Hoe moet ouers reageer wanneer hul kinders in die openbaar begin huil? Wat moet jy doen as jou kinders voortdurend met mekaar baklei? Hoe gemaak met kinders met gedragsafwykings?

Hierdie is ‘n paar van die vrae wat JB Roux onlangs gestel het aan Anchen Witthuhn, die skrywer van Change Your Child’s Behaviour.

Witthuhn vertel dat dit belangrik is dat ouers nie aggresief moet reageer nie, maar ferm en met deernis met hul kinders moet gesels. Ouers moet verder met kinderoppassers ooreen kom oor hoe dissipline gehandhaaf word. “Dit is belangrik vir kinders dat daar standvastigheid is,” sê sy.

Laastens gesels Witthuhn oor goeie ontspanningstegnieke, waarvan televisiekyk nie een is nie.

Lees die artikel:

“Dit is ook nie nodig om op jou kind te skree nie. Om te skree is ook ‘n vorm van aggressie en daar mag geen aggressie wees wanneer kinders ter sprake is nie. ‘n Ferm stemtoon is meer as genoeg.

“Moet ook nie wanneer jy jou kind dissiplineer, enigiets doen wat as wreed beskou kan word nie. Daar is ouers wat byvoorbeeld, wanneer ‘n kind ‘n woede-uitbarsting het, haar in ‘n kas of kamer toesluit om haar te kalmeer. Dit is nie aanvaarbaar nie. In ‘n situasie soos hierdie het jou kind liefde nodig.

• Volledige artikel: Vrouekeur

Boekbesonderhede

• Change Your Child’s Behaviour deur Anchen Witthuhn
  Boek se tuisblad
  EAN: 9781432304607
  Spoor hierdie boek met BOOK Finder op!

Blending two or more families together can be very tricky if not managed well, especially after a painful breakup of the original family unit.

Cape Town-based counsellor and educator Flicky Gildenhuys’ book Blending Families equips readers with psychological tools to cope with transitions like this in order to blend successfully to live together in harmony.

A wedding album that went viral recently highlighted the importance of the principles Gildenhuys shares in her book, illustrating how a successfully blended family tackled one of the most emotional days a family could go through: a wedding.

“Todd Bachman started to walk his daughter down the aisle last weekend when he stopped the procession and walked over to the bride’s stepfather, Todd Cendrosky,” Eun Kyung Kim reports for US publication Today.

Read the article to see what happened next and why his gesture moved everyone to tears:

“All of a sudden, at the last second, he turned his head to me and grabbed my hand,” Cendrosky told TODAY.com. “He said, ‘Hey, come with me. You’ve had just as big of a part in raising this child. It’s time you and me walk our daughter down the aisle together.’”

The expressions of an emotional Cendrosky as he was led by a determined Bachman back to the bride were captured in a series of pictures that have since gone viral on the wedding photographer’s Facebook page.

• Complete article: Today

Have a look at the viral photo album, with over a million likes and just under 600 000 shares:

• Not loading? View on Facebook

Book details

• Blending Families by Flicky Gildenhuys
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432303631
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

A recent viral video of a Grade 7 boy being bullied in a very violent manner has refocused attention on the ever escalating problem of bullying in South Africa.

Claire Keeton from the Sunday Times recently spoke to Bully-proof author Gail Dore to find out more about the phenomenon of bullying. “No child is safe,” Dore says, explaining that kids can be targeted for anything and nothing at all. Her advice for parents is to “recognise that being bullied is your child’s problem, not yours”. This means not fighting their battles for them, but rather to help them find a workable solution.

