HRM Parent Blog

by guest blogger, Deanna Cogdon Miller

Three can be a frustrating age. Between whines, cries and all-out tantrums lies a child who is old enough to know what they want yet still too young to do many of the things they think they can do. They begin to exert their independence - choosing to share when they feel like sharing, choosing to eat when they feel like eating and choosing to wear plaid tights with polka-dot skirts and striped shirts if that's what they feel like wearing. 

I fell in love with three this weekend. Of course I'm truly, madly, deeply in love with my three year old but there's something magical about the age of three that hit me over the past few days. In addition to everything mentioned above, I realized how incredible the world is to them. At this age they are just starting to really grasp everything around them and to get excited about the fact that because they are getting bigger, there are more opportunities available to them. More importantly, when you give them those opportunities, you can see the sparkle in their eyes as they soak it all in.

 Our three year old began her first swimming lessons without a parent this weekend. Before we left she was adamant that she did not want to go. She was convinced the pool was too cold, that she didn't want a boy teacher and that she already knows how to swim. We somehow got her there and she very quickly trotted off with her (female) teacher and the other kids in the class. As soon as she got into the pool and started following the teacher's instructions you could see how incredibly proud she was of herself. After each task she completed, she'd look for us with a huge smile and wait for our little claps from the sidelines.  I felt full of life watching her accomplish something new and something that was so obviously bringing her a ton of joy.

We celebrated that afternoon with her first haircut (took her a long time to get hair) and again, the joy in her face as she sat in that big chair experiencing a hair salon for the first time filled my heart. Full of questions, beaming from ear to ear and very proud to show me the locks left on the ground when it was done. As she walked out with a piece of her hair, a certificate for her first cut and a sucker it was as if she was floating.

The weekend ended with our girls participating in the MEC Citadel Highlander Kids Race. Our three year old was the youngest participant and as I ran next to her in the moat, I found myself wondering what she was thinking as all the kids passed her. It only took a few minutes for us to feel like we were all alone and as we ran she looked up at me and said, "Mommy I'm running a race." As we neared the finish line and could hear cheers coming from around the corner, her sister suddenly appeared, grabbed her hand and said, "Come on you're doing great, you're almost done." After they crossed the finish line I knelt down and gave her a hug. I couldn't help but think about how amazing this weekend had been for her.

As we walked to grab a snack and some water, I told her how proud I was of her. She was once again grinning from ear to ear. As we reached the snack table I asked her if she wanted an apple or a banana. Her arms suddenly crossed and a scowl came across her face. "I want a granola bar." "Well there's only apples and bananas." "I don't want anything." How about some water." "Only if it's in a green cup." I just had to laugh. Such a magical time. Such a frustrating time. Welcome to three.

 

Deanna lives in Dartmouth with her husband and three children. When she's not reading stories, dancing to ABBA or burping a baby, she works in communications for Bell Aliant.

These make a delicious, nut-free & school-friendly treat.  They are a great source of fiber, healthy fat and quick energy, and are very hard to keep around in my house.  You could easily substitute in a different whole grain flour, dried fruit or seed if you have favourites in your household.  

Ingredients:
2 1/4 cups of old fashioned rolled oats (not quick oats)
2 cups of spelt or whole wheat flour
1 cup of unsalted sunflower seeds
1/2 cup unsalted pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/4 cup ground flax seed
1/2 cup unsweetened coconut
3/4 cup sugar
1 tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp sea salt
1 cup dark chocolate chips or coarsely chopped dark chocolate
1 cup raisins or dried unsweetened cranberries
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup molasses
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup + 1 tsp canola oil (preferably organic)
1 cup unsweetened almond milk

To prepare: 
Preheat oven to 350F.  Line two baking trays with parchment paper.  

Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl, and wet ingredients in a separate smaller bowl.  Add wet to the dry and stir until just mixed.  Place about 8 - 2 tbsp-sized scoops of mixture per tray, pressing each scoop gently with a fork to flatten slightly.  Bake for about 20 minutes, checking the bottom occasionally to prevent burning.  Let cool on wire racks.

Makes about 32 cookies.

 

Wendy McCallum, LLB, RHN, is passionate about providing busy parents with the tools & support they need to feed their families wholesome food, so everyone can play, learn, and feel better!  She is a mother of two terrific HRM kids, aged 7 &8.  For information and recipe ideas, visit her website.

