early childhood development Archives

How To Handle Toddler Stranger Anxiety

OphiraLeave a commentJune 12, 2021December 28, 2019

Read time: 5 minutes

Wondering what happened to your toddler who used to go happily to Aunty G? Why is he now clinging onto you for dear life? Toddler stranger anxiety is a normal part of child development. Don’t worry, you are not doing something wrong.

In fact, just like babies go through a period of stranger anxiety, some toddlers too experience anxiety around unfamiliar people.

WHAT AGE IS STRANGER ANXIETY SEEN IN TODDLERS?

Toddler stranger anxiety can start around 14 months of age and usually disappears on its own by 2 years of age.

WHY DO TODDLERS EXPERIENCE STRANGER ANXIETY?

Even though this anxiety around other family members may feel unreasonable and unpredictable. Toddler stranger anxiety only means your child now has a strong attachment to you. So yes, certain family members he may have played with in the past suddenly make your child anxious. But this has nothing to do with your child becoming introverted suddenly, which is the common misconception.

I have seen many families starting playschool or daycare around this age range because now they fear their child is becoming “shy” and will never learn to be social.

Remember, stranger anxiety is a normal part of childhood development, it indicates a strong bond between you and your child. There is nothing wrong with your child and you are not failing at Parenting.

Some toddlers experience this phase intensely whereas others may skip this stage altogether. Each child is different.

I find this My Feelings Card Set quite useful in helping children understand and name emotions. It creates awareness about what to expect and how the child can express feelings appropriately.

Related reading: How to ease your toddler’s fears

WHAT ARE SOME SIGNS OF STRANGER ANXIETY?

Anxious around extended family, friends, and other kids
Hiding behind you or another object (curtains, sofas, and cupboards)
Crying out for you
Looking away from the guest
Avoiding interaction and participation in the party or socialization
Clinging onto the parent

How can you help your toddler deal with stranger anxiety? Read on

TIPS ON HANDLING TODDLER STRANGER ANXIETY

Prepare your child beforehand

Before you head out to a party or in case you are expecting guests at home, give your toddler a heads up. Describe to him, who he will be meeting. Maybe tell a little backstory about the new person he will be meeting. For eg. “Max Uncle is your daddy’s friend from work. He met you last when you were a baby. He made you laugh with silly faces.”

Sometimes knowing beforehand, helps the child feel prepared to meet new people.

Reassure your child

When greeting someone new, and your toddler starts to get anxious, grabbing at your legs or hiding behind furniture take a moment and reassure him. Speak in a calming voice and let him know, that it is all okay. Introduce the guest and then give your child a moment.

Explain to guests or family

Explain to family and guests that your toddler needs a minute. You can reassure the child and explain to guests in one sentence by saying something like, “Tracy will join us when she is ready.” This way your child knows you are there for her and your guests can back off and give the child a moment to warm up to them.

Stay close to your child

After you reassure your child, stay close for a few moments. Let her know you are there for her. Depending on how severe the toddler stranger anxiety is you can either take a few moments breather in another room or carry your child and comfort her.

When you feel assured that the child has calmed down, bring her back into the room and carry on socializing.

To make the toddler feel comfortable around a room full of strangers or a new guest, get her involved in helping out. Ask the toddler to carry out a box of napkins for the guest table or bring water for the guest. All along stay close to your child until you see them relax and get confident in moving around the new person in the room.

Continue with your social life. Don’t change anything.

A few incidents of extreme toddler stranger anxiety should not deter you from having a social life. Both you and your child need to socialize and take breaks from routine. Continue with exposure to new unfamiliar social scenarios and don’t think too much about what others think of your child or parenting style.

Give it time

Most importantly give it time. The child needs to feel confident to step into the world and the only way she can do it is with you by her side.

Most experienced parents will tell you that toddler stranger anxiety does not last more than a few months. Sure it feels hard when you are dealing with it, but remember this phase too shall pass.

Trust in your child and give her some time to figure this out and become more social. She is watching you interact with those around you. Model the behavior you want to see in her, and she will soon get over the stranger anxiety.

I hope these tips help your family through this phase in child development. Like everything in parenting, take it one day at a time.

Loose Parts From Nature : Gifts for Open-Ended Play (and learning!)

