If you'd like to promote your baby's brain, you'll find 3 simple parenting activities here. Our parenting skills expert, Deborah McNelis, authors brain development packets for babies and children. They are loaded with ideas you can use. Today she'll share the importance of repetition and 3 learning actions your 6-9-month-old baby will love.

The Power of Repetition for Your Baby's Brain:

If your baby could talk, he might say, "Repeat that, please!" Babies need repetition to learn how things work. When you repeat fun activities, his brain will make the learning connections.

3 Parenting Activities that Help Babies Learn:

1. Make fun sounds and tell your baby what they are. "This is a bell. This is clapping. This clock is ticking."

There are so many sounds you can repeat. If you choose a bell and it's safe for your 6-9-month-old, let him touch it, hold it, ring it.

2. When feeding your baby say, "This is a (mashed) carrot. This is a cheerio. This is pudding." If you want her to touch it and play with it, that's up to you.

3. Take a deep breath and smell things saying, "This is a rose. This is an onion. This is (baby) lotion." Teach him to take a deep breath and smell the things you name.

Deborah advises you to promote all your babies senses with things that are safe to see, hear, touch, taste, and smell. Repeat your activities often and with enthusiasm to help your baby's brain make the connections.

Let's THANK Deborah for sharing her learning ideas from her vast experience as an early childhood specialist.

Deborah McNelis

Pick up her packet, BrainInsights: Love Your Baby - Making Connections in the First Year.

Available at: Braininsights Online

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With warm wishes,

Jean Tracy, MSS

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• 80 Fun Activities to Share with Your Kids
• 101 Ways to Get Your Children to Cooperate

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Great Parent Relate to Their Teenagers

Are you the parent of a teenager? If so, you'll profit from the tips, tools and stories of our parenting skills author, Dr. Parnell Donahue. As a pediatrician he interviewed many teens in his book, Tools for Effective Parenting. Today he'll tempt you with his tales and help you with his tips and tools.

Tools for Effective Parenting opens with Luke's health evaluation. Dr. Par, is the ideal doctor for all young people. He cares for both their physical and emotional health. In this book, he chats with Luke and other teenagers and enlightens us on their thoughts and values.

You'll learn the important questions he asks to get them talking, how he listens, and the stories he shares.

Read to find out:

. How Claire, the grunge girl, shocked him with her take on religion
. Why Rafe complained when Dr. Par questioned his moral compass
. Why Marc's comment, "If you sleep with dogs, you'll get fleas," made him chuckle

Beside the many inspiring stories flowing throughout this book, you'll receive helpful parenting tips at the end of each section.

7 Parenting Tips and Tools from Dr. Donahue:

1. Let your children know what values you live by.
2. Be responsible for your own behavior. Don't make excuses.
3. Tell your children the truth.
4. Model the behavior you expect your children to follow.
5. Love and respect your partner. Even if you're divorced be respectful in your words and deeds.
6. Eat together and chat together.
7. Consider getting a family pet to care for and love. (From pages 73-74)

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Parents who say, "Don't do as I do. Do as I say," weaken their parental authority. Without following the above tips and tools don't be surprised if your teenager ignores your words or disrespects your actions.

By living the tips and tools, you'll be authentic, real, and a model to look up to. Don't be surprised if you're respected too.

Dr. Par's true stories, lessons, and tips are satisfying to read and easy to remember. That's why Tools for Effective Parenting holds so much value for parents everywhere.

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Let's THANK Dr. Donahue for sharing his knowledge and respect for parents, children, and teens.

Dr. Par Donahue

Pick up his new book, Tools for Effective Parenting, and learn his secrets to raising wonderful teenagers.

Available on Amazon.com

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With warm wishes,

Jean Tracy, MSS

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• 80 Fun Activities to Share with Your Kids
• 101 Ways to Get Your Children to Cooperate

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If you’d like to increase your child’s vocabulary, check out these games from our parenting skills author, Carol Jossel. Carol is an expert learning specialist who’s written a parenting guidebook entitled, Other-Wise and School-Wise. It’s filled with wonderful ideas parents, homeschool parents, and tutors can use to have fun helping kids learn.