Easter is just a few short days away and for many of us look forward to this time of year to spend a bit more quality time with our families.

It's also a time for both children and adults alike to over-indulge in lots of chocolate and other treats.

As you plan your family's Easter weekend, make it a point to establish healthy traditions.  Easter provides a perfect opportunity to make healthful, outdoor family fun a bit part of what makes holidays "happy."  When your own children grow up they'll be likely to repeat traditions that bring back warm memories.

Here are a few ideas for how to work a bit of exercise into your Easter celebrations:

- Instead of chocolate eggs for your egg hunt, use hollow plastic eggs that you can open and fill with smaller treats like a handful of m&m, a few mini eggs or foil wrapped eggs or some jelly beans.  The kids will get a smaller amount of candy overall and you'll make a buck stretch a lot further.

- You can also turn your egg hunt into a treasure hunt by putting small clues in the hollow eggs, so your kids know where to look for the next one.  Bump up the activity level (and the fun quotient) by making them travel from clue to clue in a silly way, like hopping on one foot, doing the crab walk, bouncing like a bunny or crawling on their hands and knees. 

 

- Play Easter Egg Tag: Tie an empty Easter basket around each player's waist. Give each of the players some plastic eggs (you can reuse the ones you used for the egg hunt). Instruct the kids to try to get rid of their eggs by putting them in other player's baskets. The winner is the person with the least eggs in their basket or the first one to get rid of all of their eggs.

- Have an Easter bunny race: Substitute a potato sack for an old pillow cases for this one and get the kids to decorate them by drawing Easter eggs and bunnies on them with marker. Then get them to climb in so they have to hop like the Easter bunny and get them to race from one end of the yard or driveway to the other. If you're stuck inside on a rainy day, turn your living room or playroom into an Easter bunny obstacle course - get your little bunnies to hop around furniture and crawl under coffee tables to slow them down. Or get them to go one at a time and time them, to avoid them crashing in to each other if the space isn't big enough.

 

- Try your hand at Easter-egg bocce ball: An Italian-inspired Easter game, this one is played with each person receiving a colored hard-boiled egg. Take a white egg and gently toss it onto the lawn or carpet. Take turns rolling the colored eggs to see who can get the closest to the white one without touching it - or breaking their egg. For real fun, try it outside with raw eggs.

- Have an egg roll race: Maybe you can't be at the annual egg roll at the White House, but you can start your own Easter tradition at home. Each child is given a hard-boiled Easter egg. The object is to get it from the starting line to the finish line. There are several ways to roll the egg. The White House version allows the kids to push it with a spoon. An alternative is to push the egg with the feet without cracking the shell. Alternately, the kids can be instructed to get on their hands and knees and push their eggs with their noses. The egg roll can be held outside if the weather is nice, or inside if the weather doesn't co-operate.

- If you're lucky, you'll get a beautiful spring day so you can get some fresh air together. Go for a family bike ride or walk in the park. Make a hopscotch  with sidewalk chalk. Climb the jungle gym at the playground or skip rocks down by the lake.

 

Dalplex, Dalhousie University's main fitness and recreation facility, has been proudly serving the community for over 30 years, offering a wide variety of fitness, wellness and recreation programs and classes for adults, children, youth and seniors.  Visit their website or follow them on facebook.

 

 

All children are by nature active learners. They are inquisitive and curious and inherently brilliant. But often, when it comes to school learning, their natural brilliance seems to fade.  

There are a multitude of reasons why children lose their natural curiosity and encounter academic trouble. In school, they are expected to follow a certain path and conform to the curriculum. They have to learn subjects at a certain pace that may not be in keeping with their personal interests. That's when their passion for learning and exploring tends to diminish; that's when children start to become passive about learning.

As parents, we don't want to see our children have difficulties in the classroom, and we want to encourage them to use all the resources that they have available to them. Luckily, it's easy to help kids develop their active learning skills.

 

What active learning means

So what exactly is active learning, and how do we make sure that children are using this important skill?

Rather than sitting in a classroom writing down notes, a student who is learning actively is asking questions about the new material, seeking understanding, and relating what he or she is being taught to pre-existing knowledge. An active mind thinks about learning. An active mind is curious -- it notices detail, infers meaning, develops understanding, integrates past experiences with the present action, and judges the appropriateness and value of anything and everything. An active mind doesn't just learn; an active mind is engaged.