Ophira3 CommentsMarch 25, 2022August 27, 2019

Read time: 8 minutes

Open-ended toys are growing in popularity because they encourage a child’s creativity and problem-solving skills. Did you know that you can find free or inexpensive open-ended toys that your child will treasure? And, what’s more valuable is that many of these open-ended toys can be collected lovingly from nature? The kind of nature treasures that are available probably won’t surprise you (rocks, flowers, and shells, oh my!), but let’s take a whole new perspective on them today as I introduce you to Nature’s Loose Parts! Read on to know more about the value of loose parts, which one’s to find in nature, and some simple open-ended activities using Nature’s loose parts.

**What are Loose Parts?**

Loose parts are objects, in our case children’s play-things, that are free from a predefined use and can be moved, manipulated, and used in an endless variety of ways. This means that they are, by their very definition, open-ended toys. Some examples of loose parts are small cloth pieces, blocks, bowls, shells, and sticks. All of these objects have many possible uses: they can be stacked, lined up, tied together and they can be imagined into any kind of pretend object. For example, a stick can be a spoon, a sword, a wand, a pencil, or a broom; the possibilities are limited only to a child’s imagination!

The real value of adding loose parts into child’s play is providing them to children in open-ended activities and play. In this way, a child can determine what to use, how to use it, and the process of how to implement their decisions and goals, which involves a whole lot of thinking skills that are invaluable to their brain development.

A Quick Peek into Play and Brain Development

Open-ended play with open-ended toys, a.k.a. awesome loose parts, supports the development of executive function skills. Executive functions are like the CEO skills and tasks of the brain. These skills include organizing and planning, starting tasks and keeping focus, paying attention, regulating emotions, and self-monitoring. Just as a great CEO can lead a company to great success, well practiced and refined executive functions developed in a variety of experiences and with a lot of repetition (lots of play!), can lead a child to great success. In fact, executive functioning is an important predictor of school readiness in young children. Open-ended play supports executive functioning by:

Letting the child choose what to play with and how to play with it
Engaging children in self-motivated, focused play (learning!)
A child sets a goal for a play outcome then plans and organizes to reach that goal
Involves problem solving, creativity, and emotional regulation (which are also valuable in social play where they can practice empathy, communication and collaboration)

Before we get to the examples, here’s one more bonus of playing with a variety of loose parts: multi-sensory experiences in everyday play! Rich sensory play with a wide variety of textures, smells, colors, and sounds (that means more than just plastic toys and just wood toys) help the brain build more complex and stronger networks of neural pathways. And nature has so many sensations to offer, right?

Abundant Loose Parts from Nature

Loose parts from nature help children build a personal connection with nature that instills value and compassion for natural and living things.

If you remember anything from this post, remember this: when you go out with your child to collect these precious treasures from nature (or any other toy for that matter), I want you to think about the immense opportunity for open-ended, multi-sensory play that they offer. Some of us (yes, I am in this group too!), with the best intentions, may go straight for the educational opportunity, as in the science, math, and knowledge to be taught about each object. But at a young age, children benefit most from the experience WITH the object in play, the rest can be worked in gently through books, stories, and conversation after their curiosity has been piqued.

And now, here are our favorite loose parts from nature (but, of course there are so many more!):

Nature’s Loose Parts Materials List

Rocks
Sticks
Leaves
Flowers
Seeds/cones (many plants have dry fruits that look like little capsules, these are great and in such huge variety!)
Shells
Tree cuttings (they can be sawed into shorter pieces or left as is for some large and interesting construction opportunities)

Easy peasy, right? Just remember to collect with sustainability in mind. If there’s only one, don’t pick it, and never take more than what you need. We mostly try to pick leaves, flowers, seeds and cones from the ground. Exceptions may be if there’s a specific learning objective about those items or if they are from your own garden.

Using Nature’s Loose Parts

Everyday Pretend Play

Now that my children are used to playing with loose parts, as opposed to toys with predetermined uses, they’ll pick up loose parts from nature for use in any sort of pretend play they are involved in, from making a soup for the baby to building a garden or home for their fairies. We keep a few sticks, rocks, and seeds available at all times specifically for this purpose.

There are also many amazing play activities that we can set up with these loose parts. These activities are great if you want to introduce or expand a particular area of learning (like letters, shapes, colors, construction, etc.), and they give children who may be new to loose parts an opportunity to expand their creative ways of using them. Once they get started, believe me, they’ll be picking up any stray objects to use creatively in their everyday play!

pretend play with loose parts — Pretend play with loose parts

Activities with Nature’s Loose Parts

Here are few ways to set up open-ended activities that can be set up inside or outside (note: it’s best and more interesting to go outside and collect objects WITH your child).

