Are AI Toys Safe for Young Children?
For as long as I have done this work, parents have asked me some version of the same question. Is this new thing harmful to my child? The thing keeps changing. The worry does not. When I began this work, the thing was television, which had just learned to run all day. Then it was […]
Is Your Child Settling In at School, or Struggling?
The first day of school tells you very little. Everything is new, so everything you see is a reaction to newness. The tears, the clinging, the big brave face: all of it belongs to day one, and none of it says much about how the year will go. A few weeks in is different. The […]
Children Are Meant to Be Heard: A Clinical Psychologist on Really Listening to Young Children
There is an old saying that used to infuriate me when I was younger, and it infuriates me still. Children should be seen and not heard. The saying is older than most people realize. It appears in a collection of homilies written by an English clergyman around 1450, and it was not written about children […]
AI and Young Children: One Question Every Adult Should Be Asking
It is bedtime, and a four-year-old who is not ready to be alone yet has stopped asking the speaker on her nightstand why the moon follows the car. Her voice has changed. She is asking it whether monsters are real, and then nervously asks if it can shoo away the monster who’s hiding under her […]
Why the First Five years Decide Everything: A Clinical Psychologist on Early Learning
Early learning, to me, is everything. It is the foundation upon which a child’s entire life is built, and it begins far earlier than most of us realize. Long before a child picks up a pencil or recognizes a letter, they are already learning. They are learning how to feel. How to trust. How to […]
72% of Early Educators Say Kids Can’t Follow Directions. That’s Not a Behavior Problem — It’s an Emotion Problem.
If you teach pre-K through third grade, you already know. You’ve felt it in the first weeks of school, in the circle time that won’t hold, in the transition that takes twice as long as it used to, in the child who melts down when the marker won’t cap. You don’t need a survey to […]
Emotional Dysregulation is Rampant, Educators Need Support
Stress for children today is unlike what we’ve seen or dealt with in the past as they’re bombarded with social media, tech devices, bullying, and lots of external forces and challenges – and children need the tools and support to help them deal with it all. A survey by the Centers for Disease Control and […]
Infant Milestones & Activities
Your newborn will grow and change more in their first year of life than during any other time, making it an exciting (and at times anxiety-producing) age, particularly for first-time parents. Being a parent is one of the hardest jobs we’ll ever do, filled with joy, along with stress and anxiety, not only about managing […]
EI Before AI: The Importance of Connection
We are living in a moment of extraordinary technological acceleration. Axios recently reported that more than 40 million people are turning to ChatGPT every day for health information—and that’s just health care (Axios, 2026). For families and educators, AI can feel like relief: faster answers, easier planning, more efficiency. But childhood isn’t meant to be […]
High-Quality Child Care Counts
The High Cost of Early Childhood Care The November 5, 2025 issue of The Economist includes the article, “Universal Child Care Can Harm Children,” which explores the results of various attempts to make early child care accessible to all parents, regardless of income status. The one aspect of early childhood care that is undebatable is […]
Building Co-Working Community Through Peer Mentorship
Every educator has their own unique background that can benefit a school community. Teachers who are just starting out can learn a lot from veteran teachers, who have years of experience, expertise, and knowledge. And educators who have been in the field for years can also learn a great deal from new teachers, who offer a fresh perspective and can bring different strategies and creative ideas […]
Emotional Regulation is at the Heart of Academic Achievement and Positive Social Relationships
A Troubling Trend: Preschool Suspensions on the Rise I read a recent article about suspensions in Tulsa – hundreds of children are being expelled or suspended for aggressive, out-of-control behavior, including assault – and they weren’t just limited to high school students. We’re talking about hundreds of preschool students who have been suspended over the […]
Soft Skills, No Longer a Nice to Have, They’re a Need to Have
A recent Harvard Business Review article examined an analysis of 1,000 occupations and hundreds of skills, capturing 70 million job transitions, and identified several core skills necessary for success across all domains. First and foremost were foundational skills, such as collaboration, mathematical thinking, and adaptability. However, a subset of skills were also paramount to success […]
“COVID Babies” Head to Kindergarten
As parents and children prepare to go back to school, there’s a special cohort of kindergarteners heading to elementary school – “COVID Babies.” These 5-year-olds were born during a time of face masks, social distancing and isolation, among other preventative measures and circumstances, that undeniably affected the development of these babies and toddlers when their […]
Keep Emotional Intelligence Growing All Summer: A Guide for Educators to Support Families Beyond the School Year
Summer is here! School is out, summer programs and camps are underway, and routines are shifting for children, families, and educators everywhere. That’s why the summer is the perfect time to support families in continuing to nurture children’s emotional intelligence skills. We’ve created this guide to foster the home-school connection and keep children’s emotional intelligence […]
A Parents’ Guide: Toys that Support Young Children’s Development
I often say that play is a child’s “work” – it is an essential part of a child’s life for their overall health, learning, and well-being through which they process their lived experiences and the world around them. Play provides children with a treasure trove of learning opportunities, and the toys they reach for and […]