painting allows them to use all five senses (provided you are using edible finger paint)
  • It promotes creativity, imagination and self expression.
  • It gives lots of opportunity to young tots to practice their hand eye coordination.
  • Older tots learn about color mixing and exploration.
  • It promotes sensory development.
  • Sometimes children express their emotions through painting.
  • Finger painting is easy for toddlers who can’t wield a brush or a crayon.
  • It makes a great activity for a bunch of toddlers painting simultaneously.
  • The art work can be displayed for years to come, remind you and the child of the happy time spent together.
  • The messier it is the more fun!

 

Making Edible Finger Paint at Home

I could never quite trust store bought paint for the fear of toxins and chemicals. There is a simple recipe I use for making edible finger paint at home.

Yellow: Mix turmeric in one cup of water and boil it till it reduces in half of its quantity. Add sugar to taste and store in an airtight container.

Red: Peel a beet and cut into small pieces. Add 100 mils water to it and pressure cook it till the beet is tender. Once done, strain the colored water and mix in the sugar! And Viola edible red finger paint.

Green: Quite similar to the recipe above, all you need is some spinach leaves pressure cooked in very little water. Once done, strain the water in a container and store it in fridge.

Image Source: [google.co.in]

Teach your Child to be Thankful

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In today’s world, one thing that is most difficult to be found is ‘satisfaction’.  We human beings never think, feel or say that what we have is quite a bit. Rather we fail to enjoy what we have, in search of what we don’t have. It is good to be ambitious and aspiring. But at the same time, if we fail to see what we have got and focus only on the glass that is half empty, then we would never be able to taste ‘happiness’.

How many times in a day do we actually thank the Almighty for what He has given us? Do we ever thank Him for the simplest things which we take for granted like getting a parking place easily, getting a green signal at the road which is generally jammed, for getting ample supply of water, for electricity without which our urban life would come to a standstill, for getting the hot delicious food on the table every day, for the light and warmth of the sun, and so on….The list is endless, if we actually open our eyes to see the same.

We seem to be so occupied and stressed in focusing on what we don’t possess, that we fail to derive pleasures in the simplest things, the absence of which would make our life miserable.

This attitude of ours reflects in our children, because they have more or less the same vision as ours. We teach our children how to look at the world, knowingly or unknowingly.

Quite often our children crib and complain about the toys that they don’t have, about their dress that is less trendy than their friend’s dress, about the luxury car that their neighbour’s son drives, in front of their so-called ‘ordinary’ one. For them too, the list is endless and we as parents, feel that inspite of doing so much, we cannot satisfy them. It is because we never imbibed in them, the magic of gratitude. Teach them to be thankful for everything that they have or are getting in their life. But before doing so, remember the old saying, ‘Practice before you preach’, and see the enchantment in your and your children’s life. They will always be thankful to you for the rest of their life…..

Re-published with permission from the blog of ParentEdge, a bi-monthly parenting magazine that aims to expose parents to global trends in learning and partner with them in the intellectual enrichment of their children. This blog was written by Raina Bajaj, who has worked in the education sector for many years now. Working with children in their formative years has given her insight into in understanding children’s needs, aspirations, desires and psychology.

Image courtesy: Google Images

Daily Chores Help Children Learn To Share Household Work And Take Up Responsibilities

