Kids And Energy

I’m not sure why, maybe because it’s summer, I’m getting a lot of questions and stories about kids and energy. I’ll put them all under that broad category but there have been several different subcategories discussed: kids and ADHD, kids and anger management, and kids and computers.

Kids and ADHD

Let’s start with kids and ADHD. There seems to be a big trend here in the US of drugging our children so they can “control” their behavior in school. I am NOT in favor of this practice.

Why is there such an epidemic of ADHD diagnoses in our children? I don’t want to oversimplify but I believe one reason is that our children don’t have the opportunities they had in previous generations to run around and expend their energy.

In years past, kids got to play in the parks, in the streets and in their own yards. Today, that happens less and less. Parents are too afraid to allow their children to be outside unsupervised, and rightly so! There are predators out there who would do your children harm. However, kids still need to expend their energy, somehow.

So, many times the activities available to them at home are sedentary, such as playing video games, watching television, talking on their cell phones or using the home computer. None of this provides opportunity to release energy, unless your children are like my niece who paces vigorously while talking on the phone.

Then we send them to school and expect them to sit down and be quiet. In addition, many schools are reducing the amount of physical education time for our kids and I’ve even seen recently that some schools forbid children to run at recess or use certain playground equipment because they fear of physical injury lawsuit. Is it any wonder our children are having difficulty?

Now I know there are parents and teachers out there who have stories of children who have been helped immensely by the addition of Ritalin, Adderall, Concerta or Dexedrine to their daily diet. If you know a child who is being helped by his or her medication, I’m not saying to discontinue it but for every child who is being helped, I believe there are at least three others who are still exhibiting all the ADHD behavior the medication was designed to reduce.

There have been studies done on placebo medications that show that in double blind studies, when neither the patient nor the doctor knew whether the patient was getting the actual drug or the placebo, the ones getting the placebo actually did better. Is it possible there is a placebo effect with some children?

If your child displays what you or the teachers believe is an excessive amount of energy, do your best to create situations where that child can expend energy. I have two boys who could both have been diagnosed with ADHD as children. They were very physical. Luckily, I lived in the country during a time when parents sent their kids out the door to simply “play.” I also spent a lot of my spare time running them around to different athletic events—YMCA soccer, wrestling, flag football, T-ball, basketball, you get the idea. This definitely helps.

Kids and Anger Management

I spoke with a woman over the weekend whose son is 10 years-old and she says has anger management issues. We didn’t really get into his specific behaviors but it caused me to reflect on some inherent differences between males and females.

I think that from very early on, boys and girls deal with their anger differently. As a general rule, girls need to talk about it to feel better, while boys need to work it out physically.

So if you have daughters, you want to teach them verbal skills to be able to work out their frustrations but with boys, you will need to provide opportunities for them to work out their anger physically—maybe with a punching bag, racquetball, running, or martial arts. The list of possibilities is truly endless but don’t expect your boys to “talk about it,” at least not until they’ve had the opportunity to release the anger in a safe physical manner.

Kids and Computers

This week, a mother contacted me about her child disobeying her limits with the home computer and sneaking time beyond her allowed limit.

In this situation, the mother had a need to protect and nurture her child. She wants to be able to loosely supervise her daughter’s time on the computer to possibly prevent her from falling prey to adults who victimize children by finding their victims on the Internet. She also wants to support her child’s need for physical activity so she restricts her computer usage and encourage outside physical activities instead. Is this mother wrong? Absolutely not.

Her daughter, on the other hand, has a desire to be on the computer. All her friends are on there and want to know why she isn’t. They don’t have limits while this girl does. This girl is quite accomplished on the computer and can build website pages for her friends. She also has a high need for freedom and doesn’t like being restricted and the computer is plain fun to her. She gets her love & belonging, power, freedom and fun needs met with the computer. Is she wrong? Absolutely not.

How does it get resolved? I think the way to resolve this issue is for the mother and daughter to sit down and talk about what each other needs and wants in the situation. If the child can convince her mother that she has the skills and knowledge necessary to protect herself from predators and she agrees to engage in other healthy activities each day, then her mother could relax her restriction on the amount of time she has on the computer.

In this case, and many others like it, the daughter wouldn’t be able to meet her freedom need with the computer if there wasn’t a rule to break. Sometimes we create the very behavior we are trying to stop with the rules we make. When a person has a high need for freedom, they will inevitably break the rules, particularly the ones they don’t like or that don’t make sense.

Parenting is one of the hardest jobs you’ll ever do and the stakes are incredibly high. We all do the best we can and hope for good results. Fortunately, when we have good intentions are kids generally survive in even thrive.

