Difficult conversations | How do we talk about death with our children?
Talking to your children about death can be an act of love. You can't take away their pain with a simple conversation, but you can give them something just as important: truth wrapped in gentleness, the reassurance and relief that they are not alone in their grief, and even the hope that sees beyond the loss.
Preconceptions that cause unnecessary anxiety for parents
Today's mothers are faced with difficult decisions: breastfeeding or formula feeding, having a career or being a stay-at-home parent, modern or traditional education—and silent pressure from the fear that any choice they make is a mistake. This constant doubt weighs more heavily on them than the choices themselves.
Spoiling is not love
Being a parent means, among other things, engaging in agonising negotiations to keep the supermarket aisles relatively quiet and the shopping trolley from overflowing with sweets. Some are successfully concluded. Others, a real failure. Although we are very adept at recognising a spoiled child on the street, we have a much harder time spotting the signs in our own children. After all, what...
Getting your kids to do chores
You wouldn’t think so, but whether or not children do chores is one predictor of their future happiness and success.
Strategies for managing children’s digital behaviour
Parents have a crucial role in managing their children's digital behaviour, as well as preventing and detecting addiction. Their success depends on their own relationship with digital devices.
When your child has a meltdown
Children have big feelings. Even worse, children have big feelings over what seem to be rather inconsequential things.
Single parents and children’s religious education
Is it possible, as single parents, to instil in our children a love for God and for the church?
Do you know your child’s love language?
In 1997, Dr Gary Chapman released the book "The 5 Love Languages of Children" as a follow-up to his bestseller, "The Five Love Languages."
”Think of the children!” Are video games harming us?
As the world went into various lockdowns over the course of last year, people turned to a variety of entertainment forms to cope with...
Managing screen time
Are you tired of feeling guilty for letting your kid play with an iPad or watch a show on Netflix? Perhaps you’re worried about the impact screen time has on them.
What kind of children do our words shape?
"The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice" (Peggy O'Mara).
How to raise confident children
While it can be healthy to be aware of other people’s judgement—we can adjust our behaviour to become more pro-social—sensitivity to the perception of judgement can get out of hand. In worst case scenarios, children can become depressed, anxious and avoid settings in which judgement is anticipated. Here are some strategies to help, as shared by clinical psychologist Katie Kjelsaas.
1…2…3…run to the wall! Freeze! Playful parenting
There was a time when the word parenting would cause me to either roll my eyes or shrug. It was a time when seven hours of sleep a night, instead of at least eight, had the destabilizing potential of a hurricane, a time when the clear voices of children in the park would compel me to grab a book and read under my...
Disciplining children creates distance. True or false?
He is 22 years old and has deep black eyes. He is tall and very confident. Why wouldn’t he be? He is doing satisfactorily in college, works to support himself and makes the most of his free time with his friends.