Archive for the ‘Cognitive Development’ category

The Role of Play in Children’s Learning

September 23rd, 2011

Play plays a fundamental part of learning how to communicate as well as cognitive development. Many parents do not realize the significance of intertwining play with learning and what it can accomplish as far as the child’s natural development is concerned. So this article will be an attempt to emphasize the all important role of play in the natural development of a child’s life.

All work and no play & you know how the rest of this old saying goes. It ends with Jack becoming a dull boy. But the truth of the matter is this may have been meant literally and figuratively. As in dulling the senses and destroying Jack’s interest in learning itself.

Not allowing for play can become a serious problem which causes all kinds of social and developmental delays.

During the first few years of a child’s life the brain is growing and in a much more impressionable state than it will ever be in again. It is when the little being of life, the person behind the brain is experiencing everything for the first time and without any previous information to compare anything. It has a clean slate.

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Importance of Hobbies for Children

September 19th, 2011

There was a time when the only recreation, children had was to keep themselves physically and mentally active through outdoor games and indoor hobbies. What we see today is a large number of kids wasting their childhood playing video games and surfing the net, all day-all week long. There is no doubt that the Internet is a rich source of knowledge, nonetheless not everything in the web world is useful information.

Let’s go a little further and simply state that there is a lot of things on the Internet which are not meant for children and they must be kept away from such influences. However why put yourself in a situation wherein you have to monitor your child’s every move while surfing the net, instead why not encourage them to pursue interesting hobbies. This article discusses the importance of hobbies for children, meant for benefit of both parents as well as kids.

Why Hobbies are Important for Children?

#1 Ignites Creativity
Hobbies, such as poetry and story writing, painting and sketching, clay modeling and pottery, help children use their creative abilities in order to make something unique. They use their imagination while doing these activities. They learn to think and visualize so as to come up with newer ideas. There is nothing creative about playing digital games at home and sitting on the couch all day. Instead kids must be encouraged to make up imaginary scenarios and create a game out of it, which they can play with their parents and friends at home or elsewhere.

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Spirit Children

September 16th, 2011

The concept of spirit children is a belief held by many ancient cultures. The belief is based on the idea that a spirit child selects his parents before or at the time of conception. Along with this idea it is only reasonable to assume the parents would also have to agree to this arrangement.

This falls in line completely with the concept of free will, which we all possess. Nothing is done in our life or pre-existence without our consent. Free will has a play in every aspect of life, one simply cannot have free will in choosing whether to have a hamburger or fish sandwich and not have free will in choosing every aspect of our life. Free Will is a law of Nature and thus cannot be changed.

The Aborigines of the Australian out back were and still are firm believers of the spirit child theory. They accept it unequivocally, even going so far as to accept the child if the known father is someone else than the mother’s mate. In aborigine custom, the father has to dream of the child before it can be his. The dream actually has more to do with parental lineage than sperm.

Many times a male aborigine will dream of his child many years before conception. Many times the dream occurs during periods of hunting or isolation from their families. In a representative dream, a small dark-skinned spirit-child, two to three inches high, reveals its name and expresses a desire for birth. If the man has several wives, he chooses the most appropriate mother and describes her whereabouts to the spirit-child. Often times the spirit child will tell the father of another soul desiring to be his spirit child and that such child will arrive in so many years.

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Try Building Character In Children

September 12th, 2011

In an effort to teach children how to be responsible, respectful, and honest throughout their lives, schools throughout the United States have implemented structured character education classes. For the most part, parents are extremely supportive of these types of programs because they want their children to learn how to respect others, how to have integrity, and how to exhibit self-control.

Building character is also the responsibility of parents, however, so it is not something that can just be left up to school systems to take care of. Teaching and helping your children to build solid characters is one of the most difficult and time consuming parts of parenting, but there are some general tips you can follow that will help you to put your children on the right path from an early age.

  1. Parenting should always come first – this may be one of the most basic, yet challenging things for busy parents to do. There are so many demands on our time that it is often an easy thing to pass on spending quality time with your kids. Good parents make time to spend with their kids on a regular, consistent basis, and it goes a long way towards developing strong, positive character traits in children.
  2. Set a good example – it is very important for parents to be exceptional role models for their children. Like it or not, your kids look to you as an example of how adults should behave, so you will be the biggest influence in shaping your children’s character traits.
  3. Pay attention to what your children see and hear – kids tend to absorb pretty much everything they are exposed to (good and bad). Carefully monitor what your kids watch on television, what they do online, the songs they listen to, and the books that they read. All of these have a tremendous influence on developing children’s characters.
  4. Listen to your kids – this is just as important as spending quality time with them. Take the time to listen to what they have to say and most importantly, take them seriously when they talk to you.
  5. Practice responsible punishment – punishment tends to get a lot of bad press these days. People report that parents take things too far or not far enough, which results in children that are out of control and undisciplined. Punishment has always been part of the way that human beings learn, and if used in a reasonable manner, it will only serve to strengthen your children’s characters.
  6. Use clear language – children can only learn to distinguish between what is right and what is wrong through the use of clear, direct language. If you are direct with your kids, it will help them to develop a clear sense of how to behave throughout life.
  7. Make family meal time important – the trend in America for the past couple of decades has been for family meal time to gradually die out. Fewer and fewer families sit down to have a regular meal together, and the result is a loss of values and ideals. Children learn a great deal about manners, rules, and values through shared meals with their families, so it is important that parents make every effort to keep this tradition alive.

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Cognitive Therapy For Children – A Family Approach

August 10th, 2011

In recent years, cognitive behavioral psychotherapy with children and adolescents is receiving an increasing amount of attention. While cognitive behavior therapy with children and adolescents considered as an effective and widely used therapeutic approach, most cognitive behavioral therapists lack skills when it comes to working with parents and other family members.

Research shows that most childhood disorders are associated with family problems. Children’s difficulties occur in a familial context and family members play a role in the initiation, maintenance, as well as exacerbation of children’s problems.

However, there are few cognitive behavioral approaches to family therapy. This is regrettable for at least two reasons. First, children and adolescents infrequently refer themselves to therapy and typically are brought to therapy by powerful others such as peers, teachers, and institutions. Second, cognitive therapists working with individual youngsters rarely include other family members and create a consistent environment to effect generalizable and enduring changes in the family context.

Since the beginning, family therapy has been interested in how interactions between family members can create and maintain problem behavior. Family therapists are also interested in the circular nature of causality (A influences B influences C influences A). A family therapy approach in cognitive behavioral therapy allows therapists to gain an understanding of how the child’s context can create, maintain and change the presenting problem. It also allows the child not the feel stigmatized. In addition, the family can learn to be supportive to the child experiencing mental health difficulties.

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