Learning to manage their emotions is part of the job of being a child.  But when those unmanageable emotions involve anger and aggressive outbursts, it takes a bit of a different approach than learning how to be patient or share.

If we’re honest, we can sometimes recognize that our kids pick up some not-so-great habits from us.  Whether it’s nature or nurture, we often see reflected back to us behaviours that we aren’t so fond of in ourselves.  Remembering that parents set the tone in the house, ask yourself if one of the first ways to help your children is by being less reactive and have fewer loud words and/or outbursts yourself.  Modelling is a pretty powerful way to teach children how to handle stress — this falls into the “do as I say and not as I do” category if you find yourself struggling with some of the same challenges as your children do.  Less yelling in general, more deep breaths and decreasing the stress and tension in your house will all help your kids avoid some of those struggles.

But that may not be enough.  There isn’t necessarily a “magic bullet” for solving anger issues in kids; it’s a problem that involves a combination of personal temperament, environmental influence, stress and anxiety levels, verbal skills, and any other elements that go in to the mix, so the solution may require changes and tweaks in lots of different areas.  Chat with your family doctor to see if she or he can offer your child some suggestions. 

If changing the tone and the way you react yourself doesn’t have enough of an impact, having your child meet with a therapist for a few sessions might be called for.  Play therapists who specialize in working with children can play games and do exercises and activities with your kids designed to teach them the specific coping skills they can use when their temperatures start to rise.  And because you’ve already created a family environment that is designed to help your child stay cool, you’re all good to go when he or she comes home and needs to test out these new strategies.

If there were a 12-step program for television, my daughter would be a prime candidate. Given the opportunity, she would watch the tube most of the day. There are very few things she’d rather do than watch a movie or TVOKids. Of course, this isn’t a new or unique problem. Rudolph Dreikurs, author of the classic parenting book Children: The Challenge devoted a whole chapter to “meeting the challenge of tv”. He discussed the perils of “passive” entertainment and the amount of poor quality programming, or “trash”, that’s on the air. Mealtimes, bedtimes, and family time have all been disrupted, he writes, leading to fighting and tension at home.

His book, by the way, was written in 1964. Apparently, not much has changed.

One of the things that has changed is that there is without question a better selection of quality kids’ programs on television today. While there certainly still is an awful lot of junk being broadcast today, it can be easier as a parent to relax about tv watching these days because of shows that emphasize reading and vocabulary, social skills, physical fitness, and cultural awareness. But most of us have to admit that our kids watch more television than they “should” or that it has sometimes taken on the role of electronic babysitter.

As parents, we might react to this situation by feeling as though we need to do something to manage the tv situation. But in reality, it is a family problem, and can be more effectively resolved by the family as a whole. This is a great discussion for a family meeting: how much television is appropriate, what shows are appropriate, how do we balance television with responsibilities such as homework, chores, and bedtimes. Instead of Mom or Dad being the heavy who lays down the law, Dreikurs suggests that when a problem or a conflict arises, the question the parent asks is, “What is to be done now?”, putting the onus back on the child to participate in finding a solution.

He also makes some good points about fighting with our kids over what they can and can’t watch. As soon as we ban a particular program, that’s all our kids can think about. They may not be able to watch it when we’re home, but there are increasingly more and more avenues to watch programs, outside of the family room television. This is a great opportunity to help your children develop critical thinking skills. Watch some of these questionable shows with your kids, then have a discussion afterward: What did you think of that? Did you agree with the choices that were made? How do you think the others felt? What else do you think they could have done? This is not an opportunity to “correct” the thinking of our kids, but to ask them some open-ended questions and let them consider some new ways of looking at the situation. If you think the show is so extremely inappropriate that you can’t even bear the thought of sitting together and allowing your kids to watch even one episode, discuss the show instead. Remember, anything that is banned becomes just that much more appealing and there’s a good chance they’ll find a way to watch it anyway, so this is a good opportunity to demystify the show and remove the “charge” from the situation. If television isn’t the source of a power struggle, it often becomes less and less of a big deal, and less and less interesting.

