The Power of Parents

 

Teachers, peers and society play major roles in a child’s education. But parents are a child’s first teachers. And home is a child’s first classroom.

 

School can and they do spend enormous amounts of staff time and money trying to compensate for what is sometimes missing in children’s homes.  But if a child is to succeed in school and in life, it is important that parents and other adults provide a solid base of support from the preschool years through the school years.

 

The kinds of support children need from parents is not necessarily or solely financial.  Children need parents who can help hem learn how to think clearly, parents who ask their opinions and respect what they hear, parents who find the time to share themselves and instill solid values.

 

Of course, our children don’t come with instructions (there were certainly times I wish mine had). But recently, I ran across a short, but fairly complete Parent’s Pledge.  It provides a good checklist for parents who are, indeed, a child’s first teachers.

 

Parent’s Pledge

 

1. I want my child to have the best possible education and I realize that strong school systems are essential
2. I will provide a home environment that will encourage my child to learn.
3. I will help my child build a small but meaningful home library.
4. I will insist that all homework assignments are done each night.
5. I will discuss at dinnertime what my child has learned at school each day
6. I will include stimulating books among the presents I give my child.
7. I will review newspaper stories and television news casts with my child and discuss how the news may affect our lives
8. I will meet regularly with my child’s teachers.
9. I will remind my child of the necessity of discipline in the class room? Especially self-discipline
10. I will help my child appreciate and enjoy the excitement in learning and the thrill of an inquiring mind.

 

To keep this pledge, parents need support: business that create family-friendly workplaces and give parents the flexibility to occasionally volunteer for duty in their child’s classroom.  Parents need communities with information about school programs and student progress.  Families want to belong.  Teachers and students need parent’s involvement.  It’s a two-way street that will lead our children to happiness and success.

 

Do Babies Really Feel Pain?

Do babies feel pain? I certainly think they do, but, to find out, we should not have stuck them with pins. There are other objective indications of pain.
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1. Crying. It seems perfectly obvious now, but for a long time, experts were informing the public that infants cries were only "random" sounds, not genuine communications. It took a quarter century of cry research to prove otherwise. 

 

 Cries are not only meaningful signals, but often compelling ones. They increase in intensity with degrees of pain. Spectrographic studies that reduce sound to an elaborate visual portrait show just how varied and complex cry language is. Acoustic studies show that changes in pitch, temporal patterning, and harmonic structure also reflect the degree of pain and urgency. For example, in a thorough study of cries during circumcision, acoustic features precisely reflected the degree of invasiveness of the surgery. 
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Parents present at circumcision (a rarity) have recalled how their babies cried. One father, present in the delivery room told me of his great surprise when the obstetrician proceeded to circumcise this boy at delivery. Having been quiet through the entire birth, the boy proceeded to protest loudly about the circumcision! A Jewish father, reflecting on this boy's circumcision on the eighth day, said it was the saddest occurrence of his babyhood: the boy cried more that afternoon, he said, than anytime in his whole first year.
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2. Facial expressions. Second, the pain that babies feel is clearly expressed on their faces. Brows bulge, crease, and furrow. Eyes squeeze shut: bulging of the fatty pads about the eyes is pronounced. There is a nasolabial furrow that runs down and outwards from the corners of the lip. Lips purse, the mouth opens wide, the tongue is taut, and the chin quivers. This look on a human face of any age communicates pain. Why do we doubt that it means the same on the face of a baby?
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3. Body movement. Body language in its larger motor dimensions is also a language that babies share with older humans. In response to pain, babies jerk, pull back, try to escape, swing their arms, use their hands to push away, and frantically scrape one leg against the other to dislodge an offending stimulus in that area. They strike out with their upper extremities and kick with the lower.  Receiving routine heel lancing, a deep wound made in the heel to obtain blood samples. Using calibrated hairs, they gently stroked the corresponding areas in the injured and non-injured heel. Even premature infants showed the same well-defined hypersensitivity to tissue injury that is found in adults.

