Rowan Berries Childminding

Important car seat safety info to remember in this cold weather. ❄️

I have seen this so much lately with the cold weather so here is my PSA:

Thick coats, sweaters, etc. can add compressible volume to your child that prevents you from getting a highly important snug fit on the straps. I know it’s cold and we all want our babies to be comfortable.
You can have them wear their coat to and from the car, just take it off in the car.
You can have a blanket or even use their coat as a blanket to place on top of them once they are buckled.
We have a “car blanket” that just stays in there to cover up with on cold days.
You can let the car heat up a few minutes prior to leaving.
The point is, a few seconds in the cold is far less harmful than a coat in a car seat. I know taking it on and off add extra work for you as the parent but I promise these extra steps are so worth it.

Adding info as people have commented to address misconceptions:

Being in the cold does NOT make you sick. You can only catch a cold of virus by airborne droplets.

You cannot adjust the straps based off of the coat and ensure a secure buckle for your child. In a crash the coat will compress and the straps will be too loose in the car seat and will not keep your child secure in their car seat.

I am not sharing this to shame anyone, just to help educate and inform because car seat safety is SO important!

So I've got myself a copy of the new book by Sarah Ockwell-Smith.

Can't wait to get my teeth into this, I have a feeling it's going to make big waves in the way children are viewed societally.

I bloomin' hope so, anyway. 😁

................................................................

"Society is making great strides in increasing awareness of oppression and injustice, but one group remains mistreated: children.

Commonly recommended parenting and discipline methods treat children in ways that would cause uproar if adults were treated similarly. Children's needs and feelings are frequently dismissed and ignored by adults. Children are taught to blindly obey adults in the name of 'respect', although respect is so rarely shown to them.

We are a society that is afraid of treating children kindly, as evidenced by the almost constant uproar and ridicule of the 'gentle parenting' movement.

In this timely book, bestselling author and parenting expert Sarah Ockwell-Smith blends childcare history, sociology, psychology and current affairs to raise awareness of childism - the unconscious discrimination of children in our world - and why it impacts everybody.

Essential for parents, carers, teachers and anybody who works with children, Because I Said So! is both a thought-provoking guide and an urgent call to action. It will help you to understand your own upbringing and how this has shaped your beliefs and behaviour; prompt you to consider the prevalence of childism in society today, so that you can change the way you look after the children in your care or reinforce the approach you are already taking; and consider how we can transform the way our society treats children to create positive, lasting change for generations to come.

Childism is an issue that has been ignored and avoided for far too long. If we want to change the world for the better, we must start with treating our children better."

I love love love this 🥰

The more I learn from parents and the more books I write, the more I realise that ultimately the best parenting advice centres on changing the parents, not the children.

It is rare that I’m asked a question where the behaviour change needs to come from the child (although that may be the ultimate goal).

What do I mean here?

* changing adult expectations of behaviour/sleep etc (IMO 90% of all parenting problems are caused by developmentally incorrect expectations).

* changing adult communication to be more child-friendly and inclusive.

* changing the physical set-up of the home and organisation to make things easier for the children.

* changing family routines and timings to better suit children.

* parents working to understand and manage their own trigger points.

* parents working to de-condition their beliefs based upon treatment they received in their own childhoods.

* parents linking up with other like-minded parents, virtually or otherwise, for support.

I genuinely believe if there was a huge shift to thinking in this way when approaching any and all parenting conundrums, then life would be so much easier and happier for the whole family; parents and children. Don’t you?

Alas, our society is still firmly entrenched in the mindset of trying to change children. I hope one day things will change.

Do you agree?

If you liked this post, I know you will love my new book. Find out more here:

https://sarahockwell-smith.com/because-i-said-so/

I'm soon to have availability for a little one on a Monday and Friday, please contact me if this would suit your needs.

There are some lovely free events being held locally this summer if anyone wants to join them. ☺️

😍😍😍

Everyday my 4 year old picks up a tiny handful of these colorful stones off the ground at her pre school during yard time. She then puts them in her jacket pocket. She brings them home to me and every single day says

"I brought you coloredy stones mammy"

I add them to my collection in my office and kitchen and we cuddle and I thank her. And afterwards, the first word that comes to my mind is

'Object Permanence'

My fellow therapists and Psychologists will recognise this term but usually parents have never heard of it. It is a fancy word to describe a very important process that happens in the first year of your child's life. Possibly the most important.

