I'm a full-time mummy

I came across this article which I must definitely share with you guys as I'm very interested to know your thoughts on this. For your convenience, I have copied the excerpts from the article here:

Parenting is a tough job. Everyone wants to be a great parent, but no-one teaches you how to be a great parent – you have to pick it up yourself. There are lows and highs, and it can be tough to be the perfect parent every day. The main priority is making sure your child is happy, well-fed, loved and safe.

Check out 50 small things you can do to be an amazing parent.

1. Don’t try to fix everything. Often your child will need your help, but don’t run in to help every time without thinking. Sometimes your child will be able to solve their own problems, and letting them do so will teach them to be self-reliant.

2. Pay attention to your child’s interests so that you can help them to develop their interests.

3. Share as many different experiences as you can with your child. From sports to reading to dressing up, these experiences could turn into future talents.

4. Let your child decide what’s for dinner one night of the week.

5. Remember that discipline and punishment are two different things.

6. Read books with your child for at least a quarter of an hour each day. This is a great way to bond with your child.

7. Encourage family time. This gives your child the chance to bond with their extended family.

8. Admit when you are wrong. After a tough day you may snap at your child. Instead of secretly feeling guilty, apologise to your child to teach them about fairness and honesty.

9. Accept that your partner may have different ideas about parenting and then make a compromise that you are both happy with.

10. Don’t pressure your child to learn. If they complain repeatedly about their violin lessons, don’t force them to go. This is only making your child deal with stress and worry.

11. Have high expectations for your child, but always remain realistic.

12. Praise your child whenever they succeed so that they know they have supportive parents.

13. Ask your child five “you” question every day, such as “Did you enjoy school?” or “Did you like your lunch?”

14. Teach your child responsibilities while they are young. From putting their toys in their toy box to putting their juice carton in the recycling, your child is never too young to become aware of the world around them.

15. Eat one meal as a family together every day. Your child may not remember each individual meal, but they will always remember the tradition.

16. Love your children equally but remember they are unique in different ways.

17. Don’t label your child. Once you do, it can be very difficult for them to grow out of the label.

18. Be silly with your child. Tell your child silly jokes, and encourage them to make up their own jokes to tell you.

19. Listen to your child without dismissing their thoughts for being young.

20. Give your child open-ended toys like Legos or blocks. These will encourage your child’s creativity.

21. Savor the great moments. Being a parent is a wild ride with highs and lows – let yourself enjoy the amazing moments.

22. Don’t compare your child to others. They are a unique individual and comparing people is often more damaging than it is useful.

23. Encourage your child to think about their future without influencing their decisions.

24. Keep the TV in the living room. This encourages family time and provides your child with fewer distractions when they are supposed to be sleeping.

25. Keep sunscreen next to your child’s toothpaste, and put it on every morning during summer as part of the same routine.

26. Take your child to different places, like the museum, the swimming pool, the library and parks to to expand their interests.

27. Give your child gifts that encourage their interests.

28. Always put anything your child makes for you on display in your home to show you are proud.

29. Introduce your child to your most interesting friends.

30. Give your child choices to help them to work on their decision-making skills.

31. Set aside part of your home as a play-space for your child.

32. Accept your child for who they are.

33. Tell your child that you love to play with them, and that it is just as fun for you as it is for them.

34. Tell your child stories about them as a baby.

35. Let your child help you while you are cooking to help them to develop an interest in cooking.

36. Hug your child every day.

37. Put down your phone when you are playing or reading with your child.

38. Remember that when they are a teenager, they will be potty-trained, so don’t worry too much about it to early.

39. Don’t force your child to hug or kiss extended family or your friends if they don’t want to. They know what they are comfortable with and what they don’t want to do.

40. Keep a diary of all of the funny things your child says to show them when they get older.

41. Practise what you preach – follow the rules you teach your child to teach them about fairness.

42. Have a weekly movie night with your child. This is a cheap, easy and fun way for you two to bond.

43. Trust your gut instincts with your child – you know them better than anyone else does.

44. Get involved in your child’s education by always attending Parent’s Evening and helping them with their homework.

45. Take your child for long walks so they can experience the magic of nature while bonding with you.

46. Accept that both you and your child will have flaws.

47. Count to 10 before you react to your child’s anger or sadness.

48. Buy a joke book and tell your child a silly joke every day.

49. Show your child lots of affection. Hold their hand when you walk together and high-five them when they have good news.

50. Speak to your children as equals and respect their opinions.

What do you think?

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost everyday) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.

I came across this article which I must definitely share with you guys as I'm very interested to know your thoughts on this. For your convenience, I have copied the excerpts from the article here:

In a new study from the University of Montreal, infants remained calm twice as long when listening to a song, which they didn't even know, as they did when listening to speech. "Many studies have looked at how singing and speech affect infants' attention, but we wanted to know how they affect a baby's emotional self-control," explained Professor Isabelle Peretz, of the university's Center for Research on Brain, Music and Language. "Emotional self-control is obviously not developed in infants, and we believe singing helps babies and children develop this capacity." The study, recently published in Infancy, involved thirty healthy infants aged between six and nine months.