Best Word Games for Kids

1. Prefixes like co, anti, and dis come before the root word.

How many words can your family think up using prefixes? Feel free to use the dictionary.

Sample Prefixes

a. Prefix ‘co’ means ‘with.’

   Root word = pilot

   Together = ‘copilot.’

b. Prefix ‘anti’ means ‘against.’

   Root word = modern

   Together = ‘antimodern’

c. Prefix ‘dis’ means ‘not.’

   Root word = interest

   Together = disinterest

Discuss each part and how putting the prefix and root word together mean something different than the root word alone.

2. Sniglets: A sniglet is any word that doesn’t appear in the dictionary but should. Look around the room and see how many sniglets your family can create. They don’t have to be real words. They can be your family’s fun words.

Sample Sniglets:

   a. Blotchslide is slapping the bottom of a catsup bottle to get the rest of the catsup out.  

   b. Brattled is the feeling you get when kids make fun of you.

   c. Doorslinky is the spring piece that prevents the door from banging against the wall.

Have fun building your own family vocabulary with sniglets.

3. Hangman:

Build vocabulary with the old favorite, Hangman. Use the words about a grade higher than your child’s grade. Write the correct words on a piece of paper to post on the fridge. Give a high five every time you hear him use one of the words correctly.

Carol's book has fun chapters on the brain, memory, spelling, and much more.

Carol’s vocabulary games came from page 136 in her creative book:

Other-Wise and Fun-Wise: A Parent Guidebook

Available on Amazon.com

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With warm wishes,

Jean Tracy, MSS

Sign up for my FREE Parenting Newsletter and receive:

• 80 Fun Activities to Share with Your Kids
• 101 Ways to Get Your Children to Cooperate

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Friends Make Me Happy!

 If you want to raise happy childen, teach them friendship skills. The good news is friendless youngsters can now learn exactly what to do. My new kindle book, Character Building Stories: Friendship Skills for Raising Happy Children + 75 Parenting Tips helps your kids get exactly what they want - FRIENDS!

Each character building story includes a cartoon character with a typical friendship problem. The character learns a simple social skill, motivating self-talk, and shows your child how to make friends.

Here's a Peek at 5 of the 20 Friendship Skills:

1. The Friendly Stretch - Rubber Band Ruby discovers the 'give-and-take' she must practice. If she doesn't stretch, she'll end up all alone.

2. The Eyeball Tactic - Eddie learns the power of eye contact as well as being a good sport.

3. The Laughter Law - Funny-Bones Fanny overcomes her fear of the spotlight and learns the power of humor for making friends.

4. The Upbeat Booster - Betty learns how to encourage others by encouraging herself.

5. The Praising Principle - Bentley, the Braggart, changes his focus and his words to gain the friends he longs for.

These social skills teach your children what they need for developing a friendlier personality that boosts confidence and attracts friends.

How Friendship Skills Promote Emotionally Intelligent Children:

You can raise your children's emotional intelligence with each story's discussions questions to:

. See things from another child's point of view

. Learn how to use a person's own name to grab their attention

. Notice and praise the good points in classmates

. Become a leader by thinking of fun things other kids like to do

. Find out the power of body language for attracting friends

Watch your  son or daughter put these these insights and skills into practice. And if they tell you what they really feel, you might hear them say, "I'm so happy."

Pick up Character Building Stories: Friendship Skills for Raising Happy Children + 75 Parenting Tips

Available at Amazon.com

Reviews are never required but always appreciated.

Please support today's author and share your opinions about this blog post. Just click on the View Comments link below. It will open up for you. We'd love to hear from you.

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With warm wishes,

Jean Tracy, MSS

Sign up for my FREE Parenting Newsletter and receive:

• 80 Fun Activities to Share with Your Kids
• 101 Ways to Get Your Children to Cooperate

****** 

Please “Like" this blog article and click on the icons to share with your social media sites. Thank you so much.