by Susie Windle | Feb 17, 2016 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, Your Child's Brain
Self-talk is powerful because having conversations with ourselves—even silently—links thought, language, and action. Self-talk is really like a delay switch to action allowing us to think things through. Children are great teachers for showing us how language can...
by Susie Windle | Nov 18, 2015 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, Parents: Practice Self Care
Just a reminder . . . When your stress level is rising, take a few minutes for a stress-reduction break! When you have one minute: Breathe in slowly and pause for a count of three. Exhale. Pause for a count of three. Repeat for one minute, pausing for a count of three...
by Susie Windle | Nov 4, 2015 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills
Not only does a sense of gratitude feel good, research shows that this pleasant emotion and its expression result in higher levels of happiness, vitality, optimism, and hope. According to those interested in studying gratitude and its effects, people who consciously...
by Susie Windle | Oct 21, 2015 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, Your Child's Brain
Temperament is a term referring to a genetic foundation for individual differences in personality. The overall stability of temperament, however, is actually low in infancy and toddlerhood and only moderate from preschool age on up. This means that children’s...
by Susie Windle | Sep 9, 2015 | Parenting Playbook, Parents: Practice Self Care
Parenting is a stressful job. To be a calm, loving, empathetic parent, you need to make time to take good care of yourself. Recharging your emotional battery is required when your job includes broken sleep patterns and tests of patience. If you keep going without a...
by Susie Windle | Apr 1, 2015 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, The Importance of Emotions, The Power of Play, Your Child's Brain
Children love it when a parent will play with them, and child-led play builds a strong emotional bond. When children lead parents in play, opioids—the natural chemicals that give us a general sense of well-being—are activated in their brains. Child-led play has been...
by Susie Windle | Feb 4, 2015 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, The Power of Play
If you have a child who has reached toddlerhood, it won’t be long before she puts your hat on her head, grabs your purse, prances around with a grin, and waits for your captivated laughter. Your toddler has recognized and is imitating a grown-up pattern of behavior,...
by Susie Windle | Dec 31, 2014 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, Parents: Practice Self Care, Your Child's Brain
Scientists believe a negativity bias is wired into the brain as protection against all the dangers faced over the millions of years of evolution. Our brains are alert to potential threats that might have an impact on our survival. In effect, the brain is like sticky...
by Susie Windle | Dec 17, 2014 | Discipline and Trying Times, Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, The Importance of Emotions, The Power of Play
Parents can easily begin to feel that they are either disciplining their kids or chauffeuring them from one activity to the next, and nothing much else. It’s important to make time for some family fun! As humans we are hardwired to play, explore, and connect with...
by Susie Windle | Aug 27, 2014 | Parenting Playbook, Parenting Skills, The Power of Play, Your Child's Brain
Children thrive in our world when they thrive on the inside. The inside—where personality, imagination, heart, and mind reside—often seems to receive less attention than the behaviors and interactions we observe on the outside. Yet a shift that occurs in that internal...
