Get your child to love numbers and improve their behaviour

Posted April 8, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: child behaviour
Tags: , , , ,

pic of john mighton

JUMP Math is a numeracy program started in 1998 by mathematician, author and award-winning playwright John Mighton. He runs a federally registered charitable organization based out of Toronto, Canada.

“JUMP Math believes that all children can be led to think mathematically, and that with even a modest amount of attention every child will flourish. By demonstrating that even children who are failing math or are labeled as slow learners can excel at math, we hope to dispel the myths that currently prevail. We offer educators and parents complete and balanced materials as well as training to help them reach all students.”

“We convince people they have only one talent, or usually there’s only one subject that’s not beyond their grasp. And I think that’s totally unnecessary. From my work with kids I’m quite convinced that kids are born almost universally with abilities in both areas, if we would nurture those abilities.”

Oh, and if this isn’t enough to get you excited about re-introducing your child to Math, John Mighton was the brain behind the movie “Goodwill Hunting” starring Matt Damon.

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Power food-Acai berry

Posted April 6, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: child behaviour, Health and Nutrition
Tags: , ,

Strengthening the immune system is something we all think about over the cold season, so you might want to remind yourself of this recipe come January. What caught my attention was “promoting sound sleep!”. What parent isn’t craving a sound sleep from their children?

Two- and three-year-old children sleeping less than 10 hours in a 24-hour period were consistently at greatest risk for behavior problems such as oppositional or non-compliant behavior, “acting out” behaviors, and aggression, reported the team of Northwestern University scientists conducting the study.

Preschoolers who sleep less at night have almost 25 percent greater chance of psychiatric diagnosis, according to the study, published in the June issue of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics.

acai berries
Açaí Fruit Smoothie

For increased energy, mix a delicious smoothie featuring this highly nutritious Brazilian berry. It’s known for its high anti-oxidant count and for strengthening the immune system, promoting sound sleep, cleaning and detoxifying the body, improving circulation and more.
Ingredients:
1 cup organic fruit juice
1 cup fresh organic fruit
3 Tbsp. protein powder
1 oz 100% pure Acai juice
1 Tbsp. omega-3 oil
1 Tbsp. ground flax seed
(if required, add extra juice or water for desired consistency)

Method

Pour the organic fruit juice, organic fruit and protein powder in a blender and mix until well blended.

So, those of you who know me, know that I am pretty biased when it comes to feeding my kids organic foods. The simple reason is that I feel like I am getting ripped off otherwise. I’d love to be able to measure the difference in the amount of nutrients in organic vs. non-organic produce.

Please send in recipes or info you might have on the Acai Berry…

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Improve your child’s behaviour… Omega’s!

Posted March 28, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: child behaviour, Health and Nutrition
Tags: , , ,

Even studies out of Oxford University in the UK have confirmed that Omega 3 Fatty Acids are crucial to improving your child’s behaviour, mood and learning. Even more directly, studies have yielded results pointing to improved concentration, less impulsivity thus improving reading and spelling scores.

Dr. Richardson out of Oxford has stated that Fatty Acids have reached historical lows and points to the damage these lows can have on our child’s developing brain. There is even talk of supplementation being provided to school children given that 1 in 10 kids suffer from learning or attentional challenges.

Given this important news, there are some important standards to keep in mind when shopping for fish oils. I haven’t had much luck with the chews. They start out nice and chewy with a hint of citrus and then wham, out splashes fish oils…not exactly smooth culinary experience. I started by adding fish oils to my daughter’s water when she was 4 months old, and have now graduated to giving both of my kids a half teaspoon of a peach flavored version.

Do make sure the source is pure and free of mercury. Brands originating from fish oils are best. Here’s a link to some other ways of incorporating the fatty acids into your and your child’s diet provided by About.com.

Let me know what you think?

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Praise Good Child behaviour

Posted March 23, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: child behaviour
Tags: ,

Here’s a quick tip on increasing your child’s positive child behaviour….

praise kids
Verbal rewards are extremely valuable. Children love to receive praise and by simply telling them how pleased you are with them you are boosting your child’s self-esteem. Verbal rewards are easy to use and free, yet it is surprising how infrequently they are used.

Focus on your interactions with your child and listen to how many times you tell them not to do something and compare this with the number of times you praise them. Most parents find that without realizing it, they are often telling their child what not to do rather than praising their child for doing the right things. This is normal, because we tend to react versus pro-act.

Telling your child no leaves them working through the process of elimination to figure out what exactly they are supposed to be doing. Why not be a straight shooter and tell them in a direct way “walk please, you might slip and get an ouwee”.

When you do use a verbal reward make it clear what aspect of your child’s behaviour you are praising. Simply stating “You are a good girl”, doesn’t reinforce what your child is doing correctly. A statement like “Thank You for drinking your water quietly” is far more informative. Your child then knows that you like the way they are completing the task and therefore they will do it again!

Let me know what you think?