Because the reality is that television is only as important as we make it. Remember my daughter the junkie? There’s only one thing she has a greater addiction to than the tube: spending time with her family. She will cheerfully run off and leave the tv forgotten for a chance to go with us to the park, to the store, to the kitchen to do some baking. As always, the most potent force in a child’s life is not the lure of hours of channel surfing, but the undivided attention of her family.

I came across this great web site of Rob Nickel’s, who is a former OPP detective and is currently a world-renowned expert on cyber safety.  This link takes you straight to his Tips for Parents page, which has a lot of important information about keeping our kids safe online.  Here are some highlights:

• always have your computer in a public place in the house, not your child’s bedroom
• teach them never to meet an online friend offline unless you are with them
• make sure your kids are comfortable coming to you and that you don’t overreact when there’s a problem
• encourage discussions between you and your kids about what they enjoy online
• warn them that people aren’t always who they say they are online, and that people they chat with are not their friends, just people they chat with
• discuss and agree to Internet rules
• teach them never to give out personal information

This is just a snapshot of some of what Rob shares; it’s worth taking a closer look at.  And while you’re there, you have the opportunity to sign a petition to have the sex offender registry made public, which would all us to know if a sex offender lives in our neighbourhood.  Currently only police have access to this information — but wouldn’t you want to know if your child shares his or her neighbourhood with someone who has a history of sexual offences, especially since child molesters, of all sexual offenders, are the most likely to re-offend?  If this is information you’d want to have access to, this petition is a great place to start.

You may or may not have already had "the talk" with your kids, your daughters in particular.  You may be avoiding it like the plague, you may feel that there’s no need because if your daughter needs information she’ll come to you, or you may be confident that you’ve got the kind of relationship with your daughter that’s open and healthy, and not much slips by you. 

Here’s the problem: regardless of how you would describe your experience or expectations in this area, there’s a good chance a lot is going on that you don’t know about.

Here are some facts to consider, from a recent survey:

• "Only 22 percent of mothers think their daughters are uncomfortable talking to them about sex, while 61 percent of girls say that, in fact, they are."
• "…the actual number of 15- to 18-year-olds in our survey having oral sex (30 percent) is double the number mothers know about, or even suspect…"
• "…46 percent of girls that age who’ve had intercourse didn’t tell their moms."
• "Seventy-eight percent of surveyed girls who are no longer virgins say they’ve had sex without using a condom, and 65 percent of them admit they lied about or hid it from their mothers."
• "…a sobering 56 percent of girls who are no longer virgins have had sex without any form of birth control: Sixty-six percent of these girls have kept that a secret from Mom."
• "Even among the few girls who had an abortion, many didn’t tell."
• "…only 4 percent of girls say their moms are the biggest influence on their attitudes toward sex."

Did anything there surprise you?

These statistics are direct quotes from an article by Liz Brody in O Magazine.  Here’s a link to the full article (I definitely recommend reading the whole thing).  The survey referred to is one that was conducted jointly with O Magazine and Seventeen Magazine, in which 1000 girls ages 15-22,  and 1000 moms of girls those ages, were surveyed. 

The words I would use to describe my reaction to this survey are distressed, saddened, and re-energized.  It’s time to take control of this topic within our own families, get educated ourselves, and open up a dialogue so that we can say with 100% confidence, that the results of this survey don’t reflect what’s happening with our kids.  Here are some resources from Oprah to get you started:

First of all, read the whole article.  Make sure you have accurate information in order to answer any questions she may have, learn from what’s worked (and not) from the moms interviewed, and decide what approach you’ll take with your daughter.

There’s also an online quiz you can take to determine how well you’ve been doing in this area with your own daughter.  It’s another great resource.

