The WM Parenting Connection

By Jennifer Tomasino

Creativity; it’s where these posts have been heading all along.

Creativity is the key to our future, it will allow our children to go, achieve, and build bigger and better things than we have. Think back to the products and inventions that have arrived in the last 20 years. We have the Steve Jobs legacy, the Bill Gates empire, we carry little computers around in our pockets that miraculously receive phonecalls and can send pictures around the world. You can talk to your car and tell it to find pizza. I have a sewing machine that is probably smarter than the white house security system of 50 years ago. Creativity has opened some amazing doors, all because yesterday’s children learned how to think outside of the box and turn some inspired daydreams into reality.

There is a Healthy Children article (from the AAP site- see link below) titled “What Your Children Are NOT Doing When Watching TV.” Some of the things your kids aren’t doing are asking questions, solving problems, being creative… there’s an entire list. When I interviewed the Children’s Librarians (that I mentioned last week) about learning, they cited multiple studies that found young children cannot actually LEARN from the television.

And this is about when parents start getting defensive again. I admit that this topic is one I discuss frequently; whenever I mention that studies have proven little kids don’t learn from TV, I get responses like “That’s wrong- Sesame Street taught my daughter to count” or “My kid learned Spanish from Dora.” Several times I’ve scratched my head at this, thinking, maybe the experts weren’t asking the right kids? Then I found the answer.

Parenting magazine recently printed an excellent article on imagination (Dec/Jan 2012). In this article Rex Jung, Ph.D., a clinical neuropsychologist with the Mind Research Network in Albuquerque, discusses the topic of kids and appearance of learning that takes place from TV programming. He compared little kids to sponges and says “If you’re just a sponge…you may be able to regurgitate facts, but you can’t combine them in novel and useful ways.” Basically, yes, your 2 year old can learn the ABC song from her hourly PBS show, but she just learned a song, she has no idea what the letters are, why they’re important, or what to do with the song. Your child then needs a teacher (and parents are the first teachers) to come along and say “That’s the alphabet. See? Here’s the letter B, it comes after the letter A.” That’s when learning happens, when the little synapses start firing and she puts the puzzle together and goes “AHA.”

Those “AHA moments” are the key to the future; the reason so many parenting experts rave about the importance of unplugged, free play. Free play is when your child learns how the world works, when they use their imagination and creativity. Free play and the skill to let one’s imagination run wild is how someday, one of our kids will discover a way to travel to Saturn, how they’ll invent the next technological breakthrough, how they’ll find a cure for cancer.

That little boy, the one who proclaimed he’s a cowboy/pirate-monkey and tore all the pillows off your couch to build a fort; that little girl who just ran through the kitchen saying she’s an airplane going to the moon- let’s unplug them, give them space to explore, and sit back and watch the amazing things they will discover.


http://www.healthychildren.org/English/news/Pages/Babies-and-Toddlers-Should-Learn-from-Play-Not-Screens.aspx

http://www.healthychildren.org/English/family-life/Media/pages/What-Children-are-NOT-Doing-When-Watching-TV.aspx

Playing Pirate Monkeys- Encouraging Imagination

by Evan Fischer

Every teen approaching the legal age of licensure feels like he or she is responsible enough to drive a car. Just ask; they’ll tell you that they’re ready! Unfortunately for your teens, you’ve been in their shoes and you know better. However, you do want them to turn into independent, competent, and confident adults at some point, and a large part of that in this day and age is the ability to operate a motor vehicle. So even though you’re no doubt worried about what might happen once your teens are behind the wheel without you, it behooves you to find a way to fight through the fear and help them to become the best drivers they can be. And preparations start at home.Certainly you’ll want your teens to take a driving course, but you need to be on call for supplemental lessons. For one thing, you should definitely sit your teens down to talk about some of the rules and responsibilities that go hand-in-hand with driving. The easiest place to start is with the driver’s manual, so take the time to go over it with them and help them to study and learn the rules within. This is the foundation of responsible driving that will stick with them forever and of course, they’ll need to learn it in order to pass their written exams.

Once your teens are well aware of the laws that govern driving you should lay down some rules of your own. Although they may chomp at the bit with all these restrictions, you must keep in mind that you are ultimately accountable for their safety, so limitations are important, at least until they prove that they can handle the responsibility of driving by making good decisions. You might think about setting a curfew, restricting areas that can be driven in, and disallowing highway driving and friends in the car. In many states, there are actually laws pertaining to one or more of these conditions anyway. But you should impose your own rules nonetheless.And you’ll also want to impress upon your teens the risks and responsibilities they’ll face as new drivers. Of course, if you start talking about peer pressure or accident statistics they’ll probably just zone out. Instead, consider showing them one of the many PSAs on YouTube about texting while driving. Some are pretty graphic, so you may want to watch them first before you show them to your kids. But the truth is, those kids in the car could be them; if these ads don’t scare them into compliance, nothing will.