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KidsandResponsibilty

If you want to teach the right behavior to your children as part of your behavior management plan, you must identify and ensure that your children have some chores to do on a regular basis. This is because chores make children understand that they need to share the household work as a member of the family along with others. Making your children carry out some specific chores every day is also helpful in teaching them the importance of taking up responsibilities.
Children who do their daily chores with a lot of discipline learn as to how they can become responsible adults. Most adults are required to do several chores on a day to day basis in order to take care of the responsibilities they have. It is, therefore absolutely essential that children learn to do some of the chores at a young age so that they will not experience any difficulties when they have to take up more responsibilities as they grow up and become adults. Actually, children as old as 4 years can be given daily chores to do and you can add on more complex chores as and when grow older.
Chores That Can Be Given To Preschoolers
If you have preschool children, you can always give them simple chores that require them to pick up and keep things back in their respective places after they finish using them. To give you an example, the chores that you ask your preschool children to do include picking up toys and keeping them back in their proper places after their playtime each and every day. Preschoolers can also start to learn as to how they can pick up their room so that it remains tidy and how to put the dishes away after they finish eating a meal. If you teach as well as show them how to do these chores, they will learn to take up the responsibility for the messes that they themselves create.
It has been observed that young children respond better if you make use of a sticker chart to help them remember to do the daily chores that they are expected to do. This is because preschoolers generally would not have developed the capability to read. Therefore, it is a better idea to use a chart with pictures stuck on it to remind them about chores they are supposed to do. As and when they complete a chore, you can present a sticker to your child. Young children can be motivated to do their chores by giving stickers as incentives. However, you may have to provide better rewards in order to motivate older children to do their chores.
Chores That Can Be Give To School-going Children
As children grow up and start going to school, the complexity of the chores that they have to do need to increase and they should be trained to take up more responsibilities as well. The children of school-going age should be encouraged to continue doing the chore of keeping things back in their proper places as they were trained to do as preschoolers. This concept is best explained with the help of an example. You can teach your children to keep their backpacks and shoes at the places allotted for keeping them when they return home from their schools.
You can give new or additional chores your children who have already started going to school. For example, you can ask them to take care of one of the pets that you have at home. It is a great way to train them to take up more responsibilities.
As you start giving your children more complex chores to do, it is absolutely important on your part to teach and equip them to effectively complete their jobs. As an example, if you expect your child to put away his/her clothes, you should tell him/her as to where the clothes have to be kept. Moreover, you should also discuss with them as to what your expectations are so that they can do the job well. Finally, you should remember to praise them whenever they put in the effort and encourage them to continue to do the chore. However, you must never expect them to be perfect in doing their daily chores.

How You Can Help Children With Aggression

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Pulling Hair! Hitting! Biting! It’s even possible that your child showed a fit of rage and lashed out or even hurt someone. Your child may have been bothered by some other aggressive child. If you’ve experienced these issues or situations, you’ve finally joined the crowd. Almost every parent struggles with helping and understanding the child when he hurts someone else. Most parents don’t even understand the underlying cause when their children are hit by others.

It can be a big shock when your sweet son or daughter suddenly throws something at someone or bites a new baby in the family. If you’re worried and need some help, you can learn a lot with the following guiding principles for relieving your child’s aggression. This will allow you to enjoy and relax with his siblings and friends.

 Helping Your Child Relieve Aggression 

 First of all, it is very important for you to understand that children never want to attack others. Most children just want to have some fun, feel loved and focus on their safety. Almost every child plays well when he feels connected. However, in some situations, children may completely lose their sense of connection. This can make them feel frightened, isolated or tensed.

When this happens, children may experience an emotional emergency, and lash out at other children or even adults. It is important to understand that children never intend to be cunning or mean. Most of the time, a child does not have any control over acts of aggression.

When a child feels safe enough to show his feelings, he would never hurt anyone intentionally. Children always feel a special bond with their caregiver or parents. Thus, when they feel attacked, they run to the nearest dear and loved one for attention and help. Most children start crying and try to release the knot of grief and fear they strongly feel. The person who listens to the child fall apart can give the perfect gift of love and care to allow him to heal from certain feelings which could be making life harder. When a child does not feel safe anymore, he may signal for help by relieving aggression in some form.

 Reasons for Being Aggressive 

A child who lashes out just feels sad, alone and frightened. However, this child does not look very frightened when he’s about to push, hit or bite. But his fears are always the underlying problem. His feelings are controlling his every action. Fear and threat robs a little child of his ability to feel that he also cares about others.