About Author:
Kim has a graduate degree in counseling and works with parents and children helping them with their communication skills ultimately leading to an improvement in their relationships. Sign up for her free teleclass Empowerment Parenting

Keeping Kids Safe

We can teach you to teach your kids to keep themselves safe when you are not around.

That's right. Teach your kids to keep themselves safe. When you are not around.

You will want kids naked to pay very close attention to those words. The cold war kids words are the key: keep themselves safe.

That's right, again. Mom and Dad, its not about how safe they are when you are around.

Pay very close attention to this concept.

As long as you are around them your kids are pretty safe. It's when they are alone, walking home from school, shopping at the mall or even in your front yard, anytime you are not with them, that they are most vulnerable.

Of course it's about predators but it's also about bullies.

It's also about:

Fire safety
Water safety
Pool safety
Bicycle safety
Roller blade safety
Halloween safety
Sports safety

The list goes on. But the real point is, can your children can keep themselves safe when you are not around? If they can, they can be stronger individuals and you can worry and stress out less.

Keeping your kid safe starts with safety from sexual predators and bullies at school. A great and effective safety program teaches kids to learn for themselves how to stay safe if Mom and Dad are not around. It also should help parents reinforce safety techniques at home to make sure they are learned and understood well.

Things like pbs kids confidence and mental focus are real safety techniques. Kids as young as four years old can use them and be less of a target for predators and bullies. Kids with good mental focus and self confidence are less of a target.

Kids with these qualities tend to spot potential danger early and stay away from it before they get involved or trapped into it.

There are also techniques, we call ours Getaways, that kids can learn that allow them to escape the grasp of any adult in the horrible event that they get grabbed.

It does not get any better than this for a parent.

Now For The Truth. Now its time for you to pay even closer attention because in order to keep your kids safe you have to be on top of things as an adult and a parent.

Working with kids to learn safety techniques is one thing as we teach them to improve their self confidence and self image. If they appear to be happy and confident your kids will be less of a target for predators or bullies.

You, as a parent, can't fake this. You need to be confident and centered in order to help your kids be the same. You need to lead by example.

So, we involve parents in everything we teach. We improve families and kids together in order to keep them safe.

You need to take care of yourself first before you can take care of you kids. Are you a positive person? Do you feel good about yourself? Are you happy, centered and focused as kids crafts an adult?

Focus, improve yourself, then reinforce it in your kids for safer kid rock.

Why Should Children Be Encouraged To Play Soccer?

In today's media we are constantly being reminded of a health time bomb that is about to explode as children today are not active enough.

There are so many competing distractions for our children's attention, video games, endless channels to watch, these can all lead to sedentary lifestyle if they are not kept in check.

Soccer is the beautiful game, played by millions of young girls and boys (aged 6 to 18) across many continents, whether it's on the beaches of Rio, the back alleys of a major city nearby or the local park, you will find someone kicking a football around.

In today's society there has been a shift to more organised soccer practice for our youth players. Gone are the days of jumpers for goal posts, as streets are littered with cars and grass verges now have houses built on them.

Having a more structured approach is both a good and a bad thing; on one hand young players get structured development and education through willing volunteers who show them how everything from how to warm up correctly, develop their technical ability with the ball right through to skill development and organised small sided games to wrap everything up together to provide a total learning experience.

Today time is limited and therefore there may be only an hour or two devoted to structured soccer practice during the week, what happens when practice is over?

Getting your child to participate in an organised soccer school or club can bring tremendous benefits to you and your child.

Soccer can help increase your child's self esteem, which feeds their self talk which ultimately drives their performance. But soccer isn't the only winner, quite often it can be seen that academic performance can increases to!

Studies have shown that getting young children involved in soccer at an early stage promotes a real healthy attitude towards the game and this attitude continues with them into adult life.

The number one reason why children play soccer is to have fun; if soccer is fun and enjoyable then players will want to continue playing. This benefits their overall fitness and reduces their health risks considerably.

Soccer is made fun by coaches worldwide who willingly give up their time voluntarily to organise youth soccer practice and coach teams.

Gone are the days when soccer, for the really young players, was an 11 a side game with offside rules and no touches of the ball for massive periods of the game.

Youth soccer from the age of 6 to 11 is typically about having fun, playing small sided matches such as 4 v 4 with no goal keepers, promoting lots of touches of the ball and player interaction on the pitch.

Through playing soccer and encouraging children to take regular exercise many of the risk factors that are associated with heart disease such as obesity and diabetes can be reduced significantly. It is stated that childhood obesity has increased by more than 50% since 1976, which is a really scary fact.

