In this chapter I will introduce myself, tell you who I am and what I’ve done to become a Parenting Consultant and Family Therapist, as well as give you an outline of what the different chapters throughout the semester will be all about.

Whether you are a parent to an infant, toddler, child or teen, this chapter will give you a peak into how our brain works with a simple brain model from Conscious Discipline and based off of Dr. Dan Siegel. Understanding it will help you identify your kids’ or your own brain state in a moment of crisis (anger, frustration, sadness, etc) and be able to respond accordingly.

The Covid-19 pandemic has hit everyone really hard, and completely flipped upside down our usual or “normal” lives. As many places start re-opening up cities, it means making the decision of sending kids to daycare, school, universities and adults going back to work. This special chapter is meant to provide some tips and strategies as we enter our new “normal”, whether it is kids going to school, having a caregiver come into the house, parents going back to work, etc. I want to give you some tips that will help ease the anxiety, both in kids and adults, that can come hand in hand with big changes like this one.

We will take a look at what Temperament is, in order for you to identify your own and your child’s, and this way, be able to KNOW your own child better, and this way understand his behaviours and needs better.

After exploring our children’s temperament, we take a look at the importance of also understanding their developmental stage, and the behavioral factors that come hand in hand with their developmental milestones. Knowing these will help you see the behavior with a different perspective and provide the tools and skills they need to learn at each moment.

In the third part of the series Understanding your child, we will see what it means to see the child as a part of a whole, understanding what their family context entails and how this can affect their behavior, personality and development one way or another.

Two years is a milestone many parents are afraid to encounter, because of tantrums, meltdowns and more. But really, developmentally it is such a wonderful moment, and here I will explain a bit of what happens “behind the scenes” so you have a better understand, and why I call it the Terrific Twos.

Tantrums and meltdowns are part of our children’s healthy natural development, in this lesson I will go into some tips on how to manage them,