 Humans are in fact naturally enraptured by music. In adults and older children, this "entrainment" is displayed by behaviours such as foot-tapping, head-nodding, or drumming. "Infants do not synchronize their external behaviour with the music, either because they lack the requisite physical or mental ability," Peretz explained. "Part of our study was to determine if they have the mental ability. Our finding shows that the babies did get carried away by the music, which suggests they do have the mental capacity to be "entrained"."

The researchers took a variety of measures to ensure the children's reaction to the music was not influenced by other factors, such as sensitivity to their mother's voice. Firstly, both the speech ("baby talk" and adult-directed) and the music presented to infants were produced in Turkish, so that the song and language were unfamiliar. "The performer sang Turkish play songs, not Western ones. This is an important point as studies have shown that the songs we sing to infants have a specific range of tones and rhythms," explained first author Mariève Corbeil, also of the University of Montreal. "Every parent knows it's not much use singing Rihanna to their baby!" Secondly, the babies were not exposed to any other stimuli. "Although their parents were in the room, they sat behind the babies, so their facial expressions could not influence the child's," Corbeil added. "Infants were also exposed to recordings, rather than a live performance, to ensure comparable performances for all children and no social interactions between performer and child."

When the infants were calm, parents took a seat behind the infant and the experiment began. The researchers played the recordings until the infants displayed the "cry face" - lowered brows, lip corners pulled to the side, mouth opening and raised cheeks. This is infants' most common facial expression of distress. "When listening to the Turkish song, babies remained calm for an average duration of approximately nine minutes. For speech, it was roughly only half as long, regardless of whether it was baby-talk or not," Corbeil said. Baby-talk kept them calm for just over four minutes, on average; for adult-directed speech, it was just under four minutes. "The lack of significant distinction between the two types of speech came as a surprise to us," she added.

The researchers then tested their findings by exposing a different set of infants to recordings of mothers singing songs in a familiar language (French), and found the same effect. "Our findings leave little doubt about the efficacy of singing nursery rhymes for maintaining infants' composure for extended periods," Peretz said. "Even in the relatively sterile environment of the testing room-black walls, dim illumination, no toys, and no human visual or tactile stimulation—the sound of a woman singing prolonged infants' positive or neutral states and inhibited distress." "While infants listened to the Turkish play song for roughly nine minutes before meeting the cry-face criterion, it was six minutes for the play song in French, a language with which they were very familiar," Corbeil added. "These findings speak to the intrinsic importance of music, and of nursery rhymes in particular, which appeal to our desire for simplicity, and repetition."

The findings are important because mothers, and Western mothers in particular, speak much more often than they sing to their children, missing out on the emotion-regulatory properties of singing. The researchers believe that singing could be particularly useful for the parents who are challenged by adverse socio-economic or emotional circumstances. "Although infant distress signals typically prompt parental comforting interventions, they induce frustration and anger in some at-risk parents, leading to insensitive responding and, in the worst cases, to infant neglect or abuse," Peretz said. "At-risk parents within the purview of social service agencies could be encouraged to play vocal music to infants and, better still, to sing to them."

What do you think?

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost everyday) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.

I came across this article which I must definitely share with you guys as I'm very interested to know your thoughts on this. For your convenience, I have copied the excerpts from the article here:

"Don't talk to strangers" is still common advice—I hear it often even from parents who are professionals in the child victimization field—but if it was ever good advice, it is not now.

 The parental instincts behind the advice are good.  As a mother of two, I want more than anything for my children to be safe and try to protect them as best I can.  That is what virtually every parent I've ever known has wanted.  However, avoiding strangers and avoiding social interaction ends up sending the wrong message.

 Children of today need assertiveness training. They need to be taught how to identify adults who are usually safe, such as police officers and staff members.  If they get lost at the mall or a fair, they should not be afraid to talk to any stranger--they should know who to ask for help.

There is a very large scientific literature that tries to understand the mind of a criminal.  I know it's kind of creepy, but if you try to put yourself in the mind of a criminal, the world looks very different.  Criminals look for easy targets.  Most criminals will avoid contact with large, able-bodied adults.  That is why children and the elderly can be especially vulnerable to some types of crime.  Criminals are looking to "win" in their assault of a target and will almost never pick a target who they believe to be stronger than they are.  This is also why walking alone at night or breaking down on an isolated highway can temporarily increase your risk of victimization—criminals will exploit other vulnerabilities and weaknesses too.

Criminals are remarkably consistent in who they identify as good targets and anxiety and social isolation are two factors that can make someone seem more vulnerable.  This is also one reason why re-victimization is a common problem for victims.  It is so horribly unfair, but the very symptoms of post-traumatic stress and anxiety that one crime can cause can make someone more vulnerable to another criminal.

The good news is that the solution is something that is good for your children in all sorts of way.  Give them practice and experience interacting in a wide variety of social contexts.  Teach them assertiveness skills and how to speak up if someone tries to make them do something they do not want to do.  Be sure they know how to seek help and call 911.  Explain to them what the police can (and cannot) do for them if they are in trouble. Be good role models and be assertive and positive in your own interactions with the general public.

This is one of the best gifts you can offer any child.

What do you think?

** Note: I have disabled the commenting feature on my blog engine thanks to all the spammers who happily spam my blog every day. If you wish to ask me any questions, you can find me at my Facebook page (I'm there almost everyday) or just drop me an email if you wish to maintain some anonymity.