You guys are fabulous!  Thanks to everyone who took the time to peek out of lurkdom to say a few words. (If you haven't, but would like to, please check out the comments section on this post and let us know who you are!). It means a lot to me and it was so SO interesting to get a sense of who you are and the sorts of challenges you're facing. LOTS of great fodder for future posts: work/life balance, potty training, feeding/eating challenges, sleep (of course!), discipline stuff, sibling issues, worries about protecting our kids from developing problems with depression and anxiety, co-parenting with our partners, t.v.-watching, mommy-guilt issues (so many of you, like me, feel like you're not spending enough time, doing the "right" things with your kids… I don't think we need to change what we do as much as change our attitude and cut ourselves some slack, by the way, but I'd like to cover that in a full post). I have to say, almost all the concerns you all have brought up, I've had myself. So I hope with some future posts I'll be able to give you some research that's helped me with the earlier stages that we've already muddled through. And I hope we can also commiserate and help each other with the many issues that we share (there are SO MANY).

Finally, I wanted to let those of you who are new to this site know that we DO have a Facebook page. Obviously, there's less anonymity there, and I understand that some people are more cautious about protecting their identity than others. But if you WOULD like to join our page, that would be fabulous! Right now, most of the action there is just me posting reminders of blog posts that are up. But there's lots of other potentials. I have always wanted that space to also serve as a community of parents who can provide support for one another, without my direct mediation. If anyone has the time (HA!) and inclination, I'd be thrilled to get more action over there and help build that community. If nothing else, you can get notices from Facebook when there's a new post. I'm still a newbie in that environment, as you will no doubt pick up.  Here's the site details (I have to change the name… On my to-do list). You can join as a fan anytime!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Bed-Timing-The-when-to-guide-to-helping-your-child-sleep/80178916228

Have a great weekend, everyone. And, again, THANK YOU for all your great input.

Ahem… Sorry about the missing-in-action thing. Apparently, a blog does NOT write itself and apparently I cannot maintain one without childcare and WITH a more than full-time job (and the holidays, which really sucker-punched me this year, in terms of chaos and crazies). So, we're back to business as usual this week. Thanks for your patience!

This post will be a short one, to give you a  heads up about what's coming (and give me a day to recover from the backlog of a month without childcare… did I mention that I NEED childcare?!). As the holiday period comes to a close, a lot of kids have been going through lots of transitions, changes in bedtimes, changes in schedules in general, difficulties perhaps adjusting to extended family members' expectations, the fun but also the conflict that comes with being around cousins, lots of friends and family, and so on. Although the holidays can be an amazing time with children, they can also be the most stressful. So, I thought discipline would be a great topic to cover right about now.

In the next week, possibly two (depending on your interests and response), I'd like to focus the posts on behavioural challenges and how to deal with them effectively. There are SO MANY directions to take these discipline posts. First off, there are different approaches. In my usual style, you'll see that I'm all for mixing up all sorts of effective, non-abusive, constructive approaches to discipline and there are boatloads of books out there that I'll suggest might be useful places to start or enhance our thinking about discipline strategies. But, no surprise, I also think that different developmental stages call for unique approaches to discipline. Not surprisingly, the same methods that may have worked at one age will invariably fail at later ages. So, I'll try to cover different ages and stages as well as the different strategies that people use. And, as usual, the temperament of your child will have a HUGE impact on the effectiveness of any one particular discipline approach. No one method will suit all children, so the aim here will be to mix it up and call for your experiences, both negative and positive, to flesh out any data and reports provided. We'll cover issues like the types of parenting practices that can amplify or dampen poor behaviours, the challenges of implementing most discipline strategies, tantrums and the whole ball-of-wax that makes them different from just pure acting-out behaviours, time-outs and the pros and cons, and, if I have the chutzpah, I'll even open up the discussion about spanking.

We've received several emails about displine issues, but for those of you who haven't written and want a particular topic covered in this general area, please shoot us an email: scienceandparenting@gmail.com

Hope you all had a fabulous holiday period and I wish everyone the best in the new year!

Ever have one of those weeks when you can't write one interesting thing? When every single word you write you want to erase before you even reach the end of the word? Have patience with me folks… I'm not sure what the problem is, but my blogging chutzpah is a little lagging. In the meantime, here are some interesting facts, all of which I COULD write about at length, if I could, you know, WRITE.

DID YOU KNOW?

