How do children learn about guilt?

Guilt is a complex emotion to learn, it requires a set of rules to be known, knowledge of what it means to break them, knowledge of what they should have done and then the ability to put things right.  When it’s explained like that there are a large number of composite steps involved and that’s …

Why family rules are important

Why should you have family rules Boundaries are important to children.  It’s how they learn a huge number of skills, these vary according to age: As a baby boundaries set the internal regulators that we rely on as adults.  We learn how far our emotions need to go before they get capped (and in turn …

How to deal with children hitting other children

What makes children hit other children More often than not when I see children hitting other children it’s due to a social need.  For example they are cross with what the other child has said or done.  If this is the case then this is not acceptable and they must apologise. Hitting other children is …

How to deal with siblings arguing

What causes siblings to argue There’s a whole mixture of things happening here, and part of it depends on the age of your children. First of all it may be that one or more of your children may be at the social stage where play is initiated through some kind of physical contact.  We see …

Managing tantrums

What causes tantrums? Generally tantrums are caused by the brain being overloaded.  Often what happens is that the brain hasn’t learnt how to process the emotions that your child is currently feeling.  That’s why logic and reason don’t work at this point. And that’s why this is the point when we’ve felt like smacking them …

Teach children more than they learn at school

For adolescents it is important to stimulate the neurons growing in their mind as much as possible before they reach the middle of puberty.  This help stimulate the different areas of the brain so that as it rewires over the following few years in preparation for adulthood.  The best way of doing that is to …

The 6 Shifts Tomorrow Needs Us To Make

What tomorrow’s world will be like Technology is advancing so fast that it will change the way the world operates for our children.  By the time they grow up it is predicted that robots will be far cheaper than humans to do many jobs, that Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be a reality and that they …

Virtual Reality and Children – what every parent needs to know

Virtual Reality Headsets – what harm do they do to children? Virtual reality is the concept of being able to enter an imaginary world created by technology.  Currently this is achieved by wearing goggles or headsets with a screen in or a mobile phone slotted in.  The device recognises which way the user is facing …

The relationship habit that works best for more than 20 seconds

Helping your child’s emotions We learn the importance of cuddling when we are infants, it helps bond us to our mother.  It’s one of the lessons we pick up in the first few weeks of our lives, that when we are upset or emotionally aroused in some way that we can be reassured by a …

10 common causes of a child’s tantrum

What causes a tantrum Tantrums test and challenge even the calmest and most experienced parents. After all, a child in full meltdown is not a pretty sight!  You’re stressed, you’re feeling guilty, you feel like a bad parent and then you have to cope with the screaming, shouting, stamping feet, and throwing themselves on the …