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4. Vital signs. Fourth, we can see how baby pain is revealed by changed in vital signs and blood chemistry. Pain causes increased respiration. Babies hold their breath and release it in piercing cries. Researchers have observed infant heart rates increase 50 beats per minute and peak above 180 beats per minute.  In a study to compare behavioral states of the newborn to those of the fetus, Pillai and James  discovered that the heart rate during newborn crying was unlike anything seen in prenatal life. This racing heartbeat was unstable, often reaching peaks in excess of 200 bpm, in spite of the fact that baseline heart rates after birth are generally 20-25 bpm lower than they are in utero. These extremely elevated heart rates signal a serious and urgent disturbance.
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Serum cortisol is a measure of stress. In painful conditions, adrenals may release cortisol three to four times the baseline. In one study, cortisol levels clearly differentiated between three different surgical techniques of circumcision. 
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Under painful conditions, tissue and blood oxygen levels drop. 
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5. Neurobehavioral assessments. Further consequences of infant pain can be seen in neurobehavioral assessments. Babies who have been subjected to pain may have difficulty quieting themselves. Following circumcision, the normal progression of sleep cycles is reversed with immediate and prolonged escape into Non-REM sleep. After circumcision, babies withdraw, change their social interactions with their mothers, and modify their motor behavior. 

Puberty And Adolescence

Puberty And Adolescence

 

Definition

Puberty is the time in which sexual and physical characteristics mature. It occurs due to hormone changes. The changes allow you to become capable of reproduction.

Adolescence is the period between puberty and adulthood.

Alternative Names

Maturation - sexual; Adolescence; Reproductive development; Sexual maturation; Menarche; Adrenarche

Information

The exact age a child enters puberty depends on a number of different things, such as a person's genes, nutrition, and gender. During puberty, various endocrine glands produce hormones that cause body changes and the development of secondary sex characteristics. In girls, the ovaries begin to increase production of estrogen and other female hormones. In boys, the testicles increase production of testosterone.

The adrenal glands produce hormones that cause increased armpit sweating, body odor, acne, and armpit and pubic hair. This process is called adrenarche. The adolescent may find that an underarm deodorant or antiperspirant becomes necessary.

 

 

PUBERTY IN GIRLS

Breast development is the main sign that a girl is entering puberty. This will be followed by the first menstrual period (menarche). Before having the first menstrual period, a girl will normally have:

·   An increase in height

·   Pubic, armpit, and leg hair growth

·   Clear or whitish vaginal secretions

·   Increased hip size

Menstrual cycles occur over about one month (28 to 32 days). At first, the menstrual periods typically are irregular. The girl may go 2 months between periods, or may have two periods in 1 month. Over time, they become more regular.

After menstruation starts, the ovaries begin to produce and release eggs, which have been stored in the ovaries since birth. About every month after menstruation starts, an ovary releases an egg, called an ovum. The egg travels down a tube (Fallopian tube), which connects the ovary to the womb. When the egg reaches the womb, the lining becomes thick with blood and fluid. This happens so that if the egg is fertilized, it can grow and develop in the lining to produce a baby. (It is important to remember that fertility comes before emotional maturity and pregnancy can occur before an adolescent is prepared for parenthood.)

If the egg does not meet with sperm from a male and is not fertilized, it dissolves. The thickened lining sloughs off and forms menstrual blood flow, which passes out of the body through the vagina. In between the menstrual periods, there may be a clear or whitish vaginal discharge. This is normal.

Keeping track of when your period occurs and how long it lasts can help you predict when you should have your next menstrual period.

During or just before each period, the girl may feel moody or emotional, and her body may feel puffy or swollen (bloated). PMS (premenstrual syndrome) may begin to develop, especially as the girl gets older.

In girls, puberty is usually complete by age 17. Any increases in height beyond this age are uncommon. Although full physical maturity has been reached at this time, educational and emotional maturity remain ongoing.

 

 

PUBERTY IN BOYS

Unlike girls, there is no clearcut sign that tells a boy that he has entered puberty. However, boys will normally experience:

·   Faster growth, especially height

·   Increased shoulder width

·   Growth of the penis, scrotum (accompanied by reddening and folding of the skin), and testes

·   Voice changes

·   Pubic, beard, and armpit hair growth

·   Nighttime ejaculations (nocturnal emissions or "wet dreams")

The testes constantly produce sperm. While some sperm can be stored in a structure called the epididymis, the stored sperm are occasionally released as part of the normal process to make room for new sperm. This can occur automatically during sleep (nocturnal emissions) or following masturbation or sexual intercourse. Nocturnal emissions are a normal part of puberty.

 

 

ADOLESCENCE

Adolescence is the time between the beginning of sexual maturation (puberty) and adulthood. It is a time of psychological maturation, which a person becomes "adult-like" in behavior.

Adolescence is roughly considered to be the period between 13 and 19 years of age. The adolescent experiences not only physical growth and change but also emotional, psychological, social, and mental change and growth.