ATTENTION ALL PARENTS, COUNSELORS & EDUCATORS: Full disclosure: Trudy Ludwig is one of my favorite children’s authors as well as a caring human being. All her books (including Confessions of a Former Bully, Sorry, and Trouble Talk) are plain glorious, but now she’s outdone herself. Trudy has an exciting new nonfiction picture book project for kids that she’s [...]

Parent and educator guide to using the Penn State tragedy and Sandusky trial to talk about sexual abuse to kids and teens; rucial safety tips to prevent abuse and signs of sexual abuse Once again, the Penn State child sexual abuse case is in the news and has adults on full alert. “How could this have [...]

Teach your children to hang in there when the going gets tough, but know when to let them throw in the towel. Parenting advice I shared with Al Roker on the TODAY show Perseverance often makes the critical distinction between whether kids succeed or fail. Will they have the inner strength to keep on or [...]

Parenting advice to helping kids with pessimistic attitudes have a more optimistic outlook. New research finds optimism could curb kid depression as well as less heavy drug abuse and bad behavior “Optimism is the stable belief that one will generally experience good outcomes in life. We believe things will work out for the best.” Let’s face [...]

Parenting strategies to help kids  solve their problems, be self-reliant, bounce back from failure and not use us as their managers, arbiters and palm pilots A mom was running late as she drove her two sons to school. “Can we pleeeease go back?” her six-year-old pleaded. “I forgot my stamps for show-and-tell.” Any other day, [...]