“I’m sorry honey, but you’re not real yet and so we don’t have to honor your pretend feelings.” On many occasions I have observed adults making very callous and curt comments to children. I’ve seen teachers and parents act out right rude to a child and then turn to extend kindness to an adult. It […]
Tag: parenting
The Purposeful Parent: Homework vs Home Play
Homework, huh, yeah What is it good for? Absolutely nuthin, uh! If you are not familiar with music from the 70’s you may not appreciate this ‘hysterically’ funny reference from Edwin Star’s hit song ‘War.’ For me it provides a perfect opening to an article about the grand myths of that time-sucker of a beast […]
Prevent Blindness Wisconsin: Bring their vision into focus
Imagine trying to solve a math problem in school, but you can’t make out whether the number is a three or an eight on the board. Eighty percent of learning is visual. Unfortunately, most children do not show any signs of vision problems and think the way they see is the way the rest of […]
The Purposeful Parent: Let Whatever You Don’t Want For Your Children Be A Non Issue
This delightful quote comes from best selling author and international speaker Esther Hicks, and it applies to adults as well as children. Let whatever you don’t want in life be a non-issue! How very liberating, right? So very simple and yet so very powerful! When we look at raising our children from this perspective parenting […]
The Purposeful Parent: Less TO & FOR and WITH a Little More!
As I continue to work with groups of parents as well as individuals, I find that many adults are committing to more activities outside of the home. In addition to a full time job, some are also involved in volunteer work, part-time jobs, higher education, and hobbies. All of these extras are fine as long […]
The Purposeful Parent: Hocus Pocus—They Flipped the Focus
Sometimes children and adults use manipulative strategies to avoid responsibility. Today we are introducing one such trick which uses ‘slight of mind’ to quickly switch the focus off of one person and on to another. We refer to this mental magic trick as ‘Flipping the Mirror.’ When a person is confronted with changing a behavior, […]
Purposeful Parent: Psychological Based Myth Busting For Parents #2
Today we present the 2nd myth in the series entitled ‘Psychologically based myth busting for parents!’ Myth #2— Punishment is necessary to make children behave. False. Punishment is quite simply ineffective and counter productive. It can have life-long damaging effects and ironically is often responsible for promoting and creating the very behaviors we hope to avoid […]
The Purposeful Parent: Psychological Myth Busting for Parents
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so. Mark Twain For the next few weeks, the Purposeful Parent will be offering some insight into the inaccuracy of some of the most prevalent long-held beliefs about parenting and discipline — otherwise known as […]
The Purposeful Parent: That Parent in the Mirror
In what ways might I as a parent, be allowing, promoting or creating this situation? I wonder how different my experience as a teacher and parent would have been had I not learned of this dynamic self-reflective question. It was first introduced to me by my mentor, Dr. Frank Alessi, fifteen years ago during a […]
The Purposeful Parent: A Graveyard for Staplers
Teachers, I turn to you for validation— teenagers are destroyers of property! Am I right? Nothing is safe within the teen-zone. Whether in the classroom or the home, anything from a pencil to a couch, anything they can pick up or jump on is open game. If they can break it, smash it, tear it, […]
The Purposeful Parent: Why Don’t You Just Ask Me?
Let’s begin with a fun quiz for Purposeful Parents! In which hand does the statue of liberty hold the torch?On a standard stop light, is green on the top or bottom?On which side of an open book are the even-numbered pages, left or right?In what direction does water drain in your bathroom; clockwise or counterclockwise?Grumpy, […]
Do you seek obedience or commitment from your children?
File photo from Flickr Very often parents come to me with a request for assistance after their child has, in their words, ‘disobeyed’ them. I know what they want from me. Most of those who work with children are forever in search of the same holy grail. They want the consequence of all consequences— the […]
How to honor your children’s thoughts and feelings.
Sitting in the coffee shop is my favorite place to observe parenting at its best and sometimes not so best. I just overheard the following from a caring and loving group as they addressed their two-and 1/2 year-old child. Grandpa: Now you’re not going to cry again when you come with us are you? Grandma: […]
Are you smarter than a 9th grader?
“Are you smarter than a 5th-grader?” I’ve always enjoyed that television show. It’s so amazing to watch those little kiddos spew out information on such a wide variety of subjects. As an educator, I’ve spent quite a bit of time researching cognitive development in children. The average healthy 10 to 11 year old is quite […]
Continued: The grading system receives an ‘F’ for flawed
Continued: The grading system receives an ‘F’ for failure! Lastly, there is something gravely amiss with the conventional grading system, and it doesn’t seem like anyone plans to address it anytime soon. It defies mathematical logic and actually sets our children up to fail. And, it doesn’t take a math degree to figure it out. […]
