Positive Discipline Parenting Blog
Sproutable's Positive Discipline blog.
Real tips. Real talk. Read & grow.
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Feelings, the First Foreign Language I Learned as a Parent
I was visiting a friend last week and we got to talking about Family Meetings (spend more than an hour with me and this family meeting thing is likely to come up). He rolled his[...]By Julietta Skoog
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When Kids Say Really Mean Things to Nannies
Nothing can prepare you for that first time a nanny charge says hurtful things to you. You would think it gets easier but it never does. You are human after all, with feelings too. It is so hard to imagine that even at 3, 4 or 5 years old that vitriol will come out of […]By Julietta Skoog
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Turning nap strike into genius hour
By the age of 3, your child has approached many amazing milestones. They are scootering, potty training, running, hopping, even coloring and telling jokes and stories. With all this development comes a price- nap strike! It is common for children around the age of 3 (usually right before) to “drop the nap.” Don’t be fooled! […]By Julietta Skoog
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Navigating Sleep Regressions in Your Little One’s Developmental Journey
I once worked with a family whose child, an eccentric 18-month-old, was learning a new song. They told me that every night for three nights in a row, their child would wake up in the middle of the night and belt out her new song. While the parents were simultaneously sleep-deprived and charmed by this […]By Jade Folk
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Promoting Flexibility in Children
Something we’re always coming back to in Positive Discipline are the long-term goals and the traits we hope to see in the kiddos we care for once they reach adulthood. One life skill that I choose to focus on is being flexible. I’m not always the most flexible person in the room, and on occasion, I can miss out on something fun because I wasn’t being flexible enough. The good news for me, though, is that working with children gives me lots of opportunities to model, practice, and grow my own flexibility muscles.By Danielle Taylor
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Kids are SO Brave
I went down a slide last week and ended up having a huge realization that I haven’t stopped thinking about since. I was with my two nanny kiddos at a trampoline park, and we were having a total blast. Unlike me, they’re both natural athletes and love being at the trampoline park. I was following them, watching them do all kinds of crazy flips & jumps, and snapping pics to send to their parents when they started asking me if I wanted to go down the big slide.By Danielle Taylor
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Opening Up to Your Resistance
When I work with parents, lots of families resonate with the idea of letting go and being open & present with their children. But in reality, we spend so much of our time resisting in parenting. We hold onto a vision that we’ve created for our children - a narrative, an expectation, an attitude about how things should play out. This isn’t even in our consciousness; we often don’t even realize we’re holding onto these ideas.By Casey O'Roarty
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Dealing with our Parenting Triggers
What is a trigger? Trigger. There’s a difference between being uncomfortable and being triggered. Some people say triggers have to be very traumatic, like PTSD. I’m going to use trigger in a broader sense here. We talk about being triggered by content, by media, by each other, by our children. I really appreciate this definition from […]By Casey O'Roarty
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3 tips for teaching kids to be a good sport
“That’s not fair” “You cheated!” “I never win!” Sound familiar? Most kids have a tough time navigating games where there is a clear winner, or when they feel a sense of unfairness. This is because they are still learning! Getting comfortable with losing, being flexible with not going first or getting the color game piece they want, and having patience taking turns all takes LOTS of practice. It is still cognitively challenging for young children to see “fairness” because they are still growing into their capacity for perspective taking, which is why it is important to start now!By Julietta Skoog
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Catch Us at the Library
I’ve been nannying for about eight years now, and though kids & families may change, one very consistent part of my nanny routine is visiting the library. I recently found myself considering what’s still so engaging to me and my nanny kids about the library after literally hundreds of visits. Why are libraries so helpful in supporting young children?By Danielle Taylor
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My Top 5 Toddler Parenting Tools
My little baby is now a full-blown toddler. Every stage of development has been such an exciting leap, but it’s at this stage that I’m getting a glimpse into the inner dialogue of my little one’s brain. He is learning to talk and along with language comes a newfound sense of independence and autonomy. This is great when I need to clean up after meals or shoot off a couple of emails, because he can now play by himself for longer periods of time, or even better, help me around the house. It’s a challenge when I have an agenda of what needs to happen now and it doesn’t align with HIS plan. I now understand why virtually every parent of a toddler says their child is “strong-willed”. There’s a parenting myth about the terrible two’s, but what I’ve found is that it doesn’t have to be so terrible if you have some solid Positive Discipline parenting tools in your back pocket.By Alanna Beebe
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