Getting your child involved in soccer doesn't just improve their health. We've mentioned already the improvements at school.

Social benefits, such as mixing with others, having to work as a team, contributing through individual effort to a collective goal, experiencing the highs and lows, picking each other up, competition, striving to be the best, aiming to win and supporting and helping others are all by products of playing soccer.

Many of the life skills that the players learn through soccer are beneficial in later life, how to form and build relationships, developing a sense of co-operation, how to lead people, how to handle adversity, what commitment means and punctuality, are all key qualities that will benefit the players in adult life.

If your child is already playing soccer, great. But what can you do if you want to get your child involved in a local soccer team? Here are seven must ask questions that you and your child should consider when attempting to find a suitable club…

1) What level of commitment is required in terms of practice sessions and games at the weekend?

2) When are the training sessions? When are games played, what's the format and how much time will you need to devote?

3) How far are you willing to travel to training and to matches? Some clubs will operate travel teams where distances can be considerable, including overnight stops.

4) What are the costs involved? Some clubs adopt a pay when you play, others a more structured approach. The most expensive clubs are not always the best, ask yourself is what your paying in the equivalent to what your child is getting out?

5) What do you and your child want out of playing soccer? This needs to be aligned with the prospective clubs philosophy, is it about having fun or winning?

6) How best will your child learn, develop and stay interested? Are they happy just to be involved or would they thrive in a more competitive environment?

7)What is the clubs constitution and philosophy to soccer, how long have they been in existence, the experience of the coaches, location, facilities etc.

Once you have considered the above questions what are your next steps to finding a suitable club or soccer organisation for your child?

You can…

i) Get in touch with your local Soccer Association by searching the web or looking in yellow pages. They should be able to provide you with a list of clubs and organisations in your local area.

ii) Ask other parents/guardians about local junior and youth soccer teams. You'll be surprised at how many adults or their children are involved.

iii) Encourage you children to ask their school mates where they play their soccer. Knowing some of the team can be a real advantage as players integrate themselves into a team.

iv) Ask your child's form tutor or headmaster if they know of any clubs or organisations. Many clubs have formed good relationships with the schools over the years.

v) Read the local papers or local news websites you'll be amazed at how much coverage youth and junior soccer gets.

These five practical steps should enable you to find a club that meets yours and your child's soccer aspirations. However, if there still isn't a club near you that can satisfy a need why not look to set up your own team!

How to start a football programme collection

To effectively begin a football programme collection, an individual needs to choose a specialisation to his or her collection. There are hundreds of thousands of programmes available in the United Kingdom, and even more worldwide. To give a collection some sort of meaning a theme ought to be adopted to avoid needless accumulation and so as to put the designated budget a collector has to as best use as possible.

Of course, it will sometimes be the case that you come across a programme that joins or crosses two themes at once. These are likely to prove to be valuable acquisitions in years to come as they signify a special or historical occasion, which will muster memories for football fans from across the world in the future.

A football programme is the most easily adaptable element of a football match to celebrate or commemorate a particular event. This could come in the form of some sort of achievement such as a player milestone, which can be featured in the programme itself. A player milestone could come in many forms, such as an appearance record, a goal scoring record, the end of a players career, a number of years of service by the manager, and much more.

The darker side of football is also recorded in editions of match programmes. These historical events again attract collectors who see them as poignant reminders of the past and are sought after and valuable as a result. The disasters a Hillsborough, Ibrox and Bradford have valuable programmes associated with them, not only for the day itself, but also the subsequent commemorative matches.

A notably valuable set of programmes to own are those associated with the Munich Air Disaster involving the Manchester United team and Busby’s Babes. The programme from the match against Partizan Belgrade who Manchester United were playing on the tragic trip can sell for over a thousand pounds. A similar sum can be achieved for the programme against Sheffield Wednesday directly after the disaster where the team list wasn’t filled in for the Manchester United team.

Notable and celebratory occurrences are usually reflected in the content and style of the programme. Important programmes to get hold of are final matches in an old stadium, or the first issue within a new one. Most programmes of this type are abundant with interesting features and historical information, making them a gem in any soccer programme collection.

Programmes can mean different things to different collectors. The reason why you may value one programme could be due to entirely personal reasons and memories which they may conjure up. For others the pursuit is one of football passion, finding out more about the history and traditions of a football team they support. Whatever your reason, collecting football programmes is a highly rewarding hobby, and comes highly recommended to any football fan.

