Growing Pains: Five Things Teens Need From Parents
If someone asked you what period in human life is likely to be the loneliest, what would you say? Fortunately there are loneliness researchers who…
Portfolio Categories: Maturation
Irreducible Needs: What Kids Must Have to Thrive
Raffi Cavoukian, a children’s singer, songwriter, and child advocate, wrote a song titled – All I really need – which beautifully captures from a child’s perspective their most essential…
How The Mother In Us Is Born
I used to think the mother in me was born when I had my first child. My first thought waking up after her birth was,…
What Young Kids Wished You Understood About Them
Parents are routinely confused when their preschooler (aged 2 to 5) promises they won’t hit or scream only to turn around and hit or scream…
Can a Child Be Too Attached to Their Parent?
One of the most common questions I am asked about relationships is whether a child can be too attached? There is a general fear and…
When Play Ends and Boredom Begins
Understanding boredom in kids is serious business. A mother of a 7-year old boy sat in my office, clearly distressed and said, “I take away…
What Do Your New Year’s Intentions Reveal About You?
Love them or hate them, forming new year’s intentions are part of many people’s ritual in leaving one year behind and making way for a…
What Kids Worry and Fear at Different Ages
Kids have worries – from monsters to natural disasters. They can appear at random or may be triggered by everyday events. Their increasing awareness of…
Making Sense of Adolescents (or anyone who acts like one)
Mark Twain wrote, “When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around.…
Three Signs Kids are Realizing their Human Potential According to Age
Human potential is a wonderous thing. From physical transformation to psychological development, our capacity to evolve and burst forth with new possibilities sneaks up on…
As parents we look for signs that measure whether our kids are on track developmentally. Based on the maturation theory as synthesized by Gordon Neufeld, there are three vital signs that can help us take our children's developmental pulse and consider how they are unfolding. Signs of good development include whether they are moving towards becoming a separate, social, and adaptive being (1).
3. Becoming a Social Being - If we want our children to realize their potential as global citizens then they will need to consider another person's perspective while also holding on to their own point of view. Despite the myriad of competing and contrasting views, they should be able to hold onto their identity, ideas, meanings, preferences, and intentions. Being a social being means being able to cooperate, understand fairness and appreciate the context around them. It underlies healthy moral development and the capacity to use words to communicate thoughts and feelings. 
