Online Parenting Resources

Child Development | Discipline & Behavior | Parent - Child Relationship | School and Learning | Parenting through Disasters | Child Care Resources | Teen Resources | Spanish | Somali | Southeast Asian

These free online resources offer helpful hints and support to parents.

Child Development

• Children Home Alone — Self-care can be a rewarding experience for children who are ready for it.
• Praise that Builds a Child’s Self-Esteem — In an effort to enhance their children's self-esteem, parents should use praise to recognize the efforts and accomplishments of their children.
• How Behavior Changes in Babies - ages 0-18 month — Here's what you can expect in your child's development from birth to 18 months.
• How Behavior Changes in Toddlers — Ages 18 Months to 2.5 Years — Here's what you can expect in your child's development as he enters the toddler stage, age 18 months to 2.5 years.
• How Behavior Changes in Young pre-schoolers ages 2.5-4 years old — Here's what you can expect from your child's development at ages 2.5 to 4 years.
• How Behavior Changes in Older pre-schoolers ages 4-5 — Here is what you can expect of an older preschooler, ages 4 to 5.
• Making Friends — During the preschool years children develop social skills they'll need to establish and maintain friendship.
• Parenting Newsletters (University of Wisconsin Extension) - Helpful information for parents on parenting children birth-three.

Discipline & Behavior

• Catch Your Child Being Good — Many parents spend a good deal of time attending to their children when they're misbehaving. However, when they are behaving appropriately, parents often don't say or do anything.
• Dealing with a Child’s Anger — Just as children have a right to be happy, sad, lonely, or bored, they also have the right to feel angry.
• Dealing with Your Own Anger — Anger is a normal reaction. It's also an emotion many parents don't know how to deal with when it comes to their children.
• Listening Skills — Reviews why listening to your child is important and how it acts as discipline tool.
• Monitoring Tips — A strategy that is effective in preventing problem behavior is parental monitoring.
• Guidelines for Setting Consequences with Your Child — Strategies for parents to use to teach natural and logical consequences rather than punishment to change the child's behavior.
• Setting Limits for Responsive Discipline — Limits are like the guardrails on a bridge — they provide a sense of security.
• Strategies for Children with Challenging Behaviors — Strategies for positive parenting when children have challenging behaviors.
• Using “Time Out” as a Discipline Tool — Time out is a way of correcting behavior by placing a misbehaving child in a quiet place alone for a few minutes and then talking about the problem.
• Tips for Using Discipline — Thirteen tips for parents on using discipline.
• Tips for Using Parenting Tools — Parenting too relies on tools to help nurture, teach, and guide children.
• Truancy: Why It’s Important to Go to School — One of the most important things families can do to help children succeed is to make sure they attend school regularly.
• Understanding Children with Challenging Behaviors — Parenting is hard work. It is even harder for those with children who are always pushing the limits, find it hard to comlpy with request, and are intense, persistent, and energetic.
• Using Effective Tools — Summary of nurturance and prevention tools, guidance tools, and consequences tools.
• Using Guidance Tools — Strategies for parents to use in managing conflict and to teach responsibility.
• Using Natural and Logical Consequences — By allowing children to experiene the pleasant or unpleasant consequence of their behavior, parents and caregivers help chidlren learn what happens because of the behavior choices they made.
• Using Nurturance and Prevention Tools — Strategies to help parents raise healthy, happy, secure children and strategies parents can use when children are not misbehaving that will keep problems from occurring.
• What About Spanking? — There are many teaching, nurturing, and disciplining tools available to parents that are more effective and less harmful than spanking and other forms of physical punishment.
• When Siblings Quarrel — Questions to ask about sibling quarrels and steps to problem solving.
• Seven Reasons Children Misbehave — It's important for parents to understand why young children misbehave.
• What To Do When a Child Misbehaves — How do you deal with misbehavior so your child learns to behave correctly next time?
• Are You Spoiling Your Baby? — Responding to a baby every time he or she cries will not lead to a spoiled baby or teenager.
• Parenting Styles — Although parents at one time or another use all the parenting styles they tend to primarily parent using one approach.

Parent - Child Relationship

• The Importance of Family Mealtime — The Importance of Family Mealtimes — Family mealtimes are a chance for parents to serve as role models, encourage healthy eating habits, and establish family traditions.
• Encouraging Respectful Behavior — Parents and caregivers can do many things to encourage respectful behavior in a child.
• Helping Children Become Responsible — The idea of teaching responsibility to children in our society and culture has changed, but some of the basics remain from generation to generation.
• Families Find Quality Time Volunteering Together — Volunteering can help families learn new skills, teach responsibility, and bring them closer together.
• Family Problem Solving — When people are ready to talk about family issues or conflicts, two essential ingredients are needed.
• Grief and Crisis Decisions — During a stressful period or disaster, the decision-making process can be greatly affected by our emotional responses to loss and grief.
• Vacation - A Learning Experience — The more positive and constructive learning experiences children have outside of school, the better they do in school.
• Attachment: A Lifelong Commitment — “Bonding" and "attachment" are not the same; parents can continue build their relationship with their child throughout their lives.