In such a situation, a child’s trusting nature is always crusted with a lot of different feelings. A child may be thinking that no one understands him or cares about him. If you pay some close attention, you will realize that such a feeling can easily drain a child’s face of sparkle and flexibility in the few seconds before he lashes out at someone.

 A child may experience these feelings of isolation. It won’t matter how close and loving the child’s parents are at other times. They will have to be considerate in this particular situation. There are even some children who are just occasionally aggressive and frightened. Other children feel a constant abiding sense of desperation and fear which comes from specific circumstances beyond any individual’s control. A lot of children acquire different kinds of fears and threats from medical treatments, difficult birth, unhappiness around them, family tensions and absence of loved ones from their lives. According to most psychologists, even a short period of frightening time in a child’s past can easily create hard feelings and aggression.

Caregivers and parents need to understand that they have tremendous power to help an aggressive child. It is also important to understand that a child’s aggression can’t ever be erased by simple enforcing your logical reasoning, punishments, timeouts or other such acts.

Similarly, some unnecessary incentives to control behavior may create intense feelings within your child’s heart. The underlying problem is the lack of connection a child feels with his loved ones. When you’re able to help a child see this connection, he will feel safe and secure. This will allow him to discuss his issues with you rather than just lashing out. Being considerate is the best way to help children with aggression.

Work life balance for a working mom

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Work life balance

 

Perhaps the greatest challenge for a working mom is finding that elusive balance between work and home. Where exactly does work end and home life begin? Should you allow your family time to be compromised by last minute urgent work? Do you even have that choice?

In one of our earlier articles we had spoken about the predicament of an Indian working woman. She is a wife, a mother, a daughter and a sister, but the fact that she has a career too is just incidental. It shouldn’t interfere with her domestic life. That’s the general idea that her family has. Or sometimes even she could think the same. And this could make matters worse because she will frequently find herself in a situation where she doesn’t like her job but has to do it in order to support her family.

Today we impart some pearls of wisdom to all you mothers out there who want to have a perfect work and home balance. You can’t literally have it all. But baby steps will surely see you a long way through.

The first step is to acknowledge the fact that you will always be playing multiple roles. Acceptance is the key to a happy time taking all those responsibilities through.

There will be role models that you would want to follow. Women who have seemingly managed to master it all. But refrain from doing that. Your situation can never be compared to another.

It is in a woman’s nature to look for guidance and acceptance from friends, family and society. Indian culture allows for family to be around for help. Accept help whenever needed. Invest in a day-care without any pangs of guilt tugging at your heart. You are doing your best, always remember that.

Spending at least an hour of gadget free time with your child everyday has shown to make the bond stronger. When you are home, be there physically, as well as mentally. It is easy to let your mind wander to unfinished business, but training yourself not to go down that road will help you in the long run.

And lastly, listen to your inner voice. Your natural maternal instincts will always help you make the right decision for your family.

Do things that make you happy, and do it with your family too. But keep some time aside just for you. Doing things that you loved doing before domesticity set in will make you relaxed and happy.

 

 

Potty Training: Success Now, but Where to go Next?

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Having kids is certainly rewarding and a great experience, but it’s also extremely confusing! I find myself reaching to my blog or parent community websites more often than not, just to find advice from other parents who are asking the same questions or going through the same experience as me. Okay it does sound a little weird to get advice from complete strangers online, but it has actually helped me quite a bit. This is especially true after dealing with many of my friends (a lot of them without kids), who would tell me just to “not worry about it” when I asked them about how long my daughter should have her pacifier or wear diapers to bed at night.

Well, I know my daughter isn’t going to be going to college with her binky and a Pull-Up, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be worrying about these things right now! My little one is 3 and a half, and the potty issue has been difficult to say the least. She really has a hard time sleeping through the night, and that’s why I ALWAYS put a diaper on her at night. I don’t think that she is too old for these yet, and I only use them when she goes to bed at night. This means she’s going to day care and taking naps throughout the day without the diaper, and so far it’s been smooth sailing with no accidents.

