Tag: education

What Causes Depression? Can It Be Prevented?

Posted on

There are many different types of depression, and the causes for depression are varied and extensive. Depression could be the result of chemical imbalances in a person’s brain. Medication can help with these imbalances to reduce the symptoms, or sometimes, to relieve them completely.  Even when the depression is situational, the depression does not always show up at the time the causative event occurs. This makes determining the reason for depression difficult. 

For example, a five-year-old child loses her mother. We know such a loss can have a profound effect on a child’s psychological development, but the effect on the child, and the potential resultant depression, might not show up for many years. In this situation, it might be difficult to determine the cause of the depression when it appears, but once the history is known, the cause is fairly straightforward. 

Continue reading “What Causes Depression? Can It Be Prevented?”

How Do I Deal With Difficult Parents?

Posted on

At some point in a school year, a teacher will encounter a difficult parent. A difficult parent is someone who doesn’t believe or trust the teacher and blames the school for any problem their child is having. These parents believe their child is perfect even though the child might be failing academically or having real challenges with behavior. 

How can teachers approach parents like this? Shimon Waronker, EdD, experienced a situation in which a team of teachers was having difficulty communicating with a particular parent whose child was troubled, both academically and behaviorally, and the parent maintained that the situation was all the teachers’ faults. The parent truly believed the teachers were ganging up on her blameless child.

Continue reading “How Do I Deal With Difficult Parents?”

Should the schools be talking to our children about drugs

Posted on

There has always been a debate about whether we should expose children who are clueless about drugs and substance abuse to information about these sensitive topics. There are powerful arguments for both sides of this issue but in a school setting, where children are not segregated according to their levels of innocence, it may be necessary to expose the more innocent students to this information in order to inform and protect those who are engaging in risky behaviors. Dena Gorkin, CPP,  believes it is better to inform innocent children than to leave the exposed kids unprotected.

Continue reading “Should the schools be talking to our children about drugs”

Should I Refuse to Let the School Evaluate My Child

Posted on

One of the most challenging situation parents can find themselves in is when the school principal or teacher believes their child has a learning disability and perhaps requires special education intervention. Unfortunately, a learning disability is seen as a stigma by many parents and their response is predictably, “No, my child is normal. My child does not have special needs. How dare you say something like that about my child?!” The reality, however, is that each child is different; each child has his or her own special needs.

A child can be gifted but still require special education services. Each child needs to be able to have his or her needs met, and different learners learn at different paces and have different abilities. Parents need to remain open to the fact that the feedback from the school is likely correct. Maybe the child does need help, and parents need to consider how they will avail themselves of the resources that are out there to help their child.

Continue reading “Should I Refuse to Let the School Evaluate My Child”

What Should a Parent Do When Their Teenager Goes to a Party Where Alcohol and Drugs May be Present?

Posted on

For most teenagers, parties are a rite of passage and attendance or lack of attendance at a party can significantly impact their social standing. In today’s society, young people feel the pressure and opinion of their peers constantly, thanks to social media and the “standards” set by celebrities and social media influencers.

It is very important that parents communicate with their children concerning parties where alcohol and drugs may be present. Forbidding a teenager from going to one of these parties is ineffectual in the long term, and it shuts down open communication between the parent and the child. Instead, before the party, the parent should say, “I know there may be drugs and alcohol present at this party, and there’s going to be potentially risky behaviors. I love you and I care about you, and I hope you are strong enough to resist them.”

Continue reading “What Should a Parent Do When Their Teenager Goes to a Party Where Alcohol and Drugs May be Present?”

What is the Best Way to Educate My Child?

Posted on

There are many opinions as to what education really is. If you ask ten different people, you will might get ten different answers. Shimon Waronker, EdD, believes an education is primarily the development of character traits in a child.

If children are resilient, courageous, humble, and empathetic, then a parent has succeeded because no matter what challenge is thrown at them, they will have the tools they need to meet that challenge and overcome it. Character traits are critical in education and are really primary to academics. A lot of people will say, “What do you mean? Education is all about the academics!” But in truth, academics are secondary to the development of positive traits because a child with no resilience will give up and quit, and it makes no difference what challenging course material they receive—they will always have a propensity to quit.

Continue reading “What is the Best Way to Educate My Child?”

What is bullying? What is the difference between aggressive behavior and bullying?

Posted on

The term bullying is used frequently, and while there certainly is a great deal of bullying happening, it is important to know that bullying is a very specific type of aggressive behavior. Very often children fight over things. Two children want the same ball on the playground, or two children want to be first down the slide. This is fighting between two peers of equal power. It is not bullying. It may be behavior that we want to work on, but it isn’t bullying.

Bullying is the deliberate abuse of power to harm another person. There are three critical components in that definition, so let’s consider each of them:

Continue reading “What is bullying? What is the difference between aggressive behavior and bullying?”