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Is playfighting okay? Part Two of “Exploring Human Aggression”

Posted March 19, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: Aggression, child behaviour
Tags: , ,

Now, I’ve always wondered about play fighting. My daughter and son engage in this activity nightly prior to bed as part of their goodnight dad ritual. As an outsider looking in, I can see three advantages. Kids learn, who’s stronger, they learn what’s acceptable and lastly they learn the limits of others. But what’s most fascinating about play fighting is the notion of compromise. You see, the stronger individual has to let the weaker ones win from time to time or the others won’t play with them.

Direct forms of aggression decrease at four years of age and mutate into a deeper indirect form known as social aggression. This requires a higher level of language and social skill as it is not face to face with the victim and offers less danger of immediate retaliation. By four to five years of age, most kids have learned that there are negative consequences to hitting. If I hit, I will find myself alone or I’ll get hit in return. These are both strong examples of exclusion.
Thoughts…

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How do I stop my toddler from hitting?

Posted March 19, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: Aggression, child behaviour
Tags: , , ,

toddlers hitting

Most of us who have kids are familiar with the famous terrible two’s stage, or as I like to call it, the “I’m losing my mind-” parenting stage. This is a critical stage in terms of a child’s social development. You see, if parents can manage to stay calm and model effective ways to communicate and express their frustrations, toddlers can work through this stage quite quickly with a positive outcome.

Let’s use siblings and hitting as an example. There are three reactions one can have according to Joan McCord from Temple University. If a parent holds their child’s hands and says “stop hitting, do you see how you are hurting your brother?” Or “Stop hitting or I’ll punish you” Or lastly “stop hitting” and in turn hits the child. The first response is the correct one because it teaches the child empathy. Their actions have a negative impact on others and how would they feel if the same were done to them. The second response teaches a child about the notion of giving pain and the third response leaves the child wondering when is it okay to hit.

There is tremendous value in removing your toddler away from the situation while staying calm. Sitting down with them at their level face to face and waiting for them to slow down their breathing. Once they are in a calm and what I like to term, a “communication” state, we can reiterate that it is not okay to hit. The fewer the words the better, it starts to sound like a Charlie Brown episode pretty early on given their developmental level of language ability. Bringing them face to face with the victim/sibling and having the sibling repeat the same words after you to their offender is also extremely powerful. I have witnessed this time and time again as a child consultant and it works.

I found an interesting article about toddlers and hitting, click on your right hand side for a direct link or copy and paste this link into your browser: http://www.iparentingcanada.com/articles/toddlers/when-punches-fly-2097/

Let me know what you think…

Comments: 2 Comments

Bullying-Exploring the roots of aggression

Posted March 17, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: Aggression, Bullying
Tags: ,

Adolescents don’t suddenly become aggressive, bullying is an aggressive act, so lets go one step further and explore the origins of human aggression. There is often a very long history of predisposition and experience. The highest count of human aggressive acts can take us as far back as two years of age. If we were to measure the number of aggressive acts per week, two year olds would be our greatest offenders. Fortunately we don’t arrest every toddler who hits.

Toddlers are frequent offenders because their language is not to the point where they can express their needs or discomforts. Put yourself in their shoes for a moment. Think back to the last time you had an adrenaline rush, either from a car accident, spotting a bear on the trail or were cut off while driving. Were you at a loss for words, were you able to vocalize your needs or did your emotions get the best of you. If you’ve ever traveled to another country and had a difficult time being understood, you can make sense of this last statement.

You see, aggression is considered to be part of natural development until five years of age. Much like animals, resorting to physical aggression is a part of evolution and survival. However, groups of animals survive on the sole premise that they don’t attack one another.

Michael Lewis from the Robert Wood Johnson Medical School states that babies as young as 8 months engage in exploratory acts of aggression such as pulling hair and hitting. It just progresses from there as freestanding movement frees up their hands.

Any thoughts?

Comments: 2 Comments

Why do Bullies Bully?

Posted March 17, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: Bullying
Tags:

the role of the hero

http://heroworkshop.files.wordpress.com/2008/04/bully7.jpg

There are three major reasons why bullies choose to bully. It’s learned, they want to gain power or more typically, their profile describes a child that comes from a troubled past. The typical profile of a bully is one that has problematic peer relationships, compromised health, depression, and has conflicts with authority figures. Bullies have most likely been bullied themselves. Joan McCord, the former president of the American Society of Criminology stated the following, “those who are hit are more likely to hit and this statistic alone is a great predictor of later crime” in the movie Origins of Human Aggression: The Other Story (2005).

There is one other researched reason that I won’t spend a whole lot of time on, simply because I am not yet fully convinced on its impact, but find it is worth a mention. Some say bullying is an addiction. By addiction I mean “a condition in which someone keeps repeating a behavior that results in harmful consequences to themselves and/or the people around them”. The power to stop is beyond their control. This leads to core decisions that go something like this “because of what’s happened to me, something must be wrong with me. Because something is wrong with me, I feel bad about myself and because I feel bad about myself, I need to do something to make myself feel better”.