Read the article, which includes advice on what to do when you discover your child is being bullied excerpted from Bully-proof:

DO:

• Familiarise yourself with the facts about bullying and the many forms it takes. This will help you distinguish between bullying behaviour and normal peer conflict;

From the mouths of babes: child victims talk about sexual abuse
• Ask your child what he or she has already done to stop the bullying and discuss ways of deflecting a bully’s unwanted attention;

• Help your child keep a record of where, when, how and who was involved in the incidents of bullying;

• If the bullying continues, arrange a meeting with the school. Encourage your child to talk about it and hand over the record. Allow time for the school to investigate but arrange a date for a progress report;

• Keep talking until the bullying stops; and

• Encourage your child to have a buddy.

DON’T:

• Ignore or minimise your child’s being bullied. The long-term effects can be devastating;

• Confront the bully yourself. There could be legal implications; and

• Tell your child to fight back. This is not a viable solution.

• Complete article: Sunday Times

October is celebrated as Anti-bullying Month around the world. Jerusha Sukhdeo-Raath spoke to Riverside College high school principal and counsellor Dave Swart to find out what they are doing to curb bullying. They were joined by Adam Edwards, a pupil at the school, who shared his own experience.

Watch the interview, shared by News24 in two parts:

• Not loading? Watch on YouTube

• Not loading? Watch on YouTube

Book details

• Bully-proof by Gail Dore
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432303648
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

 
Sasha Wyatt-Minter recently compiled a list of some of the best parenting books of 2015 for All4Women – Struik Lifestyle is proud to have published three of the four books she reccommends.

Change Your Child’s Behaviour by Anchen Witthuhn, Blending Families by Flicky Gildenhuys and Party Time by Lizelle de Kock are commended as “great books by expert South African authors to help you negotiate the minefield that is parenting”.

Read what Wyatt-Minter has to say about Blending Families:

As the child of a blended family, I wish that my parents had had access to this book when they remarried. It would have provided them with help to face the challenges (and the sulky teenagers they had to deal with) of remarriage. It certainly gives me more understanding of what they went through, and why they made the mistakes they did in their quest to try to make everyone happy …

• Complete article: All4Women

Book details

• Change Your Child’s Behaviour by Anchen Witthuhn
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304607
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

• Blending Families by Flicky Gildenhuys
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432303631
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

• Party Time by Lizelle de Kock
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304645
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

Anchen Witthuhn recently shared practical parenting tips from her book Change Your Child’s Behaviour on the Mommy Matters show on OFM.

Witthuhn says there are several factors that can cause children to act out and display signs of bad behaviour, for example changes at home, school or in friendships. When parenting techniques are not consistent children can also be confused by the conflicting messages they receive.

Change Your Child’s Behaviour is a self-help guide to help parents to define those dynamics in the child’s life that are causing them to act out in order to change them in a non-evasive way.

Witthuhn explains a term from her book called positive behaviour and says it is important for parents to communicate with their children about what is expected from them. She explains that children often experience emotion as a physical feeling. Witthuhn says many say anger is in their stomach. Parents should help them develop the tools and techniques to get rid of that anger.

Listen to the podcast:

• Not loading? Listen on Mommy Matters

Book details

• Change Your Child’s Behaviour by Anchen Witthuhn
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304607
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

A recent study conducted by the Policy Studies Institute at the University of Westminster in London has concluded that South African parents are the strictest in the world.

When it comes to play and travel, South African parents are the more restrictive than parents from any of the 16 nations surveyed.

John Maytham of CapeTalk recently took a closer look at why this is and what is means for children in this country. To this end, he spoke to Joan van Niekerk, president of the International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect.

Van Niekerk said that being strict in order to protect children from danger in this unsafe country is understandable and even commendable. But, in order to allow children to acquire “levels of independence and responsibility associated with being allowed out alone”, so freedom needs to be allowed.

Van Niekerk outlines some of the benefits of freedom for children, and suggests some creative ways of maintaining supervision while allowing some freedom.

For more ideas about how to equip your children to cope with a dangerous world, check out Bully-proof by Gail Dore and Change Your Child’s Behaviour by Anchen Witthuhn.