Finally, you need to make teens aware of the financial responsibilities that come with owning and operating a vehicle, and this means making them pay their own way. You don’t necessarily have to send them out hunting for Ford, Toyota, or Hyundai engines for sale, or other spare parts to fix up a junker; you want them to have a car that is in good working order. But that doesn’t mean you have to buy new Beamers for kids that are almost certainly going to have fender-benders or even a more serious accidents during their teenage years (according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, teens age 16-19 are four times more likely than older drivers to get into an accident). So help them to get a car that they can afford (offer to match them) and then make it a condition of driving that they keep up with payments. It’s a good lesson in the rewards of hard work and more than anything else it will help them to value their vehicle and the experience of driving.

Evan Fischer is a freelance writer and part-time student at California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks, California.

Guest Post: How to Prepare Teens for Driving

by Lauren Bailey

It is no new news that sports are a beneficial endeavor for children of all ages. With childhood obesity steadily on the rise, organized sports offer a much needed alternative to the so often inactive lifestyle we lead today. Rather than sitting at computers or television screens after school each day, kids can spend time playing sports, exercising, forging important friendships, and learning valuable life lessons. Organized athletics offers a benefit during childhood that little else can match. While playing sports in general is most certainly a beneficial thing for many growing youth, individual sports offer an even more enriching atmosphere for kids. The values and lessons learned through childhood individual athletics are ones that will influence an individual throughout the remainder of their lives in relationships, academics, the professional world, and more.


Setting Personal Goals
Individual sports like swimming and cross country allow kids to experience a team structure while competing at an individual level. This ability to train as a team, but compete as an individual helps to build a capacity for setting attainable and powerful personal goals. In racing sports such as swimming, yes, you are racing the person in the lane next to you, but more so, you are racing the clock and your own personal best time. This allows for a certain amount of overall ownership of your hard work. You train to improve for the sake of your team, sure, but, more so, you train for your own sake. While team building and learning to work with a group is important, establishing personal goals and meeting them is endlessly valuable for youth. Setting personal goals can be a hugely difficult task. There is the issue of setting goals to grand to accomplish reasonably or too easy to create real effort. Individual sports help teach kids how to set goals that are worthwhile and productive.


Managing Personal Disappointment
Now, with goal setting comes inevitable disappointment at times. Part of maturing is learning how to cope with disappointment—and there is no disappointment greater than personal disappointment. In this way, individual sports teach a valuable lesson in perseverance. Kids will not be able to reach every goal they set out to accomplish. A young swimmer may never get that goal time they strive for in every race. Meeting this realization head on is no doubt devastating, but nonetheless an important lesson. Learning to manage personal disappoint in a productive manner is something that comes with maturity. Individual sports are all about personal triumphs and personal letdowns.


Finding Self-Motivation
Self-motivation is one of the most essential traits for success in life. This trait is found through hard work and perseverance and can be achieved in both team and individual sports. However, with individual sports, kids are pushed even hard to find the self-motivation and self-initiative to improve. Team sports are great because they allow for a communal effort towards some goal. With individual sports, while you have your teams support, the responsibility to put the work and effort in is on you in the end. Finding the motivation within yourself to strive for your athletic goals will only help you find that same motivation for other endeavors in your life.

This guest post is contributed by Lauren Bailey, who regularly writes for
accredited online colleges. She welcomes your comments at her email Id: blauren99@gmail.com.

Guest Post:The Endless Benefits of Individual Sports for Young Kids

Children today are digital natives. They have grown up with technology. It is a part of every aspect of their lives, and they have never known a world without technology. In fact, most children today know how to use technology better than many adults. Your toddler may be able to breeze quickly through an iPad to pull up his favorite videos on YouTube while you still aren't sure how to turn it on. Your tween daughter may be able to text faster than you can type. They may both know about sites you have never even heard of. Learning how to bridge this technology gap between you and your children can help you to better understand their world so that you can talk to them about appropriate use. They might also be able to teach you a thing or two about how to use technology. Here's how you can learn from your children to help close the gap between you:

Have an Open Mind

You may be more hip about technology than your parents were, but with technology always changing, there is likely a lot you still have to learn. Some aspects of technology may even intimidate you, as it could seem too complex to understand or you aren't sure where to begin trying to learn it. Don't allow these feelings to prevent you from trying new technology or learning new things. Keep an open mind, and you will open yourself up to learning.

Watch Your Children

If you aren't sure how to use a piece of technology, take a back seat and watch your children as they use it. Take note of how they navigate that tablet. Watch what they do to use their iPods and their cell phones. Take note of what cords they plug in to upload pictures to their laptops. Even more important, watch how they figure out how to do something when they are doing it for the first time. Digital natives are often able to figure out how to use any piece of technology, even if they have not used anything like it in the past. Take cues from your children about how they figure out the different gadgets.

Engage with Your Children

One of the best ways to learn about new technology quickly is to interact with your children while they are using it. Join them the next time they play a video game. Choose some songs on their iPod the next time you are listening to music together. Take charge of the remote control when you hook up the Internet TV to watch a movie. Let them guide you while you are interacting together. When they are surfing the Web, ask them about the Web sites they frequent and the types of activities they enjoy online. You will learn about current trends and better understand the lives your children lead online.

