Family & Parenting

GIRAFFE JUICE: The Magic of Making Life Wonderful By JP Allen & Marci Winters Illustrated by Tamara LaPorte (2009; Follow Your Joy Press; Hawaii, 136 pgs.) This is a treasure of a book for children and adults, too. Giraffe Juice invites us to experience an adventure story rooted in a game called “Making Life Wonderful.” Eva, a harmonica and guitar-playing 13-year-old girl, and her two school friends, are guided by one very supportive talking giraffe, Marvel. Together, their trials and successes show the practical and miraculous gifts of Compassionate Communication. Their strategy is in using the magic of “The Making Life Wonderful” Game. The 4 simple steps of Compassionate Communication, AKA Nonviolent Communication (NVC), are carefully and thoughtfully illuminated, woven into a story about how children and adults can learn to get along very well. These are the 4 steps suggested for communicating with your children to

You knew your baby would cry. But did you know how frustrating crying can become? What do you do when you have tried everything you could think of to comfort him and nothing worked? A crying baby can be frustrating but no one thinks they will shake their infant. Research confirms what Marilyn Barr, Founder and Executive Director of the National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome, says, “Frustration with a baby’s crying is the number one trigger for shaking, and the stress of handling a crying baby can seem overwhelming.” Hospitals and organizations nationwide are responding by educating parents about the period of “purple” crying, a stage when normal, perfectly healthy babies can cry for five hours a day or more. Babies sometimes need to cry even when nothing is wrong since crying is the only way they have to tell you if they are hungry, sad, or uncomfortable. Some parents will automatically interpret the sound of the cry and know what to do. But they, too, can be overwhelmed during a sleepless

Imagine that you are alone in a foreign country, with no understanding of the primary language. Without technology or books to guide you, you must navigate your way through this world. Hungry? Need a place to sleep? Where is the train? After many frustrating encounters, you might finally try using your hands to communicate. Babies and toddlers live in this world every day – they have needs that they cannot verbally express. No wonder they have tantrums! Sign language can help ease this transition from non-verbal to verbal, and, some assert, even increase the speed of language acquisition and spatial reasoning development in toddlers. As long as signing is used in conjunction with speech, it can serve to enhance a baby’s understanding of language. Once the baby can sign back, two-way communication is possible. Parents can speak as they sign (“Yes, that IS a yellow car. Did you hear it?”), and the baby learns to associate signs with words and sounds. Many parents choose to teach only

In the first half of the 20th century proponents of the Eugenics movement influenced nearly thirty state legislatures to pass a law allowing the involuntary sterilization of people with developmental, mental, sensory and physical disabilities.i This legislative trend was based on the belief that these and other "socially inadequate populations, ii would produce offspring that would be burdensome to society. The result of this policy was the forced sterilization of 60,000 American citizens, some as young as ten years old. Add to this the forced institutionalization of millions of disabled people and you see that parenting with a disability was a rare opportunity. However, by the 1970's most sterilization laws were struck down on procedural grounds and rules were adopted that prohibited sterilization by institutions receiving federal funding. Moreover, the de-institutionalization movement drastically increased the number of people with disabilities living in communities. In the 1980's

Handicapped and crippled used to be terms for the disabled and now "Special Needs has become an umbrella underneath which a staggering array of diagnoses can be placed. Children with special needs may have mild learning disabilities or profound mental retardation; food allergies or terminal illnesses; developmental delays or serious psychiatric problems. (Terry Mauro, About.com) In almost every community in the United States there are parent support groups and other community organizations directly involved in providing services to families with the aim of achieving full inclusion in the social and educational life of the community for special needs children. Easter Seals www.easterseals.com is the leading non-profit provider of services for individuals with autism, developmental disabilities, physical and mental disabilities and other special needs. It was founded in 1919 in Ohio by Edgar "Daddy Allen, a man who saw that children with disabilities were often hidden from public view.

Bonding With Your Adopted Baby Adopting a Newborn: Journey and Attachment Challenges The process of adoption is often long and emotional. By the time the exhausted new parents have been united with their baby, it is time to begin the journey of becoming a family. The joy and excitement of this new beginning, however, can sometimes conceal a very real challenge: how to form a strong attachment with this unfamiliar baby? Understanding Attachment Difficulties When Adopting a Newborn According to Dr. Walter D. Buenning, Ph.D. and expert in treating Reactive Attachment Disorder, 10-30% of infants adopted at birth may have trouble

For most people the idea of bringing an infant to work is completely alien. How could one get anything done, they may ask, while tending to the needs of an infant? Well, it is not easy but it can be done in certain professions. For myself, a researcher for Ergobaby at the time my daughter, Neela, was born, it was a challenge that I relished, since my wife and I would were committed not to put our newborn into daycare, even if it meant financial hardship. Luckily, our employer supported having babies at the workplace. Thanks to Ergobaby we did not have to be separated for hours a day from our newborn daughter. I arranged my desk to accommodate standing while working and wore my daughter in an Ergobaby baby carrier with the infant insert . I worked with Neela on my body for several hours each day. In fact, as the "experiment went on, my co-workers would also wear her from time to time. Neela became another member of the office staff. Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I must admit

www.empoweringpeople.com and www.positivediscipline.com Jane Nelsen wishes to change our perception of discipline to a more positive, affirming way of interacting with our children (or students - she does a lot of classroom training too). Rather than punishing a child for doing 'bad', it's the parent's responsibility to realize the deeper reason for the child's 'mis' behavior and communicate with the child as an equal. She also emphasizes fostering a connection between the child, their family and their community, giving younger members a voice to have meaningful input so they feel useful and develop a sense of belonging. This concept picks up where the Continuum Concept leaves off, around age two. Our story: Four months ago I took one