Listen to the podcast:

• Not loading? Listen on SoundCloud

Book details

• Change Your Child’s Behaviour by Anchen Witthuhn
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304607
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

• Bully-proof by Gail Dore
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432303648
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

Carla Grobler, an occupational therapist who specialises in paediatrics, was recently featured on OFM’s Mommy Matters radio show to speak about her book Early Childhood Development Checklist (available in Afrikaans as Mylpale vir kinderontwikkeling).

In the podcast, Grobler speaks about the aim of her checklist, and how it can help parents and preschool teachers. She says it allows role players to see where children are in their development, and “it also gives you quite a nice idea of which skills area you as a parent or teacher can work on to stimulate your child”.

Grobler reminds people that children all develop differently, and they need not worry if their child seems a little behind. However, help and therapy is always available.

Listen to the podcast:

• Not loading? Listen on Iono.fm

Book details

• Early Childhood Development Checklist by Carla Grobler
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304829
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

• Mylpale vir kinderontwikkeling by Carla Grobler
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304836
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

Gail Dore recently said that more than 15 percent of children “face some sort of violence at school”.

In an interview on the OFM Mommy Matters show, the Bully-proof author says there are numerous reasons why children do not speak out against bullies:

• Children are afraid of retaliation, that the bully will find out about it and then the bullying will get worse.

• Children don’t trust that adults or school authorities will handle the matter properly.

• They feel a profound sense of shame: If they were smarter, prettier, or more adequate in some way they wouldn’t be picked on.

• Initially children think they can handle it.

Dore shares her advice for parents on how to curb bullying. She says it is important that parents find opportunities to help children feel confident about themselves and foster a healthy self-esteem. Body-language conveys a lot to a bully, she says, adding that when a child is attacked they must know that the bullying is not their fault.

Listen to the podcast for more advice:

• Not loading? Listen on Mommy Matters

Book details

• Bully-proof by Gail Dore
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432303648
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

Presenting Change Your Child’s Behaviour: More than just a do-it-yourself guide to the often fraught business of dealing with what society in general would define as naughty or difficult behaviour from children:

In accessible, non-judgemental and jargon-free terms, Anchen Witthuhn sympathetically examines the reasons why little ones or preteens may exhibit a variety of challenging behaviours either at school, in the home or in their daily interactions with others.

Dealing head-on with sensitive issues such as discipline, anger management, exposure to inappropriate electronic media and the continuous need for firm, gentle and positive reinforcement, the book goes to the root of the problem. Through a practical, structured individual programme of daily messages, relaxation techniques, feedback and appropriate material, Change Your Child’s Behaviour provides sensible and stress-free solutions to a range of widely experienced problems.

About the author

Anchen Witthuhn, a parent herself, has a BCom Communications degree and has lectured widely in this field. As a trainer and facilitator, she has worked with school children, adults and corporate companies. She also consults with parents and teaching institutions, via workshops and individual consultations, on methods to support behavioural change in children. She understands the challenges that parents and educators face and the effects that life’s dynamics can have on children, and is enthusiastic about assisting both adults and children to deal with these challenges.

Book details

• Change Your Child’s Behaviour by Anchen Witthuhn
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432304607
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!

Gail Dore was recently interviewed by Sam Cowen about her book Bully-proof.

In the interview, Dore tells Cowen about how the book came about. She says she started writing it when she was teaching a grade four lifeskills class. One of the girls came in “in floods of tears” because she was being bullied. Dore decided to shelve the lesson she had planned and speak to the class about bullying instead.

Dore says during the course of that lesson two questions came up that she could not immediately answer: “Why do bullies do it?” and “Why do they pick on me rather than anyone else?” It was these questions that led to research about bullying and her anti-bullying campaigns.

Listen to the podcast:

Standard Podcast Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

• Not playing? Download from 702

Book details

• Bully-proof by Gail Dore
  Book homepage
  EAN: 9781432303648
  Find this book with BOOK Finder!