Even young children can develop this skill with a little coaching and behaviour modeling from parents. In fact, all students, of any age can develop and hone their active thinking and learning abilities.

 

Encouraging active thinking

Active learning is not a skill restricted to the classroom. Children (and adults too) should always be thinking about the world around them. In fact, the more that children develop this skill outside of the classroom, the more they are able to apply it in class.

The best way to help your children develop active thinking and learning skills is to ask questions that will them help them "turn on their brains". Do this during any adventure or activity, whether it is walking in the woods or reading a book together. Ask questions: 

  - before the activity to signal to the child that he/she need to be thinking critically about something. For instance, try asking, "What do we already know about what we are about to do?" or "What do we think that we might learn?"

  - during the activity to draw connections or highlight details: "What else is this like?" or "What does this remind you of?"

  - after your adventure, to reflect on the experience. For example, "What did you observe or learn that was new?"

And when you are having conversations with your child about their day-to-day experiences, remember to always ask "Why?" or "Why do you think?" Ask for possible explanations. Avoid general questions and seek specific answers. Rather than asking, "How was school?" ask, "What did you learn in history class?" Remind kids that there are no wrong answers, and that trying to answer questions is an important part of the active thinking process.

Like organization, or studying, and many other school skills, active thinking needs to be practised. The more that a child is mentally active outside the classroom, the easier school becomes. Once a child flips on the mental switch and becomes an active learner, that switch never turns off.

 

Oxford Learning offers programs for children from 3 years old through university. Our goal is to give students the skills they need to be successful in school and in life. Oxford Learning has locations in Halifax, Hammonds Plains and Bedford. For more information about our programs and services, visit us at www.oxfordlearning.com

by Deanna Cogdon Miller

 

"Well, back to reality."

Those are the words I found myself saying to the man next to me as the plane wheels touched down on the runway tonight. After a day by myself in Ottawa and then a weekend with seven girlfriends at a stagette at Tremblant, life has seemed a little surreal for the past few days.

Most notably is how much time I've had to think. This large amount of uninterrupted time to let my brain wander wherever it wanted to go has led me to the conclusion that I'm in the middle of an identity crisis. Who am I? Wife? Friend? Daughter? Sister? Colleague? Marketer? Writer? Cousin? Aunt? Volunteer? I'm actually all of these things but I've realized that when the role of parent is added to the list it makes it increasingly difficult to find balance.

The word ‘parent' brings a massive list of additional roles along with it. As soon as a child enters your life you suddenly become a teacher, a protector, a story-reader, a feeder, a play companion, a schedule manager, a healer, a personal stylist, a worrier, a nose-blower, a chauffeur, a tooth-brusher and a middle-of-the-night-cuddler (among other things). And if you have more than one child, you are all of these things to more than one person. It's no wonder work life balance is becoming increasingly important to working parents - we really are doing our best to be everything to everyone.

I struggle with it.

My kids are my priority and I try to embrace all of the roles that come with having kids. At the same time, I love what I do for a living but understand that in order to progress, I'm going to need to invest more off-work hours than I am putting in now. I volunteer with the YWCA and have great intentions when it comes to helping out but never quite follow through as much as I'd like to. I have friends and family that I'm good at keeping in touch with and many more that I've been meaning to call for ages and just haven't picked up the phone yet.  My passion is writing and I'd love to get into freelancing but haven't set aside the time to figure out where to begin. And don't even get me started on exercise. I could go on and on but the point is that the ‘to do' list seems like it's a mile long and never gets close to finished.

So as I reflect on this weekend and the time I spent thinking about all of the roles I play in my life and all of the things I don't get done, I realize that I just have to let it go. True friends and family understand why you're out of touch, organizations appreciate any time you can give and maybe being at the very top of my game career-wise isn't as important to me as I once thought it was. What's important is that I'm healthy, my relationship is strong and my family is taken care of.

At this stage of my life I can only do what I can do and I need to be satisfied with that. I've decided that it's time to stop worrying about everything I'm not getting done because it is literally impossible to be everything to everyone. What I can do is focus on being everything to my ‘little' ones and in reality it's only fair since they are everything to me.

 

Deanna lives in Dartmouth with her husband and three children. When she's not reading stories, dancing to ABBA or burping a baby, she works in communications for Bell Aliant.