Here’s an excellent link you can send your kids to with the hopes of engaging them in a conversation about bullying.

Please let me know what you think?

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Understanding the Origins of Bullying Behaviour

Posted March 13, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: Bullying
Tags:

Around one in ten primary school children are bullied every week. It happens at secondary school too, although it’s less of a problem there with around 4% of pupils affected at any one time.
Fifteen percent of a given population in a school or a workplace are directly involved with bullying, that leaves eighty five percent as a group to work with. Makes for pretty good odds.
The first step is understanding the foundation of behavior and the root causes of why some kids choose to bully and how some kids become targets. I’ll start off by letting you in on a huge secret. Bullying is a learned behavior and it can be changed.

Bullying is an imbalance of power (physical size or popularity) that involves hurtful behaviors that are intentional and repeated over time. This involves behaviors such as fighting, name-calling, threatening, teasing, excluding someone repeatedly, it evens includes making someone feel unsafe at all three levels: physical, social and emotional.

Advances in communication technology have made it possible for people to bully others in new ways. ‘Cyber-bullying’ includes bullying via text messages, email and chat forums, websites and instant messaging. Recent reports in the media have shown how bullies set up pretend profiles of a child and encourage other classmates to leave hurtful messages.

Another new form of bullying, called ‘happy slapping’, has also been reported: a videophone message is sent to the friends of an innocent person being hit or bullied (DfES, 2005). This means that bullying is now no longer left at the school gates but can continue into the evening and weekends as well. A recent study found that one in five pupils has been bullied via the internet or cell phones. However, a third of those pupils never told anyone (Anti-Bullying Alliance, 2006).

Children with special educational needs are considered three times more likely to be bullied than their peers. They are also more likely to be a bully themselves (National Children’s Bureau, 2000). Bullying does not only exist in mainstream schools. Children in specialist placements can also be at risk of bullying or being bullied according to a study by Torrence (Torrence, 2000).

The long-term implications for a child involved in bullying can be serious. Research has suggested that these children can be affected by long-term insecurities, behavioral issues and low self-esteem as well as poor concentration and possible refusal to interact in social situations because they are afraid of being bullied (National Children’s Bureau, 1994). There can also be illness due to stress and some children will go on to develop mental health illnesses as a result of being bullied.

Please send comments or share a personal story…

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Why does my toddler hit?

Posted March 9, 2009 by jodymoss
Categories: Aggression, child behaviour
Tags:

This has got to be one of the most common threats to household harmony.  Mom or dad is making dinner, folding clothes and talking on the phone with the age old themed music of siblings battling it out in the background.   Sibling rivalry is a topic on its own that i’ll discuss in the near future so check back soon.   Another very common scenario is the toddler who walks over to another child at playgroup and hits them on the head because they want the toy and the other toddler is not giving up without a fight….literally.

Developmentally, toddlers hit because they are in the pre-verbal stage of language.  Take a moment and consider the last time you were really angry or better yet had adrenaline flowing i.e. car accident, call 9-1-1, etc…it can be pretty difficult to find your words in this kind of state.  Now imagine, you were in a different country and no one understood what you were saying.  That is exactly how some toddlers feel when they don’t get their needs met.

  So, I think we can all agree that hitting others is not okay.  Here’s a few things to consider:
1-Ensure there is no modeling of this behaviour  in the home, daycare/preschool setting or on television.

2- Ensure your child clearly understands this is not okay by walking over to them, getting down on both needs, holding their hands down by their sides (not forcibly but to offer comfort and to further get them to engage), looking them in the eyes with a look of disappointment and saying “NO” in a quiet voice.  Maintain eye contact and ensure they are looking at you, you may have to wait them out on this.  If they fall to the floor, which is quite common, wait beside them and start over again when they are ready.  The key here is to model calmness.  They are not in trouble, but they are in FOCUS.

3- At this point, if it has happened before (more than three times), then you can be sure they know this is not okay.  Walk them over to a designated time out spot.  Time out spots should be away from an audience and in sight of an adult.  I wouldn’t get too worried about how your child sits in time out as long as they are sitting in one designated spot.  The key is they should sit there until you come back to them.  This is something that needs teaching.    The rule of thumb is 1 minute for each year of age.  Working up to 2 minutes for a toddler is a long time, but again, something to consider.  This will depend on your toddler’s ability to sustain their attention.

4- Before your child returns to their activity, they need to learn that their action had an impact on their buddy (empathy training also known as emotional intelligence).  Bring your toddler face to face to say sorry.

5- The last step is to problem solve the original altercation.  Help your child ask for the toy either through a sign (circle with hand on their chest means please), or with their words.  If the other child still wants to play with the toy, redirect your child to another toy or activity and ideally play with them as a reward for solving the problem without hitting.

Here’s an interesting article I recently read about the effects of too much TV time before the age of two associated with delayed language, shortened attention span and a delay in cognitive development.

Let me know what you think?

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