If you know that your daughter is thinking about having sex with her boyfriend, Dr Laura Berman, a sex therapist who has been a part of this discussion on Oprah’s show, has a list of questions to ask your daughter and her boyfriend before they go ahead with their plan.  You can find the questions here.

Dr Berman has also prepared a handbook for parents to talk to their kids about sex, regardless of their age.  It’s great — get it here.  And on that same page is a set of visual aids that you can use in your own talk, as well as a video of Dr Berman coaching a mom through the talk with her daughter. 

Take a deep breath.  You can do it!

Sleep-overs are an important rite of passage for teens and pre-teens.  But any parent who’s ever hosted one will tell you that the potential for disaster (spills and messes, hurt feelings, mischief and trouble) is very high.  Work with your kids to pick the guest list carefully.  Keeping the guest list under control will not only mean that you probably won’t have to worry about finding space for everyone to spread their sleeping bag, and it will also help to minimize personality conflicts between guests.  There are no hard and fast rules — some people suggest limiting the number of guests to the number of years in your child’s age.  But if you have a ten year old, or a 12 year old, the thought of having that many kids over to your house might very well make your head spin around.  Base your guest limit on your child’s maturity level, experience with slumber parties, and how well you know the kids involved.  Nothing’s worse than having a child invited to your house to sleep over, who then gets excluded and teased all night.

Depending on the age of the kids, you may be in charge of organizing games and activities, or you may not.  Regardless, checking in on everyone occasionally is a must.  Some groups will require more supervision than others, of course, so gauge your involvement level as needed.

You probably have a vision as to how the night is going to unfold.  This may include ground rules and absolute no-no’s.  Share these expectations with your pint sized host before the guests arrive.  Setting an expectation of how long noise is acceptable for, what time you expect "lights out" to be, and where in the house the guests are allowed to roam should all be agreed upon before the exciting event starts.

Or, if all of this just seems too much to wrap your mind around, consider what my cousin did for her daughter: host an "almost" sleep over.  Her daughter and friends were just old enough to want a sleep-over, but just young enough that the idea of sleeping away from Mom and Dad was a bit scary, and my cousin wasn’t up for consoling and reassuring all night.  So she invited her daughter’s friends to come over in the early evening in the their pj’s, and they played a few games, made their own pizzas, had cake and junk food, then everyone was picked up and taken home right before bed time.  A big success!  The sleep- over without the pretence or expectation of sleep: perfect.

I think every parent wants to raise a polite child.  Sometimes how that is defined varies from family to family, but overall, there are some things that we have as a culture generally decided are rude.  One of those things is when a child doesn’t answer or mumbles when spoken to by an adult.  This can be a tough one for shy kids, but it’s an important lesson, not only in manners, but also in making friends, developing relationships, and if not being comfortable, then at least being able to function in new situations.

The three basics that you can focus on with your kids are making eye contact, smiling, and saying hello.  Of those three, eye contact may be the most intimidating, but encourage your kids to at least look at the person they’re speaking to, even if they’re actually looking at their eyebrows instead of their eyes.

The other part of a being a good conversationalist is avoiding yes-or-no responses. If someone asks your child about a hobby or sport he’s involved in, help him to think about things that he can say to keep the conversation going himself.  It might be to mention an aspect of the sport that he really loves, or an achievement he and/or his team have recently reached, or an interesting fact about what he’s doing.  This helps kids to feel as though they are an equal member of the conversation and that they have something valuable to contribute to the discussion.

Starting out with a few conversation basics is a valuable investment in your child’s social confidence and skill, regardless of how old — or shy — he may be.  Letting your kids off the hook because they don’t enjoy or feel uncomfortable with this kind of conversation doesn’t do them any favours, nor does answering for them or making excuses about why they can’t look at a person when they’re speaking to them.  These are valuable skills we all need to have to succeed socially, as children and as adults, and a little bit of training and coaching now can ease the discomfort kids may be feeling today and avoid continued discomfort as they age.