Letters and shapes with rocks or sticks (add sand for extra excitement!)
- Make or use simple letter or shape “flashcards”. Set out 1-3 flashcards for children 0-3 yrs. For 3-6 yrs, start with 1-3 and then slowly add more.

Letter and shape Activity — Letter and shape activity

Nature kitchen
- Gather leaves, flowers, and seeds in separate containers. Provide bowls or buckets, sticks, and water or sand, if you’re brave, to create a Nature Kitchen. With the first experience, you can make a soup, magic potion, or your child’s favorite dish together, and then set them loose to create their own masterpiece. This is a favorite and repeatable activity!

nature kitchen-loose parts — Nature kitchen

Build a TeePee
- You choose the size! You can use large sticks or small sticks with string or rope. Provide cloth, rocks, leaves, and animal or peg doll toys to decorate and inhabit the structure.

build a teepee-loose parts — Build a teepee

Nature fairies
- Use peg dolls, paper cones, corks, or cardboard paper rolls as a base for the body, and then glue any variety of loose parts from nature, or from home (beads, yarn, etc.), to the doll bodies. Then be sure to PLAY with them afterwards!

Nature Fairies - Loose parts — Nature fairies

Leaf art
The possibilities are endless here, so I will leave you with several ideas!

1. Leaf prints with paint
2. Use a leaf as a painting canvas
3. Leaf etchings with crayons or colored pencils
4. Leaf men with leaves glued to paper
5. Leaf face with other loose parts glued to the leaf to make a face
6. Leaf necklace
7. Sewing on the leaf (best with a large blunt darning needle, yarn and big fresh leaves), allow your child to poke holes and pull the yarn through in whatever design they like. This idea is similar to lacing activities, except instead of a lace, they can use a needle and thread.

BIG TIP: Keep in mind that, while you may be introducing concepts or learning objectives in some activities, like with letters and shapes, the direction that the child takes the activity may not have much to do with your original intent, and that is OK! Open-ended means that they can choose how to play with the activity and if you observe their choice, you will learn a little something about what their interest is! Plus, simply seeing the letters around them in many ways and repetitively will develop an interest that they will eventually pursue. Enjoy!

Images credit : The Frolicking Tree

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kimberly is a former teacher, forever researcher, and a mother of two, soon to be three, homeschooling kiddos. She started The Frolicking Tree to help parents encourage and inspire a child’s curiosity of the natural world to develop self-motivated, passionate learners by providing activity resources and ideas to create child-led nature explorations.

How To Get Toddler To Brush Teeth Without A Struggle

OphiraLeave a commentMay 1, 2019

Read time: 6 minutes

how to get toddler to brush teeth without struggle

Are you wondering, How to get your toddler to brush teeth without a struggle?

What if I told you its possible. Yes, you heard me right!

I talk a lot about Gentle Parenting on this blog and its social media pages. But sometimes everyday tasks like brushing toddler teeth are a challenge no matter what parenting strategy you use. Many of you have asked me in the past, how do you brush your toddler’s teeth without using force or pinning him down.

Well, today I am going to share with you our toddler teeth brushing tips and tricks. These are simple things we do in our home that make brushing teeth easier.

GET THE TOOTH BRUSHING ESSENTIALS RIGHT

Make sure to buy a brush with soft bristles. For babies, you may want to start out with a baby finger brush and then move to a brush with soft bristles as the baby grows more teeth.

I usually go with the recommended age on the toothbrush package since I find that the manufacturers have done their research right and make age-appropriate toothbrushes that are easy for toddlers to hold.

Our favorite toothbrushes

Mee Mee Baby Finger Brush

Dr. Browns Infant To Toddler Toothbrush

Chicco Baby Toothbrush

Children’s toothpaste

Chicco Toothpaste (Strawberry flavor)

TIPS ON TODDLER TEETH BRUSHING: HOW TO BRUSH A TODDLERS TEETH WITHOUT A STRUGGLE

Introduce the concept of tooth brushing

Start talking about brushing teeth as early as possible, don’t wait to talk about brushing and its importance until when they are older. An easy way to introduce the concept of brushing teeth is through children’s books and nursery rhymes.

