Children | KidsDirect

Solutions to the Homework Dilemma

By Dr. Kalman Heller, Child and Family Psychologist The After-School Ritual The ritual usually starts with the first after-school sighting of a child by a parent. “How much homework do you have?” Should parents help with homework? Eventually comes the inevitable “Have you done your homework?” For a lot of parents, a real chunk of every evening goes to assisting, checking, or arguing about homework. Time with our kids is so limited and so precious. Is this really how it should be spent? No. What Parents Are Actually Responsible For What is a parent’s actual responsibility when it comes to

Polarized Parenting Hurts Everyone

By Dr. Kalman Heller, Child and Family Psychologist “She makes a different dinner for each kid.”“He walks into the house and starts criticizing the children.”“She threatens a punishment and then forgets about it.”“He gets too angry, the children are afraid of him.”“She lets them get away with too much.”“He punishes them too much.”“She doesn’t support me, and the kids know it.”“His father was never around, he doesn’t know what to do.” When Natural Differences Go Bad These are among the most common statements parents make in my office. They reflect natural differences that have gone bad. Parents are rarely identical

how fathers stay connected long work hours

Fathering When You’re not Home Very Much

By Dr. Kalman Heller, Child and Family Psychologist When Career and Fatherhood Compete for Time In today’s family life, it’s not just men putting in exceptionally long hours outside the home. But men have historically found it harder to build strong relationships with each of their family members. For a lot of husbands and fathers, being dedicated to a successful career is still the main way they express caring. But in an era of shifting marital roles, and growing recognition that relationship intimacy is a real factor in physical health, men are being encouraged to get more “connected” to their

Pros and Cons of Summer Tutoring

Pros and Cons of Summer Tutoring at a Glance By Dr. Kalman Heller, Child and Family Psychologist Before you decide anything, here’s the short version. A meta-analysis of 39 studies found kids come back to school in the fall testing about a month behind where they left off in spring, and math skills alone can slide by 25 to 34 percent over the break. That’s a real gap. But tutoring isn’t automatically the right answer for every kid, and it comes with real tradeoffs too. Here’s how it breaks down. The Pros It can close a real gap before it

How to Keep Kids Safe Online

This page has been through a few decades of internet history at this point. It first went up back when “safe surfing” mostly meant chat rooms and dial-up modems. Some of what we said back then still holds up. A lot of it doesn’t. This is basically how to keep kids safe online. Here’s the current version. The Basics Every Kid Should Know Some ground rules never really go out of style, they just need updating for wherever kids actually spend their time now, whether that’s a group chat, a game, or a video app. Never share your full name,

Back to School Tips

By KidsDirect Editorial Team Helping Your Child Ease Back Into the School Year Summer’s easy pace and school’s actual schedule are two completely different rhythms, and jumping straight from one to the other rarely goes smoothly. Most kids need a little runway. The good news is that a handful of small, deliberate changes in the two weeks before school starts can make that landing a lot softer, for your child and for you. This is back to school transition tips for parents Reset the Sleep Schedule First Sleep is the piece that makes everything else possible. Kids ages 6

Quick Test for Dads

By KidsDirect Editorial Team How involved are you really? This quick self check walks through seven habits that research keeps linking to strong father child relationships. Answer honestly. Nobody’s grading this but you. Below is a quick test for dads involvement 1Effective dads teach mostly through role modeling, and that only works if you’re actually around to model anything. Are you really “there” for your child? Do you work 60 or more hours a week? Do you travel overnight more than 50 days a year? Do you live in a different city than your child? Do you spend twice as

Dad’s Checklist for Baby Delivery

What to Pack in Your Hospital Bag Before Labor Starts Whether you’re planning a trendy home birth with a doula, a calm water birth in a tub, or a regular trip to the hospital like most parents, you need to get ready ahead of time. Once the contractions start, there’s not much room left for clear thinking. Start by putting together a hospital bag and stashing it somewhere easy to grab, like by the front door or in the trunk of your car. Not every item here applies to every family. Treat this as a starting point and build your

Tips for New Dads

By KidsDirect Editorial Team Tips for New Dads Dads Make a Difference Playing an active, hands on role in your child’s life matters for their emotional, physical, and cognitive development. Babies with involved dads tend to feel more secure, since they learn early on that either parent can meet their needs. Later on, those kids tend to have more confidence and do better in school. We’ve gone deeper into what involved fathers actually do for their kids, but the short version is that showing up consistently, starting now, pays off for years. Becoming a Dad A lot of fathers describe

Dads for the First Time

By KidsDirect Editorial Team Confessions of a First-Time Father Being a first-time father is a rather scary experience. It’s nothing like facing down a grizzly bear with your bare hands or having your in-laws come to stay with no departure date, but it’s up there on the scary scale. Since I was the youngest in my family, I had no experience with babies. When I was growing up, babies were very little people who smelled funny and were quickly handed to your sister the second they started to cry. Babies didn’t seem like such a difficult thing back then. The