School and Learning

Parenting through Disasters

• Parental Stress — Reviews the interacting factors in family stress and the effects of stress on parents.
• Dealing with Stress — Quick guide reviews types of stress, sources of stress, and tips for managing stress.
• After the Natural Disaster: A Guide for Parents — Whether a child has personally experienced trauma or has merely seen the event on television or heard it discussed by adults, it is important for parents to be informed and ready to help if reactions to stress begin to occur.
• After the Natural Disaster: Parenting Ages 0-5 Year Olds — Children up to five years of age may find it hard to adjust to change and loss.
• After the Natural Disaster: Your Elementary Aged Child — For the children who have not directly experienced the effects of high water the impact is the loss of their sense of predictability and security.
• After the Natural Disaster: Parenting Adolescents — Adults can support young people by considering their current developmental tasks and how the additional task of experiencing and processing a disaster impacts them.
• Children and Natural Disaster: From Fear to Hope — Children, particularly young children, will gain their sense of safety and security first from their parents and secondly from other adults.
• It's Important to Talk with Children about Natural Disasters — It is important for parents to take a moment from the immediate needs that must be met and talk with their children.
• Helping Your Child Cope with Disaster — To help children cope with fears, one of the most important steps adults can take is to talk with children.
• Trying to Understand and Cope with Disasters — Each person has different needs and different ways of coping, but accepting help from community programs and resources is healthy.
• What are Common Personal Reactions to a Disaster? — Personal reactions to disasters, like floods, can vary person to person.
• After a Natural Disaster: Coping with Loss — Understanding the stages of grief, giving into them, and going through them, is key to getting past the disaster and into a fulfilling future.
• After a Natural Disaster: Managing Anger — Anger is a common way to deal with what doesn't make sense, and when we are under great stress, anger allows us to feel less pain.
• After a Natural Disaster: Ending Isolation — Many people who survive a disaster experience a strong desire to separate from others.
• After a Natural Disaster: Talking with Children — When there is a serious family problem, parents often wonder whether they should talk to their children or shield them from what is happening.

Child Care Resources

• Child Care Dilemmas: What Do I Do When... — No matter how good you feel about the child care that you have selected for your child, you still need to plan for certain situations.
• Child Care: Raising Children Together — Good child care provides parents with an extended family to help share in the challenges and joys of raising children.
• Child Care Food: What Will My Child Eat — Your child will also learn, think, play, and work with others better if they are eating right.
• Communicating With Your Provider — Good communication is the key to a positive child care experience for you, your child and your child care provider.
• Preparing Children for Child Care — Entering a new child care home or center is a common new experience for many children.
• Quality Child Care: How Do I Know It When I See It? — Finding out about all the options open to you is only the first step in selecting child care.
• Understanding Child Care Contracts and Rules — Knowing the ground rules is important to a successful relationship with a child care provider.
• The Parent - Provider Partnership — Understanding yourself and your expectations of your provider can help you build a positive partnership and reduce anxiety.
• Developmentally Appropriate Care: What Does It Mean? — While there is no one right way to care for children, there are guidelines that focus on how a child develops and the care that is appropriate at various stages.
• Unemployed Parenthood: Do I Have a Choice? — To work or not to work is one of the biggest questions you and your family needs to answer when you have children.
• Finding Child Care: Questions to Ask — The first steps in selecting child care are to determine your needs and a list of potential providers.
• The Cost of Raising Children — Summary of how much of a family's yearly income is spent on the children, how it is affected by the number of children, and more.

Somali

• Xannaanada Caruurta (Child Care - Somali) — Questions to ask when you place your child in the care of someone else.

Southeast Asian

• Helping Youth Succeed: Bicultural Parenting for Southeast Asian Families — Online resources to help educators, parents, and teens understand different Southeast Asian perspectives on parenting and address related issues to build relationships.

Spanish

• Consejos para cuidado del niño (Child Care: What to Look For — Spanish) — Questions to ask when you place your child in the care of someone else.
• Apoyar la educación de su niño (Working with your Child’s School - Spanish) — Recommended practices for you to use with your son or daughter’s school, to help them be successful.
• Cuando su niño se comporta mal (What to do when a child misbehaves - Spanish) — Tips to help you deal with misbehavior so your child learns to behave correctly next time.

See additional resources for teens