Whether your child is on the autism spectrum, has developmental delays or another diagnosis, these activities are a great way to sneak in skill development while playing. Below are five great activities for some fun on a rainy day, or any day you have to be indoors. Therapi.... read more
Teaching science to preschoolers can sound, at first, off-putting, almost grandiose. Oh, but it's not! It's so fun that it seems almost like cheating to say you're doing it in the guise of opening their little minds to the world around them. Experts tell us that teaching sc.... read more
Laughter is, no doubt, the best benefit of having a happy day. And telling jokes can quickly turn a dull moment into a fun one. Whether at the dinner table, in the car, or just snuggling in bed, we find humor in the every day and in the familiar -- starting with the infamou.... read more
My focus is creativity and how we as parents and caregivers can encourage a fulfilled and creative life in our children as they grow and mature. So, towards that end, I turn to the young child as a social being and how being able to tap into their creativity, which in turn mea.... read more
What is a typical three-year-old's favorite word? Excluding "mama" and his own name, the clear winner has to be the word "why?" Our two-year-olds maddened us with "no," but the threes have moved on to a subtler means of confounding their parents. "Why" at the start of a child'.... read more
"Let's do a puzzle."Sounds kind of quaint, doesn't it? So many myriad other games and entertainments have come along to occupy children that plain old puzzles can seem downright antiquated.And yet, teachers and developmental experts will tell you that there is still noth.... read more
Fall has begun and it's a major transition for the kids. As one mother puts it: Summer can feel so scattershot. Then we expect our kids to jump right back into school-to sit still at school and focus on the task at hand and to come home after school and focus on homework and.... read more
I don't know about you, but thinking about back-to-school -- particularly in the steamy hot days of August -- would make me feel anxious when my children were younger. I was especially anxious about their new teachers. What if my son had teachers who didn't appreciate his pers.... read more
We are now between the two public holidays honoring mothers and fathers. In the last several months, I've been in a number of discussions with various professors of neuroscience and psychology about the role of parents in development. In the entry of this column before today, .... read more
Have you ever read a parenting book and thought, "Crud, I've been doing it all wrong and my kids are irrevocably screwed up now." Or read a description of a kid and thought, "Oh no, this is a problem kid? That could be my kid!" I have, and all I can say about that is ugh. .... read more
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