Most of us are familiar with separation anxiety as it relates to infants and toddlers, but what do you do if your middle-school kid or teenager still has a fear of being away from home or away from you?

Our first reaction is often to try and talk our kids out of their fears.  Explaining to them why there’s no need to be concerned or that they need to grow up and just get over it, though, usually do very little to reassure them that they have nothing to be concerned about.  Assuming that there is no history of trauma when separated from parents, this may be more of an irrational fear than a rational one, and trying to rationalize an irrational fear doesn’t usually produce much success.

A more effective strategy is to really listen to what’s bothering your child, then work together to come up with some strategies to cope with and eventually overcome these fears.  Take small steps, provide reassurance along the way, and create a backup plan in case things get too stressful.  Let your child know that you don’t mind coming to pick her up in the wee hours of the morning if needed, or driving two hours to bring him home from camp if he’s too unhappy.  Build on small successes, don’t try to minimize or talk your kids out of their fears, and plan ahead — these actions will all help your kids to overcome their fears of being away from home.

Switching schools or classes in the middle of the school year can be hard for younger kids, especially when they don’t know anyone in the new place yet. 

Work with the teacher to find out if there are any kids in the class who might be a good fit as a friend for your child, even if they haven’t really spent much time playing together yet.  Invite the classmate over for a play date, then have some fun and interactive activities planned for them.  Avoid watching tv or a movie, because there’s little time spent interacting while glued to the tube; aim for activities like crafts, games, or other structured activities that you can guide them through at first,then let them take over from there as they begin to hit their stride.

Consider registering your child for an activity or camp that fosters interaction, like Guides or Scouts, or a team sport.  (An added bonus might be that you can increase your own social network, too — a friend commented that the best thing they had ever done for their social life as adults was sign their kids up for soccer, because now all of their friends were parents of kids on the team!)  Don’t forget family activities and family friends who are the same age as your child, as an opportunity for your son or daughter to develop a sense of confidence when dealing with peers, that they can then take with them to the schoolyard.

Sometimes, there will be periods when your child doesn’t have anyone else to play with.  For those in-between times, by spending time with your child yourself, you’re sending a clear message that s/he is definitely still someone worth being around.  That’s also a critical booster for a young one’s self image and self esteem.

Someone asked me recently what to do when you don’t like your teenage son or daughter’s boyfriend/girlfriend.  It’s definitely a tricky subject.  While as parents we don’t want to watch our kids blindly stumble through life, making wrong choice after wrong choice, when we, with our gifts of objectivity, perspective, and experience, can help them out, the reality is, there’s not much we can do in situations like this.  Ultimately, the decision of whom to date is the sole responsibility of our kids (unless you belong to a culture where the parents take full responsibility for their children’s dating…but if that were the case, we wouldn’t be having this conversation anyway).  Here are some thoughts on how to proceed…

Start off by having a gentle conversation with your teen about what you see happening.  If you have run-of-the-mill concerns because you think the (let’s assume you have a daughter with a boyfriend) boyfriend is too needy, too selfish, too impolite, too whatever, coming right out and saying that you think he’s a jerk is automatically going to turn your daughter off.  Here’s the catch: it will still turn her off even if she secretly agrees with you.  She has an investment in not having you know and be right about everything at this point in her life, so she’s not going to readily admit that you’ve got a point if you come at her with both guns blazing.  It’s a matter of principle.

Instead, let her know in a respectful and gentle way that you have some concerns, and that you want to make sure that she’s ok.  Approaching her from a position of concern and love is going to be better received than from a position of animosity, frustration, or defensiveness.  Your messages of love and concern may still be met with hostility from your teen.  That’s ok; you tried.  Let it go at this point.  You can make gentle statements of acknowledgement of what’s happening, without sliding into sarcasm or lectures, from now on, just to let her know that you still have her on your radar and that you haven’t washed your hands of her relationship.  In a sense, you’re agreeing to disagree.  This will be important to her if she decides in the future that she wants to extricate herself from the relationship, because now she knows that you’ll still be there for her to talk to, without judgment or "I told you so". 