• Autobiographical memory (memories about ourselves) doesn't begin until around the age of 3. (At least for the vast majority of people. I've heard of some rare cases of memory retrieval at INSANELY young ages).
• Autobiographical memory is one of the more fascinating characteristics that distinguish us from other animals
• Children as young as infants can distinguish attractive and non-attractive faces. And they "prefer" the former.
• Self-esteem and attractiveness are not related in childhood.
• Over-weight girls are teased more than under-weight girls. For boys, the pattern is the opposite.
• In the spirit of raising "free-range" kids, there are good arguments for allowing our children to engage in "dangerous things" for their healthy intellectual and emotional development.
• You may know that early puberty can cause more conflict in parent-child relationships. BUT!  Did you know that excess distance and high-level conflict between parents and their daughters can CAUSE the onset of puberty in girls?
• Play is vital… at all ages. It makes us smarter, happier, more successful and more creative. Allowing our children to play, as freely as possible, is one of the best things we can do for our children (but also for US!).

The ideas and links above have been thought-provoking for me (not that I
can write in any depth about ANY of them right now). Any of them peek your interest?

– Isabela

I don't really know you guys that well, so I debated putting this up. But I figure you can tell me if you're offended just like the rest of the internets can yell at each other. And it might be fun, cathartic even!

I read this yesterday and snorted into my coffee several times. Do you guys know Cracked.com? It can be funny. If you're not into the f-word being bandied about (or any other "offensive" expletives) then it probably isn't for you.  After reading way too many studies this week about one thing or another that made almost no sense to me when I put it all together, this "article" offered such a refreshing perspective. I particularly liked the fact that it hit on several issues we've discussed here (either in a post or in the comments). In fact, the number 1 "Thing that Good Parents Do (That Screw Kids up for Life)" was the topic of last week's featured blog post — and for the record, my rant seems like fairy dust compared to theirs.

So, for your weekend pleasure, The 7 Things "Good Parents" Do (That Screw Kids Up for Life)!

Have a good one!

– Isabela

Hi, I’m Tracy Solomon. Isabela Granic is a great friend and highly-respected colleague of mine. When she asked me to join this blog, I have to admit that there was some hesitation. For one thing, compared to Is, I am a cyber toddler. Blogging and social networking are two things I've actively resisted so far, for a number of reasons. But let’s face it, it’s the wave of the future and it’s where our children will be interacting soon enough (if they aren't already).  Spurred by Isabel’s enthusiasm, I started reading the blog and, you guessed it, I was hooked. I think what really struck me was how much the blog reads like the kinds of conversations she and I frequently have about motherhood, work, family life and oh yes, juggling it all!  

While we have lots in common, we are also lucky enough to have some complimentary differences. Isabela has twin boys as you know, I have one 5-year-old son. He is a child of passionate interests and some unusual abilities that really keep me on my toes. Isabel’s expertise in developmental psychology is more in the social and emotional development arena, mine is in cognitive development. My key interests are in symbolic reasoning (how children learn to decode media from pictures to videos – fiction and non- to books and eventually school texts) and spatial reasoning (how children learn to navigate) and also at the intersection of these; children’s comprehension of maps, scale models, graphs, rulers etc. All of this is, of course, related to more formal learning which is how I came to my current research in early mathematics education. Although these areas are where my own research is focused, as a developmental psychologist, I'm pretty much interested and reading up on all aspects of development; basically, anything that changes over time for children. After all, you cannot just slice the emotions or the thinking and reasoning out of the child and study it in isolation. The challenge, or the puzzle, is that it’s all going on together!

It’s been an interesting journey weaving this knowledge into parenting. Funny what happens when your emotions are involved and the stakes are so very high. I may give advice, but I just as often ask for it. Frankly, my parenting and my research are that much richer since my son was born largely because of everything I've learned from other parents. I'm very excited about the chance to be interacting with you on this site. I’ve already learned a lot from what I’ve read. I hope that you too continue to find the blog useful in all sorts of ways.

Why do I post these things on Friday when probably no one will read the post for days, at best?  That's how things are working out this week, so I'm rolling with it. I'm actually on the first 3-day trip away from my kids WITH my husband (Gah!). We're in New York City celebrating our 10th year anniversary and I'm trying desperately not to imagine the second-by-second activities of our boys back home (left with their grandparents so what the HELL is my problem?!).

So, let me first tell you that the blog IS going to change. In a few meaningful ways, I think. Here's the plan, open COMPLETELY to suggestions and revisions as this thing develops.

