Parenting Fact Sheets
When you least expect it your toddler may willingly help you pick up all the toys in the family room. You wonder if it is because you said "please sweetie!" The fact is, this activity may mark the beginning of a developmental time when children become more aware of social demands. They might be more likely to control their urges and follow directions. We call this part of developmental "self-regulation." Learn more...
One of the most undesirable but unfortunately normal behaviours that some young children engage in, especially during the second and third years of life, is biting. Having a biter in a group of young children causes stress and tension and being the parent of a biter or a child who has been bitten is very distressing. Of course, so is being bitten. In fact, if you think about it, biting is a way of hurting that does not depend on size and physical strength. That is, a baby or toddler can inflict a bite that breaks the skin and is extremely painful. This means that biting is a behaviour that adults are eager to find a 'quick fix' or sure-fire way to eliminate...
Biting
(pdf 75KB)
BUILDING ON CHILDREN'S INTERESTS
Children show unique interests and strengths at an early age. The possibilities expand as children gain new skills and understandings. A young baby may demonstrate particular interest in sounds, or in social contact, an interest that goes beyond that shown by all babies. An older baby may show fascination with dropping, releasing and throwing, or develop a condition described as "container madness" where the name of the game is fitting things into containers. This may even include oneself, that is, fitting oneself into boxes and other small spaces. Toddlers may demonstrate passions for moving around in space, re-organising (or disorganising!) space by moving furniture and equipment. Toddlers and older pre-school aged children may develop particular interests in types of experiences, for example, moving to music, painting, climbing or block building. In addition, it is not uncommon for them to develop interests in particular objects around them, for example, vehicles, animals, water or plants. Sometimes these interests are short term, sometimes they are lifelong...
Building on children's interests
(pdf 66KB)
Children form a self concept or picture of themselves largely from the messages they get from others. Because parents and families are usually the most important people in the child's life, their messages are particularly powerful. The picture of self that forms in the early years will change throughout life, but the initial picture is crucial because it lays the foundation for relationships and attitudes towards learning, which in turn, influences later development and learning. Self esteem is evaluation or assessment of self. A positive picture of oneself translates into high self esteem, a negative one into low self esteem...
Building Positive Self Esteem
(pdf 70KB)
Celebrations and holidays are part of the richness of our experience. They are times of acknowledging significant milestones in an individual's, a family's, a group's or a community's lives. They bring people together. They are markers of significant historical events. For all of us, they are times that also mark our lives, re-occuring regularly throughout our lives. They usually involve rituals that provide a sense of continuity, of community, of sharing, touchstones for our lives. However, what is celebrated and how it is celebrated (including how much it is celebrated) deserve careful thought and attention, as these celebrations look, feel and mean something different to children than they do to us as adults...
Celebrations and Holidays
(pdf 72KB)
Children need at least six glasses of fluid each day. Water is the best drink for everyone. It is needed so the body can work properly. Milk is also important each day to give the body protein, calcium and other essential vitamins and minerals. Fruit juices and soft drinks are not recommended. They have a large amount of sugar, even the 'no added sugar' varieties and can contribute to tooth decay. Eating whole fruit is better than drinking fruit juice...
Drinks for Children
(pdf 72KB)
It is easy for adults to forget how hard it must be for young children to figure out what is and is not acceptable behaviour. Learning acceptable behaviour is complex in part because what is acceptable depends on the situation. For example, it is okay to throw a ball outside but not inside, it is okay to fill a cup with water when you are in the wading pool and tip it out on the grass or on yourself, but it is not okay to tip your cup of juice onto the kitchen floor. Adults understand these things (usually!), but for under three year olds, many of these distinctions are not obvious...
Every Adult is a Supermodel
(pdf 80KB)
There are so many possibilities for play, learning and exploration outside. We are blessed in Australia with a beautiful natural environment - rivers, oceans, mountains, bush and desert - as well as some wonderful urban and suburban areas. One of the values that most parents and others who care about children want to instil in children a love of nature and enjoyment of the outdoors. It isn't actually a matter of instilling however - it's more a matter of nurturing and supporting the interest in the natural environment that very young children already have. Birds, butterflies, rain, puddles of water, leaves blowing in the wind, flowers, stones, dirt, sand, mud and grass are all sources of wonder and interest to babies and toddlers...
