Parenting

Effective Conflict Resolution Strategies for Kids

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Reading Time: 6 minutes Conflicts are inevitable in human interactions and arise when individuals have different opinions, wants, or needs. This is a lesson children learn early. Whether it’s a friendly debate about which game to play or a spat over a shared toy, these everyday disagreements are opportunities for children to learn about empathy, communication, and collaborative problem-solving. Conflicts can manifest in various shapes and situations. In positive conflicts, where both parties are on equal footing and motivated to find a solution, the conflict often becomes a constructive …

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Teaching Kids Fogging Techniques Against Verbal Bullying

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Reading Time: 6 minutes Verbal bullying and complaints are communicative expressions but differ significantly in intent, effect, and purpose. Verbal bullying is an aggressive behaviour characterized by repeated harmful statements intending to belittle, hurt, or intimidate someone. It can manifest as name-calling, taunting, threatening, or derogatory remarks. It is essential to note that verbal bullying is not a one-time insult. Instead, it is systematic, recurring, and intended to exercise power. In contrast, complaints generally originate from dissatisfaction or concern about a situation or behaviour without the intent to …

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Unwrapping The German Tradition of Schultüte

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Reading Time: 3 minutes Image Credit: Pixabay Schultüte is a cherished tradition in Germany designed to ease the anxieties of the little ones starting first grade. Parents or godparents would make a Schultüte (“school cone”) or a Zuckertüte (“sugar cone”) at home, mark it with the children’s names, and take it to school to hang it in the “Schultütenbaum” (school cone tree). Then, on their first school day, children would pick their cones from the magic Schultütenbaum on the school grounds, careful not to break them. After the …

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Rubber Duck Debugging – Making Problem Solving Child’s Play

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Reading Time: 3 minutes When we hit a wall with a problem, a simple way to solve it is to take a break and explain the issue to a rubber duck. This entertaining concept started from a story in The Pragmatic Programmer book where a programmer would carry around a rubber duck and explain their code to the duck in detail.  You’re stuck with a difficult bug. You’ve already spent a lot of time on it, and the deadline is looming. So, you ask a co-worker for help. They walk …

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Tips and Tricks for Travelling with Kids

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Reading Time: 12 minutes Mommy, I have a feeling I have never felt before. It’s excitement, and joy, and anger that you never brought me here before, and unbelievability that something this beautiful can exist. A nine-year-old girl arriving in Venice, Italy Lawrence Cohen – The Opposite of Worry We’ve been home for a week after a long-awaited break, and I am still lingering in vacation mode. Here are some tips and tricks my husband and I use to make a family vacation enjoyable. Pre-Vacation Planning Learn from Previous …

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Integrating the Zone of Proximal Development, Deliberate Practice, and Flow into Child Education

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Reading Time: 5 minutes Lev Vygotsky introduced the concept of the zone of proximal development (ZPD) during the 1930s as a groundbreaking and counter-educational theory to the child development theories proposed by Maria Montessori or Jean Piaget. Vygotsky acknowledged the benefits of curiosity-driven settings for motor and practical skills but argued that a teacher or a more knowledgeable individual was necessary for specific domains, such as mathematics or writing. He proposed that in such areas, there are learning tasks within a child’s grasp and other tasks that are too far ahead, …

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Letters to My Daughter: Let’s Talk about Gaslighting

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Reading Time: 5 minutes Sometimes, the best warning a parent can give their child is: watch this, watch this movie a hundred times. So it is the case with the 1944 movie Gaslight, a terrifying life lesson wrapped in less than two hours. Warning: Spoilers ahead! A husband viciously exploits his wife’s sweet naivety, leading her to doubt her own sanity. As a young girl, Paula witnessed the murder of her famous opera singer aunt (and guardian) in their London home. The murder isn’t solved, and Paula is sent …

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Mummy, Where Do Babies Come from? A Few Books to Spark a Gentle Introduction to a Sensitive Topic 

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Reading Time: 6 minutes I have been waiting for this question for a few years now. When my six-year-old daughter finally asked me one day about babies, I reached out to the books I had bought long ago. First, I asked my daughter what she knew about this topic. Remember the extra virgin oil commercial? Since she didn’t know anything, I proceeded with the books. I want to say there was an order to my method, but who are we kidding? I just grabbed one of the books listed …

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