Right now my biggest surprise is that my daughter wants to sleep through the night without a diaper and with regular underwear. Yes, she actually asked me if she could wear her big girl underwear to bed! I think it’s absolutely fantastic she wants to feel like a “grown up”, and I’ve been trying to find the right time to get started with diaper-free overnights. Before I couldn’t do it because I was going out of town and trying to get on a potty system would have been difficult. Plus, she didn’t express the want to not have them, so I just waited. I am worried that there are going to be a lot of accidents resulting in my washing machine running 24/7 (I should probably stock up on additional bed sheets), but it’s still exciting nonetheless.

Update

Have you been waiting to hear what happened? Maybe not, but I’m going to tell you anyways! Hey, if you have kids then this advice just might come in handy in the near future. The first couple of days went pretty much as I expected, and she ended up having a couple of accidents. I ended up putting her back into diapers after that, because she actually asked me to. I figured that I should start putting more effort into this now, so I ended up keeping those diapers on and waking her up a couple of times every night to go to the bathroom. Was I exhausted? YES!

Okay, I am still exhausted from doing this for TWO WEEKS, but it was definitely worth it. Guess what? She hasn’t had an accident since those first couple of nights, and although I miss sleeping through the night, things are going fairly smoothly. I’m actually surprised things have gone so well, and hope that it will continue like this for at least a week or two more until I can transition her into self-bathroom trips. After all, I’m really only being an alarm clock, and that is getting tiring.

My question for other parents out there (please help me out here, for my sanity) is: what should I do next? I’ve been scouring other parent blogs, and they say that waking the child up throughout the night results in bad habits. Well, I guess I’m already in too deep to care about that, but I don’t know what to do next. When will she start to wake herself up to go to the bathroom, so I can sleep and enjoy actually finishing a dream or too? Or should I continue doing this for the next couple of weeks and make it a month total?

Anyone who can offer insight, please help me out! I am interested in hearing opinions, experiences and basically anything else that will give me a smidge of assistance. Oh, and PLEASE don’t tell me “not to worry about it”, because I’ve heard enough of that from my friends!

Is your child sleeping enough?

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25th Mar

When I wrote my article on ‘how to boost your child’s immunity’ for the September issue of ParentEdge, I was surprised at the number of health care professionals talking about adequate sleep, not just during illness but otherwise as well. Also routine for meals and sleep time was stressed a lot.  In the past few months I came across a few articles in ‘The Hindu’  — ‘we sleep to clean our brains’ , ‘sleep deprived teenagers may be at risk of long term damage to the wiring of the brain’.  To add to my growing concern and curiosity, recently a friend gave me a book on parenting (Nurture Shock, Bronson and Merryman) which has a chapter titled the ‘The Lost Hour’. That’s when I decided I really need to blog on ‘sleep’ because as parents, many of us may not be giving ‘sleep’ the attention it actually deserves!

Highlights from this enlightening chapter – ‘the lost hour’

There is research to show that around the world children are getting an hour less to sleep than what they got thirty years ago! Well it may seem rather inconsequential but apparently this is affecting IQ points, causing moodiness, depression, and also in some cases fuelling ADHD and binge eating! Things that we definitely cannot ignore!

Of course we all are aware of what is fuelling this lost hour – televisions (24/7 and hundreds of channels), computer time, and mobiles in bedrooms and of course academic pressure in schools is as taxing or worse! Now sleep scientists are saying inadequate sleep could cause permanent damage as a child’s brain continues to develop till the age of 21 and much of the work happens when the child is asleep!

In an interesting study done with 4th and 6th graders where children got instructions to go to bed earlier or later by 30 minutes for three days, results on standard computerised test used to rate a child’s performance and ability to maintain attention in class, showed that losing one hour of sleep is equivalent to losing 2 years of cognitive maturation i.e. the sixth graders performed like fourth graders! Other studies are finding similar results and even late weekend bedtimes for preschoolers can affect standard IQ test results by 7 points.  So there seems to be a correlation between sleep and school performance!

