Category: Everything Parenting
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Teaching Kindness
It’s almost the last thing we hear as we leave the worship service in church each week. The pastor instructs the people to “live in harmony with one another.” It’s an exhortation rooted in the last verse of Ephesians chapter 4, in which Saint Paul tells us to “Be kind and compassionate to one another.”…
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Learning and the Senses
Our brains constantly receive and interpret messages that come through our senses. The brain recalls a sound as a siren or the word hello. It can recognize the face of a friend or appreciate beautiful scenery. It registers the feel of a blanket as soft and cuddly. The taste of chocolate is different from that…
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Depression: No Laughing Matter
Talk about a conversation killer. “So, I’m working on a new article and the topic’s depression.” The small crowd gathered around the party table seemed suddenly very intent on their meatballs and chicken wings. “No comment,” said one, but still I pressed, knowing several there had struggled with depression in the past. “Really? No comment?”…
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Responsibility and Kids
Children are not born with a natural inclination to be responsible. It doesn’t suddenly appear at age 12 or in the first year of high school or when a teen gets a driver’s license. Children learn responsibility by being taught it, by practicing it, and by observing it in their parents. When we fail to…
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Parental Guidance Required
As I came into the mall, I saw a kiosk near the doorway with a poster of smiling adults and children, designed to draw my attention. The top of the kiosk had three letters: PGR. I wondered that that means, so I looked a little closer and picked up a brochure from the rack. Well,…
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Four R’s for Christian Parenting
Parents have often wished: “It would be great if children came with an instruction book, so we would always know what to do and say while raising them! If only we had a clear set of parental directions—ones we could rely on and refer to as we make the myriad of child-rearing decisions each day.…
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Celebrating Easter with Small Children
Easter Scene in a Pie Pan: Two weeks before Palm Sunday, fill a metal pie pan with potting soil and plant barley or cat grass (available at pet stores). Mist daily. On Palm Sunday, glue a paper figure of Jesus riding a donkey to a wooden craft stick and stand in the pie pan. Use…
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Create a Balance
Watching a child compete for the first (or forty-first) time is a thrill for parents. They remember their child’s first steps and reflect on that memory as their child flies down a basketball court or across a finish line. Grins cover parents’ faces as their child suits up in the team’s uniform. Bringing up a…