Kids And Energy

I’m not sure why, maybe because it’s summer, I’m getting a lot of questions and stories about kids and energy. I’ll put them all under that broad category but there have been several different subcategories discussed: kids and ADHD, kids and anger management, and kids and computers.

Kids and ADHD

Let’s start with kids and ADHD. There seems to be a big trend here in the US of drugging our children so they can “control” their behavior in school. I am NOT in favor of this practice.

Why is there such an epidemic of ADHD diagnoses in our children? I don’t want to oversimplify but I believe one reason is that our children don’t have the opportunities they had in previous generations to run around and expend their energy.

In years past, kids got to play in the parks, in the streets and in their own yards. Today, that happens less and less. Parents are too afraid to allow their children to be outside unsupervised, and rightly so! There are predators out there who would do your children harm. However, kids still need to expend their energy, somehow.

So, many times the activities available to them at home are sedentary, such as playing video games, watching television, talking on their cell phones or using the home computer. None of this provides opportunity to release energy, unless your children are like my niece who paces vigorously while talking on the phone.

Then we send them to school and expect them to sit down and be quiet. In addition, many schools are reducing the amount of physical education time for our kids and I’ve even seen recently that some schools forbid children to run at recess or use certain playground equipment because they fear of physical injury lawsuit. Is it any wonder our children are having difficulty?

Now I know there are parents and teachers out there who have stories of children who have been helped immensely by the addition of Ritalin, Adderall, Concerta or Dexedrine to their daily diet. If you know a child who is being helped by his or her medication, I’m not saying to discontinue it but for every child who is being helped, I believe there are at least three others who are still exhibiting all the ADHD behavior the medication was designed to reduce.

There have been studies done on placebo medications that show that in double blind studies, when neither the patient nor the doctor knew whether the patient was getting the actual drug or the placebo, the ones getting the placebo actually did better. Is it possible there is a placebo effect with some children?

If your child displays what you or the teachers believe is an excessive amount of energy, do your best to create situations where that child can expend energy. I have two boys who could both have been diagnosed with ADHD as children. They were very physical. Luckily, I lived in the country during a time when parents sent their kids out the door to simply “play.” I also spent a lot of my spare time running them around to different athletic events—YMCA soccer, wrestling, flag football, T-ball, basketball, you get the idea. This definitely helps.

Kids and Anger Management

I spoke with a woman over the weekend whose son is 10 years-old and she says has anger management issues. We didn’t really get into his specific behaviors but it caused me to reflect on some inherent differences between males and females.

I think that from very early on, boys and girls deal with their anger differently. As a general rule, girls need to talk about it to feel better, while boys need to work it out physically.

So if you have daughters, you want to teach them verbal skills to be able to work out their frustrations but with boys, you will need to provide opportunities for them to work out their anger physically—maybe with a punching bag, racquetball, running, or martial arts. The list of possibilities is truly endless but don’t expect your boys to “talk about it,” at least not until they’ve had the opportunity to release the anger in a safe physical manner.

Kids and Computers

This week, a mother contacted me about her child disobeying her limits with the home computer and sneaking time beyond her allowed limit.

In this situation, the mother had a need to protect and nurture her child. She wants to be able to loosely supervise her daughter’s time on the computer to possibly prevent her from falling prey to adults who victimize children by finding their victims on the Internet. She also wants to support her child’s need for physical activity so she restricts her computer usage and encourage outside physical activities instead. Is this mother wrong? Absolutely not.

Her daughter, on the other hand, has a desire to be on the computer. All her friends are on there and want to know why she isn’t. They don’t have limits while this girl does. This girl is quite accomplished on the computer and can build website pages for her friends. She also has a high need for freedom and doesn’t like being restricted and the computer is plain fun to her. She gets her love & belonging, power, freedom and fun needs met with the computer. Is she wrong? Absolutely not.

How does it get resolved? I think the way to resolve this issue is for the mother and daughter to sit down and talk about what each other needs and wants in the situation. If the child can convince her mother that she has the skills and knowledge necessary to protect herself from predators and she agrees to engage in other healthy activities each day, then her mother could relax her restriction on the amount of time she has on the computer.

In this case, and many others like it, the daughter wouldn’t be able to meet her freedom need with the computer if there wasn’t a rule to break. Sometimes we create the very behavior we are trying to stop with the rules we make. When a person has a high need for freedom, they will inevitably break the rules, particularly the ones they don’t like or that don’t make sense.

Parenting is one of the hardest jobs you’ll ever do and the stakes are incredibly high. We all do the best we can and hope for good results. Fortunately, when we have good intentions are kids generally survive in even thrive.