So what is happening actually?

When children do not get sufficient sleep, they are tired, the neurons, lose their plasticity and ability to form new connections required to encrypt memory. So this could mean –difficulty in improving vocabulary, memorising tables, history dates ..!

The brain needs a constant supply of glucose to function and with sleep loss, the body’s ability to obtain glucose from the blood gets affected. This in turn hampers the functioning of the frontal part of the brain which is responsible for ‘executive function’. So tired children have difficulty in studying and probably find tasks like watching television or playing mindless games easier!

The sleep pattern for children is different from adults – children spend 40% of their sleep time in deep slumber without dreams and during this stage their brains are shifting what they have learnt during the day to efficient storage regions! Actually the more they learn during the day, the more they need to sleep at night!!

Another interesting finding is that positive memories get processed in the deep slumber stage, so lack of it means a child will retain/remember more of the bad memories than the nice ones :(

Finally there is a link between sleep deprivation and obesity. This happens as hunger stimulating hormones are activated more than the one that suppress appetite. Also there is an increase in the level of stress hormone, which is known to stimulate fat accumulation. Hormones required for breaking down fat are secreted in the beginning of sleep and if sleep is disrupted the process does not work!

Clearly SLEEP MATTERS especially for children! We may be trying to address concerns in all other areas but ignoring this important need! So don’t try to add one more activity that you think might help your child –get her to bed early you may do her brain a favour!

——————–

So how much is enough?

3-6 year olds need 10-12 hours of sleep, children in the age group of 7–12 years need 10- 11 hours and 12-18 year olds need 8-9 hours of sleep.

ZZZZ………………

Re-published with permission from the blog of ParentEdge, a bi-monthly parenting magazine that aims to expose parents to global trends in learning and partner with them in the intellectual enrichment of their children. This blog was written by Meera Srinivasan, health and nutrition specialist on the ParentEdge editorial panel.

How to Raise Entrepreneurial Kids

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Bril blog 6

It always begins as a childish dream, our secret ambitions usually remain secret, never to see the light of the day. Very lucky few get to transform their dream into a reality. Most likely, they had a little help at hand, starting from early childhood. Which is why, to raise entrepreneurial kids, you have to catch them young.

Let us take a look at what are the common characteristics of a successful entrepreneur:

Taking calculated risks
Leaving the fear of failure behind
Great problem solving skills
Innovation; thinking out of the box
A great grasping power
A knack for financial management

When we look at the list above, all characteristics can be nurtured in a child from as early as toddler years. So, the first step to raising entrepreneurial kids is to start early.

“Breaking rules, not in my house!” If you are constantly reminding your child to follow rules then also bear in mind that too many rules can hamper your child’s creativity. While some rules are important to ensure your child’s safety, constantly imposing rules is not going to nurture entrepreneurial skills.

Letting children make their own mistakes and learn from them. Swooping in to correct your child’s mistake will only make them depend more on you in future. Letting children struggle with problems will develop their problem solving skills.

Children learn from observation. They have a knack for thinking out of the box because their mind is not compartmentalised like this of adults. They can think beyond the obvious and are really creative. As a parent, you should encourage your child even when he/she makes stupid suggestions or tries doing something in a way that is not conventional.

As soon as children start third grade, you can start explaining financial management to them. Giving small sums of money will make them realise the importance of saving and the joys of spending. Whatever they decide, they are learning an important life lesson.

Above all, respect your child and encourage honesty, integrity, resilience and vision in children. These attributes cannot be taught but can only be nurtured.

True entrepreneurship is achieved only when a child’s vision is transformed into a commercial project. There are many young entrepreneurs these days. Even child entrepreneurs are making new internationally. If you think your child has entrepreneurship capabilities, do make sure you give it the right exposure.