1. The blog is going to go bigger and better (hopefully). We'll broaden the topics we cover to any developmental issues — that means anything that you and I are concerned about when it comes to our kids' healthy (and not-so-healthy) development. Sleep will still be included, but just not the only focus. The topics we'll cover will really hit a large spectrum of issues that developmental psychologists and parents have been thinking about for decades and in some cases, centuries. Some of these topics include: discipline (across the ages spans), friendship relationships, language development, physical development, emotional "intelligence", empathy, aggression, bullying, daycare considerations, bilingual educations/upbringing, diet, potty training, attention problems (ADHD), cognitive milestones, the acquisition of mathematical concepts, kids' perceptions of all sorts of stuff (parents' arguments, emotion faces, teachers' behaviours, this list is HUGE), the function of crying, strategies to teach kids to have fun reading, doing math, playing word games, kids' abilities to understand rules, children's understanding of spatial relationships (think leggos and how children go from building one way to building in more sophisticated ways and why), and so on and so on. There's so much out there that there's no way I can put up an exhaustive list. What I can say is that this list can be as wide open as you'd like.

2. I'm going to be inviting a close friend and fellow developmental psychologists to join me in writing and keeping this blog up and running. She's a fabulous woman with an equally fabulous son and I'll make more "formal" introductions soon, but for now, you should know that her area of expertise are very different from mine. While mine are generally in the area of emotional and social development, hers are in the area of cognitive development. Cognitive development is a HUGE area that encompasses many of the topics I listed in #1 above, and much, much more. She'll explain it to you better soon, but her job here will be to deal with topics that are about how children learn to think in more and more complex ways, how developmentalists have learned to understand the child's mind, what research can tell us about how our children perceive space, time, language, etc. And all of these topics have huge implications for the education and well-being of our children.

3. The general approach will remain the same: Our posts will be largely backed up by good scientific research with a healthy does of "case studies" from our own parenting experience. 

4. We'll post much more regularly than I've been able to manage, with Q & As interspersed with research-based posts about one topic or another.

Now for the contest:  PLEASE help us figure out what to call this darned blog. I am at a loss and if we're going to put up a new banner and intro page that represents the changes we want to make, we'll need and actual NAME to call this new blog. Believe it or not, this has been the biggest challenge of putting up the new "look" of the blog. Any ideas? Something short but something that still accurately describes what we want to do here; something punny is fun, but not too cheesy is hard; something about kids, development, questions, answers, a community of parents, research… Gah! Like I said, I'm at a loss.

So, if you have any ideas, please leave them in the comments section. We'll randomly choose one of them to receive a free Bedtiming book. I'll keep the contest and comments open for one week and then do the random selection. So, notice, you don't get the free book for choosing the title we love best — for that you will get my everlasting gratitude. So you can leave funny or silly titles as well and still be entered into the contest.

Now I'm off to enjoy my getaway! Thanks ahead of time for your help and I hope you'll continue visiting when the site has had its overhaul!

I haven’t posted much this week for you. I’m sorry. I’ll be more on top of the blog next week. I’ll save you the litany of “day job” issues that have kept me from being more present on the blog and leave you instead with this little video that cracked me up.

Clearly, this would NOT be on SOMEONE’S list of “healthy sleep habits” (but the kid DOES look happy enough).

(Hmmm… after browsing youtube for other stuff, I now realize how COMMON this bounce/sleep thing is.)

I tried. I really did. I had the best intentions to keep up the blog while I was away but I totally dropped the ball. Because guess what?!  Kids? They're great, but they require FOOD and ATTENTION and STORIES and MY ARMS (to keep from drowning in large bodies of water). And since this is a blog about sleep issues, let me just tie this up neatly and say that the boys' sleep has been all whacky (not necessarily bad exactly, just whacky) and that means that I've been a bit whacky. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining AT ALL, but I'll spare you the details since you did not come to Isabel Granic's personal blog (not that I have one) but to a blog that you thought might have something to say about child development, sleep issues, and the relation therein-ish.

So, the truth is, I won't be able to get to any real nitty-gritty topics until next Monday. My brain is fried and slushy from heat, humidity and too much cheese. I want to keep my focus on my boys for these last few days of holidays and then I'll be back in earnest. I have LOTS to write about and tons of excellent questions from you to address but my headspace is all wrong for doing justice to those topics.

Please bear with me… Hope you're happy and well and enjoying some sunshine.

I seems like my internet access is a lot more sparse than I had planned. So all those posts that I almost finished? They're not getting finshed very quickly. What with 2 three-year olds running rampant and actually requiring parenting (the nerve… on MY vacation) and a husband who seems to believe that computer time isn't all that romantic, I'm less likely to post as frequently as I planned for the next couple of weeks.

But I did want to ask those of you who have read our book, Bedtiming, whether you wish there was something in there that wasn't or if you'd make any changes if you could. We just got word that we've sold the rights to the book in the States. That means we have a shot of changing things somewhat if we want. I'd love to hear from some of you…

1. What do you wish was in there that wasn't?
2. What did you find unclear that we might be able to explain better?
3. What do you wish we had left out of the book?

We'd appreciate any feedback you have!  Thanks!  (And I'll try to post something more substantive ASAP).