Get Down and Dirty Outside
(pdf 64KB)
HELPING CHILDREN LEARN TOLERENCE
Both research and experience with young children indicate that children notice differences in people from a surprisingly early age. Whether it is skin colour, voices, hair texture, size or other aspects of appearance, they note them, try to understand and experience them and sooner or later accept them. In other words, children are not born with prejudices and biases. They accept differences unless or until they are taught differently. As is the case with so much important learning, children learn attitudes towards difference from the important people around them, from what they observe and experience. Today more than ever we need to do all that we can to help children grow up with strong convictions and values and with comfort with difference...
Helping children learn tolerance
(pdf 66KB)
Picture the following: Melissa, aged 23 months, is scraping her lunch scraps into the bin. The expression on her face tells us she is concentrating and that "being helpful" (in her eyes) and doing a "real" job are giving her pleasure. Her concentration is so great she doesn't see that most of the food is going onto the floor and as she walks away steps in the peas and mashed potatoes. She has no idea her help isn't actually very helpful, that instead of helping she is actually creating a mess for someone to clean up. It's really hard for young children, especially under the age of three, to figure out what the "rules of living" are...
Its The Thought that Counts
(pdf 72KB)
LIFE WITH BABY BROTHER (or SISTER)
Your new baby is six months old and he's a happy little snugglebug. He loves playing peek-a-boo and he just started crawling last week. But since the new baby arrived, its been a different story with your three-year-old. There's no getting around it: Your toddler is now a grump. She pouts at you and frowns or pokes at the baby. She used to sleep all night, but now she is waking up and needing your help to get back to sleep. She used to say "I can do it myself," but now she whines "help me." She wants you to feed her again, to play with her often and even pull on her socks when you know she can do it herself...
www.talaris.org/spotlight_sibling.htm
Most adults need and value friendships in their own lives and therefore parents are likely to value them for their younger children. Friendships sometimes just happen, at other times they happen as a result of being actively encouraged. However, they cannot be forced. Think about your own friendships. Someone can provide the introduction and a setting that encourages exploring shared interests. At other times, you stumble into a friendship with someone because of common circumstances or interests. However, no one else can make a friendship happen. So it is with young children...
Making Friends
(pdf 63KB)
MIND OVER MEDIA: EARLY CHOICES FOR HEALTHY DEVELOPMENT
YOUNG MEDIA AUSTRALIA
What do we, as parents, want for our children? That they grow up as happy and responsible members of the community who share our values and outlook on the world? That they learn skills that will help them to have fulfilling personal and work lives as adults? Perhaps also that they have happy and fulfilling lives as children, learning the necessary skills in a safe fun environment? Many aspects of their lives contribute to them having these opportunities and experiences, some of which are outside of our control as parents...
Mind over Media: Early choices for healthy development
(pdf 57KB)
It is tempting to think of discipline, or helping children learn acceptable behaviour, as mostly a matter of letting them know when they have done something unacceptable. However, just as important, if not more important is letting children know when they do things you approve of, what we want them to do more of. Sometimes, because carers are busy, have other children to interact with, or are distracted, we may take children's desirable behaviour for granted, or acknowledge it to ourselves silently and gratefully without saying anything to the child. When we don't highlight it for the child, we miss a very valuable opportunity. Sometimes taking advantage of this opportunity is expressed as "Catching children being good"...
Nothing Succeeds like Success
(pdf 76KB)
SELECTING TOYS FOR PRESCHOOLERS
Choosing toys for three to five year olds isn't easy, for several reasons. The children themselves are vulnerable to marketing, the latest thing or what their friends have and they can put enormous pressure on parents. There is an incredible array of things to spend money on, especially when you add electronic equipment, computer games, videos and DVDs. Parents are also vulnerable to the variety of pressures placed by society: give their child a head start, prepare their child for school and help their child learn to read, to name a few. An additional complexity is the "novelty and gimmickry factor" to which adults are often more vulnerable than children. Something new or something novel is sometimes attractive to adults who justify it by saying the child needs it or is bored...
Selecting Toys for Preschoolers
(pdf 76KB)
All parents want the best for their child. When it comes to choosing toys for toddlers, it is easy to become overwhelmed by not only the range there is to choose from, but also the amazing claims made about the necessity of certain toys to "teach" toddlers particular skills or provide them with essential understandings. An extreme example of this was an advertisement some years ago about a plastic rattle for babies that had a part that disappeared when the rattle was turned upside down. The claim made was: this toy will teach your baby that when Mummy goes away she will come back. How ridiculous! Children learn that Mummy comes back by having Mummy come back. There's an additional factor as well, that is, sometimes parents are attracted to toys for a variety of reasons that may have little to do with whether or not the toy may be attractive and suitable for their child...
