BabySmileKids.com

Glenn Doman, founder of The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential, describes why teaching your baby to read is so important for his future. For more information on how to multiply your baby’s intelligence, visit: www.iahp.org

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iem1HJAEAsE&hl=en

Animals should be treated kindly. Children should be taught from an early age to be nice to them. An innocent child might not understand that it is easy to hurt an animal, and they need to be taught. Before you buy them a pet, you can let them practice taking care of a stuffed animal friend first.

A stuffed dog or cat is ideal for the lesson, since you would most likely get one of these as actually pets. Other common choices are rabbits and birds. A young toddler can learn what type of animal it is, and what to do with it.

The first lesson can be what sound does the animal make. After that, they can learn how to pet the animal, or how to hold it. Do not let them through it or hit it, because you want to teach them how to be nice to the real animal. Explain what kinds of things the animal likes to do as you play. For example, dogs like to play fetch, and bird like to sing or fly. If you get the child used to the sounds and types of activity that the actual animal typically does, they will be less afraid if you do decide to buy the real thing as a pet.

Another lesson you can give them is how to feed the animal. You can pretend to have food or use fake food for this part. Dogs and cats usually have their own bowls to eat out of. This is a good time to explain that animals need special food, and they should not be fed ice cream, cake, or vegetables from our plates, because this might make them sick.

If you really want to prepare them, teach them that they will have to clean up after their pet. You can also combine this lesson with bathing and grooming the pet. With this lesson, they will have a complete idea of what it is like to treat an animal with total kindness. It will also teach them that it takes a lot of responsibility to own a dog, cat or other animal.

Stuffed animals are an easy way to teach children about kindness to animals and to prepare them for owning a pet. The visual aid will help them remember all of the important things. They might just be satisfied pretending to own a pet, especially once they realize how much effort it takes to maintain a real one.

Tomorrow I am taking my daughter to the local County Convention for our chosen political party. We probably won’t stay long – her little activity backpack doesn’t keep her occupied forever in a crowded auditorium on a Saturday – but I will consider every minute of the experience an important act of parenting.

Democracy is kind of a joke without good citizens and good citizens are hard to find in this day and age. In spite of my tireless efforts to educate the electorate on and around the University of North Texas campus during the early nineties, the majority of Americans still have no idea how much of the real work of democracy is done in the precinct conventions that meet after the polls close in primary election years, and then in the county, state and national conventions of the parties. It is these conventions that truly decide party platforms, presidential nominees and more. They are important, but so poorly attended that it is not uncommon for a precinct convention to be in the position of needing to nominate 18 delegates to the county convention out of a group of five or six attendees. Kind of pathetic, isn’t it?

It is very important to me that my daughter grows up understanding the importance of the democratic process, rather than partaking in widespread apathy. To that end, she has often attended the polls with me over the years and we even snagged her a sample election ballot to take to school for show and tell when it was time to study the letter E at the same time as a local election. She has attended two precinct conventions with me and this will be her second county convention. Maybe not enough involvement to be elected Party Chair, but it’s pretty good for a kindergartener whose parents are not politicians.

We also encourage her to write letters to “her” elected officials when she has a concern, and she is building up a pretty good scrapbook of responses. We have lively discussions about the pros and cons of various political and economic systems, about why children aren’t allowed to vote, about why my husband and I aren’t voting for her friend’s mother…you get the idea.

Good citizens don’t grow on trees; they grow in families who model good citizenship. If our children are the future, they must learn to shape it. We can’t expect civics class to do it if we won’t. We’re the ones they’re watching.

We are all a whirlwind of emotions that seem to jockey for position. As we reach adulthood through the calendar years and gain experience that can’t quite be measured in such terms, we learn to identify them. For kids it’s harder to identify their emotions.

Teaching kids to identify their emotions before they succumb to reaction is the job of the parents and adults -teachers, guidance counselors- raising the kids. It is most important to imbue a sound foundation for identifying and correcting their emotions so that they mature into rational adults who can control the emotions of anger, jealousy, before mania prompts them to act in a way that will be detrimental to themselves or society.

Many adults react without thought and that stems from a childhood and adolescence when they weren’t made privy to the ramifications and causes of such emotions without identification and the correct interpretation. Understanding why one feels enraged when the car in front of them cuts them off or they miss an exit on the freeway and find themselves treating their steering wheel as if it were a punching bag, may reduce stress if they can consider why such a mundane act triggered that reaction, before their knuckles start bleeding.

Teaching kids to identify their emotions is a fundamental part of being a parent or guardian. As much as it may appear that the words aren’t sinking in, parents should recognize that although behavior and response may not at first indicate that the words or ideas are getting through, repetition and talking to them, asking them questions about how they feel and why they think they do, offering answers that they may not have the vocabulary to explain, is stored in their minds and will assert itself at the appropriate time in the future.

However, if adults do not have the education to teach kids to identify their emotions, perhaps the PTAs of school districts can offer seminars for the parents and guardians. Those parents and guardians who have access to the internet can educate themselves as to the best course of action for addressing the concerns for their children.

It’s not enough to tell kids to stay in school and progress through the ranks to college and beyond. Educating kids that it is important to graduate high school and go to college to get a well paying job is no more important for their lives as is identifying emotions. “The real world” beyond education is littered with many situations where self-control and self-interpretation of emotions is crucial in social networks in the workplace and in their personal life, which impact and influence each other.

Perhaps the most important lessons in life have less to do with the outside world and how it rolls on its axis and more to do with understanding ourselves and our own reactions.