Some examples of this kind of acknowledgement might be

• You are a really great friend to (give up your free afternoon/tutor him/help him clean out the garage).
• He’s lucky to have you to support him during (the loss of his grandmother/tough exam time/his parents’ divorce).
• I’m here if you need me, and I know you’re a smart cookie who can decide what’s best for her
• I love you no matter what.

What if you think your daughter may be the recipient of abuse at the hands of her boyfriend?  Ahh, that’s a different kettle of fish.  This situation causes parents to hit the panic button — and rightly so.  It’s important to tread carefully here, though, because you don’t want to inadvertently push her away from you and closer to him.  Abusers are fantastic at twisting facts and perceptions around so that our girl doesn’t know which way is up, and worries that she’s too far in to be able to ask for help to get out.  Embarrassment, fear, shame, and not wanting to disappoint can also be playing a factor. 

It’s important for you to speak to someone with experience in this area (i.e. a counsellor or psychologist, family doctor, or expert in helping girls in abusive relationships), as it’s a complicated and dangerous situation — there’s more to know than what I can cover here.  Here are some thoughts on where to start.  If you think that your daughter is being mistreated, tell her so.  Be loving and willing to listen to her; sometimes it takes girls a while to wrap their minds around the fact that this guy who treats her so well at times is actually an abusive boyfriend.  If you try to strong-arm her into listening to you and trusting you when she wants to believe something else, you’re now doing exactly the same thing to her that he is.  Be loving, be supportive, check in with her every once in a while as to how she’s doing and if there’s anything she would like you to do for her.  Read up on abusive teen relationships and know what additional supports are out there for her.  Show her through your actions that you are not the controlling, demanding, emotionally-blackmailing type of person that her boyfriend is by offering her unconditional love and support, and get outside help for both of you when the time is right.

Here’s a resource for teens in abusive relationships: TEAR: Teens Experiencing Abusive Relationships

And here’s one for you as a parent: Dr Jill Murray, an expert in abusive relationships

If you are a social butterfly, but you’ve got a kid who’d rather play alone than attend a party, it can lead a parent to wonder if there’s a problem.  The real question to ask may be, "Is my child lonely or a loner?" 

Lonely kids want to participate, but just don’t know how.  They may hang around the outskirts of a game, group of kids, or playground, watching, but too shy to approach the other kids and ask to join.  These kids often complain of being bored when they’re home alone with you, and seem unhappy with the level of social interaction they have.

Loners, on the other hand, are perfectly content to be by themselves.  They make their own fun — if the lonely child is hovering on the outskirts of the playground watching the other kids enjoy themselves, the loner is content creating to do his or her thing all alone.  These kids aren’t bothered by being by themselves, and may in fact thrive on this time without outside distractions or stimulation.

Temperament plays a big part here.  While we often think of extroverts as people who are friendly, outgoing, and confident, and introverts as shy, withdrawn, and reserved, those are not generally the definitions used when referring to extroversion and introversion in their truest forms.  Being an extrovert means that you gain energy from being around others, whereas introverts may find that kind of activity draining; they gain energy from being alone or being in a small group of people (as in one or two others).  So it is very possible for introverts to be comfortable being in groups or speak confidently to a group of people, it’s just that they’ll probably need some downtime alone afterward!

So don’t worry if your child seems perfectly content with his or her own company, even if you can’t make sense of why they don’t want to have a huge blow-out birthday party.  If your child is lonely, though, talk with him about ways to connect with others, perhaps chat with his teacher about his or her observations of your child’s behaviour and see if the teacher can offer any suggestions, and be reassuring that these kinds of social skills can be learned with a bit of persistence.