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Most parents are doing a good job of parenting - but don’t realize it. All parents should understand that there are no perfect families. I know for sure that mine isn’t! Likewise, there is no perfect parenting method. Still, my wife Cathy and I have settled on what we believe to be the ten essential ingredients for building and maintaining a happy family. Here they are in overview form: |
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You might never have thought about it before, but there are a lot of life lessons you can learn in a garden. How easy it is for a growing garden to turn into wasteland of weeds. When weeds overtake a garden, the gardener has two choices – either trash the garden and start again; or remove what shouldn’t be there and replenish what should. If you’re a parent, congratulations – the Creator has blessed you with a "garden" of sorts. The "crop" consists of children – curious, creative creatures prone to making mistakes. When these "weeds" crop up in their character, however, you do not have the option of trashing the entire "garden" The key is to learn how to correct the behavior and salvage the spirit of the child at the same time. |
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When kids cross the boundaries for behavior that you have set with them, it’s not unusual for parents to feel any number of emotions from disappointment and sadness to anger. However, parental overreaction can often come hand in hand with these emotions. The wise parent, however, will do their best not to let these feelings lead to dishing out unreasonable consequences. When it comes to effective discipline, the rule, “let the punishment fit the crime” – definitely applies! |
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Parenting adolescents can be a scary prospect, as kids get older and begin to create some distance between them and us. Still, it doesn’t have to be as scary as it may seem. There are some simple, yet powerful steps we can take in order to ensure our influence level remains high. Here are twelve tips you can use right away that will make your responsibilities as a parent a bit easier to manage. |
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 In a last month’s edition of HomeWord’s Good Advice Parent Newsletter, we asked our readers to take a brief survey about parental attitudes toward social networking websites like MySpace and Facebook. Here are the results of the survey.
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At HomeWord, we’ve maintained over the years that becoming a student of today’s culture is one of the keys to successful parenting. But, who has the time to research and investigate the many sources of news and information in order to become better prepared to help you face the world your kids are facing? That’s why we’ve created Jim Liebelt’s Youth Culture Watch blog. It’s “one-stop-shopping” for all of the latest and most significant news related to today’s culture. Take a look and add your own perspectives and comments to our posts. | |
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