Ask for Help

Even the most observant and interactive students can still have questions. When you are still stumped by a piece of technology, ask your children for help. You will get the information you need, and you will help them to feel empowered by being able to help you. Not only will you gain new skills, but you will also help build your child's self-esteem.

Immerse Yourself

Your children have become as savvy as they are about technology because they have been immersed in it since birth. Technology permeates every aspect of their lives. Learn similarly by also immersing yourself. Don't shy away from technology, especially technology you don't understand. Get the latest model cell phone. Junk your old DVD player and get a Blue-Ray player or, better yet, Internet TV. Take home a tablet from work when it's offered. The more you use technology, the more comfortable you will be with it and the easier it will be for you to adapt to new inventions.

Many parents have much to learn about technology from their children. While the gap between parent and child may be narrower since the time that personal computers first became widespread in homes, there still exists a gap as technology continues to propagate faster than some of us can keep up with it. Forget about your role as the teacher, and allow yourself to become the student, letting your children teach you what they know about technology. They will be happy to share this part of their world with you, and you will be better able to monitor what your children are doing.



About the author:

Amanda Tradwick is a grant researcher and writer for CollegeGrants.org. She has a Bachelor's degrees from the University of Delaware, and has recently finished research on grants for cosmetology school and teaching grants.

Guest Post: Why Do Your Kids Know More about Technology than You? Learning from Your Kids

Five Hours a day- that’s how much time the average American person spends in front of a TV set. That’s a part-time job!

This last summer I interviewed the two top Children’s Librarians in town for an article on reading. They threw a ton of statistics my way, but the number that really stood out was 5000. “The average kid has watched 5000 hours of TV by the time they reach age five. …that’s more time than it takes to earn your bachelor’s degree.” Which means, if you start your kids at day one, they would need to watch just under 3 hours of TV a day.

The American Academy of Pediatrics came out with a revised policy statement in October 2011. Their new stance was to discourage TV for kids under age 2, this was based on ten years of media research. They also encourage parents to limit TV for older kids to less than two hours a day.


Now before getting all defensive and exclaiming “if it weren’t for Mickey, I would never get a shower” consider this: imagine the money that the AAP would have drawn in endorsements IF they had simply said -the result of our studies blah blah blah… Baby Einstein for an hour a day will make your kid a genius. Disney would have rushed to open their checkbooks. But they didn’t. The AAP stood by their 1999 warnings of –listen parents, this TV stuff is not good for your kids!

If you read the full article in Pediatrics journal it strongly encourages pediatricians to bring up the topic of TV during well child visits. Your annual visit should go something like: ok, here you go, this will keep your kid from getting polio, looks like his growth curve is right on track, oh, and turn off your TV. It’s that important.

The official findings paper states this: “Media use has been associated with obesity, sleep issues, aggressive behaviors, and attention issues in preschool- and school-aged children.”

I don’t know about you, but those are some pretty strong words. Scary words- words that I want to make sure don’t end up on my kid’s medical charts. Is it possible to have ADD, insomnia, and obesity challenges while never having watched an episode of “Clubhouse?” Of course, but if you could reduce your child’s risk of those challenges, simply by pushing a button- would you?

For the full policy statement, visit:
http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/128/5/1040.full

Turning off the Tube

Lead Paint- What's lurking in your Toy Box?

This month I plan to explore a several parenting recommendations that can be highly controversial. I will do a series of four posts, with the first three being background information, and ending with discussion on the topic itself. This is post one of four.

Who is the American Academy of Pediatricians?

Most pediatricians are members of at least one academy, either the American Academy of Pediatricians (AAP) or the American College of Pediatricians (which split from the AAP in 2002 over policy differences). As outlined on the AAP website “The mission of the American Academy of Pediatrics is to attain optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all infants, children, adolescents and young adults.” It has over 60,000 members. If your pediatrician lists FAAP after his or her name, then they are a member of the AAP.

The AAP is funded privately through member dues, publication revenues, and unrestricted
grants. They have one of the longest running research based programs in the U.S. and conduct research to “enhance the delivery of health care to children.” It was founded in 1930 by a group of doctors who had this absurd notion that medicine for kids should be different than medicine for adults- up until then kids were treated like mini-adults.

My reason for outlining the AAP and giving you some background on the organization is to make
the case that this is a group to be trusted. A pediatrician should be a trusted friend, someone who acts as an advisor in the parenting journey (see my post on “It Takes a Village” from a couple of weeks ago). A pediatrician is the one you call when your child has a scary fever, when you’re “not sure if that’s Eczema.” They are the person you can confide in if you think your child might be facing challenges, physically or emotionally. You should be able to bring up topics like “Is my child overweight?” or “She just seems to have trouble concentrating- should I be worried?” without feeling judged. The AAP is just a larger version of this relationship, they keep our children’s best interest at heart and work to research and educate doctors and parents on the topics that can make us all better parents and caregivers.

Ok, you might say, I already knew that- check back next week to see why this is important.

For more information on the AAP go to www.AAP.org

Who is the American Academy of Pediatricians?