Positive Parenting And Using Incentive Programs

I'm a big believer in reasonably rewarding your child or children with incentives. It's worked in my house for years. However, it is not a one size fits all process. You will have to find out what leverage or incentive works best for your child.

With my son, his leverage is using tv or video games. My daughter can be more complicated. Usually a small treat or dollar store type toy works best. But there are many ideas you can use. I've also used a bag with "coupon" type of rewards that worked really well. A coupon or ticket might say "bake with mom" or "pick a game of your choice."

There are all types of sites that offer free printables for incentive charts. I found this Kidz Pointz website that offers a ton of great incentive charts and other resources. Some other great home reward suggestions listed by age group are listed on this site.
Whatever task or behavior change you are trying to bring forth, make sure to be consistent, pick an incentive program that your child gets excited about, and make a big deal about praising the positive behavior.

Coping with Child Anxiety

If you are a parent with a child who suffers from anxiety, you know how frustrating it can be. You want to help your child but you don't know how and it leaves you feeling desperate while your heart is aching for them.

This is how I felt nearly a year ago when my son began having panic attacks and severe anxiety around bedtime. The one thing I did know was that I was going to find the resources to get him help. A good place to start is your pediatrician. Our pediatrician was very helpful in referring child psychologists to contact. Even before our initial appointment the psychologist recommended some very useful books and workbooks.

A wonderful book is called Freeing Your Child From Anxiety by Tamar E. Chansky, Ph.D. And there are two workbooks that my son and I did together from "What-to-Do Guides for Kids." We used What to Do When You Worry Too Much and What to Do When You Dread You Bed. These are great tools for kids in overcoming anxiety using cognitive-behavioral techniques in a very child friendly way.

They are illustrated and interactive. In the "worry" guide, it compares the worry thoughts to a tomato plant that keeps growing and growing because you are tending to it. Just like worries will grow if you pay too much attention to them.

No matter what the anxiety is, know that it will be a process, and you will need to take little steps, and be VERY patient in helping your child deal with his or her fears. The resources along with the therapy have been completely helpful! No more panic attacks and sleeping soundly back in bed - hooray!

A Guide to Daily Happiness for Kids

Are you a bucket filler or a bucket dipper??

I just bought this wonderful children's book called Have You Filled a Bucket Today? by Carol McCloud. It is the winner of many awards including the Mom's Choice Award. It is a story about how everyone carries around an invisible bucket, and our job is to fill our bucket with happy thoughts and feelings and how to help other people fill their buckets by doing nice things for them. In Judaism we call that doing mitzvot; good deeds.

I love when simple stories like this have profound messages and take tangible things, like in this case a child's toy to create a symbol for compassionate behavior. It also reminds me of one of my all time favorite books, Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson. We also have WMMC for Kids. My son always enjoys when I read him this story about about making changes and overcoming fears, when two little mice and Hem and Haw can't find their "old" cheese in a maze, and what they have to do to find "new" cheese. This story had a huge impact on my life when I had to make a big life-changing decision several years ago.

Have you filled somebody's bucket today?