Selecting Toys for Toddlers
(pdf 75KB)
Separations from people we enjoy being with are a common part of daily life. As adults we accept them as such and probably don't even think about the inevitable sadness, reluctance, disappointment, insecurity or sense of loss that is likely to accompany them. Yet those feelings are probably there, at least in some degree, with all separations from people we are close to. Young children have less life experience, self control and understanding of time than adults do to draw on when it comes to coping with separation. Besides, young children are more dependent than most adults on the presence of someone they know, trust and feel secure with to help them cope with new situations. No wonder children have difficulty separating - it's really amazing that so many of them cope so well...
Separations
(pdf 63KB)
Sharing is typically high on the list of what parents think that children should learn in the preschool years. In part, this is because life is made much easier when children are with other children, either in the family or outside, when they have the ability and are willing to share. Learning the range of skills needed to interact sucessfully with others is one of the major challenges of the first five years of life. Babies are born wanting and needing to relate and communicate with others, but they are not born with the skills to do this...
Sharing
(pdf 73KB)
Children need a couple of healthy snacks to get enough food for the day. Snack times are ideal to encourage children to eat fruits, vegetables, dairy foods and cereal products. Snacks are best thought of as 'small meals' of healthy foods, rather than specially packaged items. Pre-packaged snacks may be high in fat and/or sugar, such as muesli and "breakfast" bars...
Snack Foods for Children
(pdf 77 KB)
SOME OF THE WORLD'S GREATEST SCIENTISTS WEAR NAPPIES
Picture this: Thirteen months old Mathew is sitting in his high chair. His dad puts a cup of juice on the tray. He clutches the handle of the cup with his right fist, extends his arm and hand carefully over the side of the high chair, strains his body to lean over as far as the restraint will allow him and with the serious and studied look of someone doing a task of great significance, tips the cup and watches with interest as a stream of liquid cascades to the floor and bounces around the tiles. His gaze still fixed, his mouth fixed in attention, he repeats the tipping action, this time causing all the remaining juice to pour onto the floor in a great rush. the sound of the juice hitting the floor causes his dad, who is preparing tea for the family, to glance over at Mathew and speak. So hard was he concentrating on his pouring that Mathew startles when his dad speaks. So how does his dad respond to Mathew?
Some of the World's Greatest Scientists Wears Nappies
(pdf 76KB)
SOUNDS OF LANGUAGE - "IT'S A WABBIT"
It's a sunny day and you're taking your baby for a walk in the park. As you stop to rest, you see a friend with an eighteen month old boy who's pointing excitedly at a poster on the side of the bus. He clearly wants to tell you something...
www.talaris.org/spotlight_wabbit.htm
One of the most unpleasant and challenging phenomena that parents of young children have to deal with is temper tantrums. Theories abound about their causes and suggestions are offered freely and with great certainty about the "best" or "right" way to deal with them. Especially in a public place under the scrutiny of others, temper tantrums challenge parents in ways that other difficult behaviours don't. As adults, we are likely to feel uncomfortable, embarrassed, sometimes helpless and even threatened by what appears to be unstoppable out-of-control behaviour, even when it comes from a very young child. Temper tantrums occur in young children of all ages and are especially frequent during the turbulent times...
Temper tantrums
(pdf 47KB)
There are at least two kinds of transitions in young children's experience:
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Major transitions, such as children entering child care, preschool or school
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Minor transitions, such as moving from one segment or part of the day to another.
We could refer to these as "big transitions" and "little transitions". Lets look at the big ones first. For all of us, beginnings and endings are significant. They often have a heady mix of conflicting feelings attached to them: anticipation, excitement, insecurity, sadness and loss and a bit of fear of the unknown. So it is with children. When children begin participating in a children's service or are faced with any other major change to their daily experience, these big transitions need atention. Obviously the particular ways of dealing with them depend on the age of the child and the circumstances...
Transitions
(pdf 66KB)
WHEN YOUR OVER THE LIMIT YOU NEED HELP
Babies are not born with self control, or the ability to stop oneself from doing something you want to do. Rather, it develops and increases over the first few years of life. In actual fact, it is something many people struggle with for the whole of their lives. Sometimes young children just can't stop themselves. What they are doing may be so much fun or so interesting that even though they have some idea that it isn't okay and won't be approved of by adults they just keep doing it. Pressing buttons and moving the volume control on the TV, DVD or VCR, pulling toilet paper off the roll, flipping light switches on and off, pulling the cat's tail, pouring liquids, throwing things and tearing pages out of books are all acts that have huge appeal to under three year olds. Unfortunately, they are also things that adults tend not to approve of...
When your Over the Limit you Need Help
(pdf 88KB)