Children quickly pick up catchy rhymes like, “this is the way we brush our teeth, brush our teeth, brush our teeth”.

I also noticed my son will do a daily task better when he reads about it in a book. When he sees the characters in the book performing these daily tasks he is more inclined to try for himself.

Books on tooth brushing for children

Tiger’s toothbrush – Ladybird series

Monkey Bandit and the funny toothbrush – Maria Ellis

Let the child have a go at it

Children love to copy adults. Hand your toddler a brush and let him copy you as you brush your teeth. Brush together in the morning’s so that a routine is set.

Do not expect children under 6-7 years of age to be able to brush their teeth clean. At best most of them are just chewing on the bristles and cleaning a tooth or two. But this act of showing confidence in them when they are doing it themselves helps maintain the motivation to do it every day.

Help him finish the routine

I always let my toddler have a go first and then follow up with the real teeth cleaning process.

For this part, I like to use a little bit of storytelling. Read the next point to know more about how we incorporate storytelling and make tooth brushing fun for the toddler.

Makeup stories with the child’s favorite characters

Between the ages, 1-2 our son was learning about different animals so we made stories using animals as characters. First I would hand him the toothbrush and tell him how all the jungle animals are having a grand party in his mouth. He needs to get them out of there so his teeth can also go night-night (go to sleep)

He would brush his teeth, while I cheered him on saying, “oh look, I just saw you catch a little bear in your brush”. This would excite him and he would continue brushing his teeth.

Once I felt that he is done trying on his own I would say, “give me the toothbrush, let me have a look and see if you caught them all” this is when I would start the actual brushing process.

When brushing I use a steady and gentle hand making sure not to brush too hard.

In between the brushing teeth process, I always add in a line or two more to my story so that he will sit through the process longer. I will exclaim loudly and say; “Hey! a giraffe was hiding here, wait let me get him out” This way both of us would be laughing and giggling while we brushed his teeth.

Now that he is older ( 2 and a half years plus) and obsessed with cars I have changed the storyline to that including cars.

Recently I also introduced the concept of “germs” and what they do to our teeth if they are not removed each night and we pretend that the toothbrush is his favorite vehicle who goes in each night to kill all the germs from his teeth.

So, one night we have a ‘big digger’ in action getting rid of germs from his mouth and another night there is a ‘police car’ doing the cleanup work. I make all the sounds these vehicles each night, trying my best to add a little fun to our daily routine.

More toddler life-related blog posts:

How To Ease Your Toddler’s Fears

How To Get Your Toddler To Listen Without Yelling

5 Simple Toddler Sleep Tips To Help Them Sleep Fast

Practical Potty Training Tips By An Experienced Mom

Praise their efforts and reinforce the good habits

This is a very important point that most of us forget in the rush of our daily routines. Do not forget to praise your child’s efforts. It’s not easy for a 1-2-year-old to have someone bring in a foreign object that’s rubbing at their teeth and tender gums. You wouldn’t enjoy anyone else poking around your mouth either. So praise them when they try on their own and when they allow you to have a good go at cleaning their teeth.

Even with all these efforts, there may be days or nights when the toddler won’t comply. We really can’t tell, he may be having a bad swelling on some teeth going through the teething phase.

When my toddler is having a particularly bad day like this I let it go and request him to gargle his teeth and get the germs out. This helps him relax and also reinforces the concept that we must clean our teeth before we start the day and before bed. It also shows him that I trust him and I am understanding of any discomfort he may be feeling in his gums or teeth that moment.

Believe me, it’s not often that we skip brushing teeth. Once set into such a routine the child enjoys brushing his teeth, its more fun than a routine.

As he grows I will modify the story or my approach altogether to suit his developmental needs. Whatever new method I use, it will be one that will gain his cooperation over forceful compliance.

What is the tooth brushing routine in your home? Do you use storytelling as a way to gain your toddler’s cooperation? Leave me a comment below.

9 Simple Tips To Encourage Language Development

Ophira16 CommentsNovember 3, 2020November 2, 2017

Read time: 6 minutes

Language development is an important developmental milestone. Each child has different growth and development rates. But there are a few basic parenting strategies that can be practiced by all parents to encourage early language development.

