A Fine Parent

A Life Skills Blog Exclusively For Parents

About Dr. Tali Shenfield

Dr. Tali Shenfield is the Clinical Director of the Advanced Psychology Services Center in Toronto, Canada. Dr. Shenfield is a Licensed Psychologist with over fifteen years of experience in the identification and treatment of learning, behavioral, and emotional issues in children and young adults. Her primary areas of practice include gifted testing, social emotional and psychoeducational assessments and psychotherapy. Dr. Shenfield taught graduate level courses at the University of Toronto and worked as a consulting psychologist at The Hospital for Sick Children and TDSB. In addition to her clinical work, Dr. Shenfield is an avid blogger - you can read her latest articles on parenting and child development topics at psy-ed.com/wpblog/

How to Raise Bright Children

by .
(This article is part of the Positive Parenting FAQ series. Get free article updates here.)

How to Raise Bright ChildrenWatching a child learn and grow is truly a pleasure. Each day, parents are delighted as their child discovers new experiences, develops new skills, and comes to understand more about the world around her.

During these precious early years, parents wish to do everything in their power to enhance their child’s learning and give her all she needs to be successful, both personally and academically.

Fortunately, there is good news for hopeful parents: intelligence is more malleable and dynamic than was previously thought, meaning that there’s a great deal parents can do to encourage their children to excel intellectually. Understanding the mind of your child, with all of its unique aptitudes, can unlock potential far beyond that which can be measured by IQ tests.

[Read more…]

Autonomy Supportive Parenting: The “What, Why and How to” Guide

by .
(This article is part of the Positive Parenting FAQ series. Get free article updates here.)

Autonomy Supportive Parenting: MainThe journey of childhood is defined by the transition from a state of complete dependence to one of personal autonomy. To go from being a helpless infant to an independent adult.

To achieve healthy independence, kids need to be taught how to feel comfortable with every aspect of who they are. This is especially important for children with elevated anxiety levels. They must be provided with enough structure to make them feel secure, but not so much structure that their ability to make decisions is curtailed.

You’ve heard of helicopter parenting? How about the lawn mower parent? Both these parenting strategies come from a place of fear. Fear of failure. Fear of danger. Fear of the unknown.

And both these types of parenting, according to Julie Lythcott-Haims’s book How to Raise an Adult, prevent children from developing resourcefulness, resilience, and critical thinking skills. This overparenting cripples our children and prevents them from becoming healthy, independent adults.

Practicing Autonomy Supportive Parenting is one way to end overparenting and achieve our true parenting goals with minimal stress – to them and us.

[Read more…]

The ADHD Debate

by .
(This article is part of the Healthy Families series. Get free article updates here.)

The ADHD Debate: What Every Parent Needs to KnowThe American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the National Institute of Health, and millions of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder sufferers all agree on one point: ADHD is a valid condition that requires timely diagnosis and treatment. The symptoms of ADHD (such as hyperactivity, attentional difficulties, and impulsivity) are, after all, fairly clear-cut. Moreover, the disorder has been shown to respond favorably to targeted therapies and medication.

For most people in the above groups, the continuing controversy surrounding ADHD is perplexing – particularly given the fact that ADHD was added to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) over thirty years ago.

At the same time, however, ADHD critics raise valid points: If ADHD is simply a natural variation endemic to human physiology, why have ADHD rates risen so dramatically in recent years? (According to the CDC, ADHD rates in the USA rose from 7.8% in 2003 to 11.0% in 2012.)

More puzzling still, what could account for the fact that people are diagnosed with ADHD in the United States far more often than in any other developed nation?

Even within the United States, there are peculiar regional variations. Available data suggests that children in North Carolina, for example, are twice as likely to get ADHD as children in California. The reasons for such differences are unclear, leading many critics to suggest that the criteria for diagnosing ADHD must be highly arbitrary.

While many critics are quick to dissect why ADHD is being diagnosed at such alarming rates, part of the problem undoubtedly lies in how ADHD is being diagnosed.

[Read more…]