These strategies helped us with our son. When we started with these we didn’t do it with a goal of enhancing his language; it was just our way of interacting and nurturing a bond with him. But along the way, we observed how this parenting style helped him start talking early and pick up a variety of words. I thought it would be great to share these tips with other parents just starting out or those who still want to try and help enrich their child’s vocabulary. So let’s begin;

Talk, Talk, Talk

Start talking with your little one from day one. At this stage, they crave to hear your voice since they can’t see very well. They respond with coos and gurgles and this marks the beginning of early communication. Examples of talk with babies can be as simple as asking; “how are you today?”, “Are you happy to see Mumma?”, “What is my little one up to?”. Modulate your voice to get them interested in what you are saying and pause for them to respond.

Point at things

As a few months pass by and your baby’s eyesight is getting sharper start pointing out things. Describe what you see around you at home or outside. Examples: Look at that red bus. These are beautiful yellow flowers. Look at the butterfly. Keep repeating and pointing at everyday objects from their environment. On repeatedly talking about the crows and making sounds of the crows during your walks, for example, they pick up the word “crow”.

Be specific in your instructions

As they grow in their toddler years, a lot of times it’s difficult for parents to understand what exactly the child wants. They cry and throw tantrums for a lack of knowledge on how to communicate their feelings. It is best to give clear instructions and ask specific questions to communicate well with your toddler.

Examples: “Mommy can’t hear you over the crying, do you want_____?”; “Bring me the red bucket”. This type of communication encourages them to speak and also helps them understand what is expected of them.

Messy play

Baby-led weaning is a great way to getting messy at the table and in turn encourage language development. When the child touches and feels their food through this form of sensory-based self-feeding, they start understanding words associated with certain non-solid objects; for example hot, cold, liquid food, soft food, squishy peas, etc.

I personally felt baby-led weaning and messy eating at the table helped immensely with my son’s grasp of certain words. Another way to incorporate getting messy is through messy play like coloring, painting, playing in a sandbox, etc.

Read, Read Read

I cannot emphasize this point more. Read to your child from the very beginning. Even if it’s just a board book with few images make an imaginary story around those images and read to the baby.

Reading helps them learn words, encourages their creativity and imagination too. Look for books with rhyming words, these get toddlers excited when read aloud. They pick up rhyming words quickly too. I am adding a list below of books I observed that helped my son pick up a lot of words from, hopefully, you will find them useful for your child too.
What the ladybug heard next
Polar bear polar bear what do you hear
The very hungry caterpillar
Vikas tiny board books
Baby faces
F irst words
Little baby books everyday
Eyes, nose, fingers, and toes
Here come Poppy and Max

Pretend Play

Around the 16-18 month period toddlers start enjoying pretend play. Use pretend play to introduce new words, associations, etiquette, and style of talking. A kitchen set is most apt for this age group, but you can get anything your toddler enjoys and engage in some pretend play.

Open-ended toys

Open ended toys promote language development, for example, jungle animal sets, fruits, and vegetable sets. You can use these for pretend play or allow the toddler to explore and try out different games with these.

A fun game my son came up with is to match his toy safari set to the pages of a book he is reading where the animal is featured. His eyes light up and he squeals in joy when he finds a match. This type of association building between real-world objects and age-appropriate toys and books facilitates early language development.

Here are a few open-ended toys we found to be engaging for little ones.

Getting out of the house

In one of the previous points, I spoke about how you should point at things and describe them in detail to your baby. Spending time outdoors is an important activity that can aid this step. When you are out you can show your child a variety of things.

Take them for a walk in the park, or a local museum, art gallery, beach, restaurants, malls, play areas, or the library. Every experience outside is teaching them new words and encouraging them to use words.

Socialize

Once they are a little older start taking them to family functions, festive celebrations, and parties. These social events create an environment where your child is exposed to different styles of spoken language. And in a country like India, maybe even a different language than one spoken at home.

I know many families don’t take small babies to social events. But, you can always take them to your grandparents’ place and family and friends’ place. They crave interaction and this helps to get them interested in talking from a young age.

I hope these points get you started on interacting more deeply with your baby. Talk to them, read to them and most importantly spend quality time with them.

With busy lives, we are all turning to screens to help us with our kids. But a screen is a consumption device that cant help the child to interact in a two-way manner thus restricting their language development.

Use screen time judiciously and try and introduce them to books and other activities that introduce them to a rich language. I wrote here on how you can engage your child in non-screen time activities.

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