When a baby's parent leaves the room there is some time in those early days that the baby believes the parent has literally left - he has no state of mind to configure that the parent is in another room, no sense of the world as trustworthy just yet, no feeling that the parent will ever be back. The parent has disappeared, gone forever and the devastation is utterly debilitating (this is why using cry it out as a sleep intervention at this crucial time of attachment development can have negative consequences).

Over time, the parent has this consistency of going away and coming back, going away and coming back, going away and coming back. Whether its to the shop, to the next room, to work etc. But you always come back. And so the baby learns 'object' (mammy/daddy) 'permenance' (exists even not with me). The coming back part is loaded with relief and love for both parent and baby which further compounds the babys sense of himself as held in his parents mind even in absence.

It is a task for both mum, dad and baby to negotiate in those crucial first 3 years.

Side note - this highlights why hide and seek is such an important game for emotional social and psychological development. If you do it with a baby, watch closely. You'll see anxiety in the moment your hand covers your face and relief on babys face on the exposed face. Then with repetition, the anxiety is replaced with excitement and trepidation.

An example of unnegotiated childhood object permenance is an adult who obsesses with their partner, friends, therapist etc, frantically sending texts or calling them in absence.

Are all children who find separation challenging and anxiety inducing, having problems with object permenance? No, not at all! Often times, there are a litany of reasons for that.

Instead, find the evidence that you as a parent successfully negotiated this incredibly important sense in your child. My evidence is colored stones. Whats yours?

Its
The picture I drew you mammy
The seashell i found for you daddy
The poem from your pre teen.
Its even the after school collapse (I held it in until i had you mammy)

It is the seemingly passing moment that is actually shining with meaning. And the meaning is you. You mean the world to your child and they sense you every where they go.

Because you always came back.
And when you left,
You left them something they could feel until,
You came back.

She will collect these stones every day until she finishes pre school this June. And someday she will teach me my own object permenance about her. Because she will leave school, she will leave home, she may leave the country.

I may feel all this sadness she will leave when that happens,

But she will have left me stones.
And so she will never have left me.

Just as I, in all the times I went away,
Never left her.

We are absolutely loving this warm sunny spring weather we are finally getting!

Today we went foraging for pretty things to decorate our Easter eggs with and had a lovely time gluing and sticking in the afternoon.

🌱🌞🥚🐰💐🌼🪻🌸🌿

Hope you all have a lovely Easter weekend.

All behaviour is communication 👌

Behaviour is communication.

And sometimes, behaviour is born from a bubbling up of emotions that eventually spills over, oftentimes resulting in a flood of angry words, lashing out, and tears. In these moments, we must resist our old programming - we cannot give in to the voice that tells us to “shut it down!” or hisses, “You can’t let her get away with this!”

Instead, these moments are asking for your loving compassion. These moments are asking for you to sit quietly until the tears have stopped flowing. These moments are asking for your patient ears, to hear all of the stories that lead up to this meltdown. These moments are asking for you to connect with your child, and to help them find their way back to a regulated state.

It isn’t always easy, and our own narratives can sometimes trip us up, but you can do this. You were made for this. ❤️

In the Original Learning Approach there is a loving hands on AND hands off approach.
Children’s right to play is not simply about adults stepping back and letting them only play, it is about being in their lives respectfully.
That children’s play is valued.
The Original Learning Approach is about the interweaving of play, learning, teaching and understanding as equals. If there is not adequate space (physical, temporal, emotional, social etc) to play it doesn’t matter how much teaching or forced learning we try to stuff into each child’s day they are less likely to learn deeply, understand fully and gain a wide breadth of knowledge as they would with adequate play in their days, every day.
All humans need to play. Not just children.
How we play and how much of our day we need as play changes as we age.
Play-responsive teaching is a way of teaching that is tuning into how the brain is learning.
By observing the children’s play we learn as educators (and parents) about what the children are curious about (natural motivation) what strategies they use to acquire and process new information (knowledge building) how they interact with the world and how they maintain their well-being.
This information can feed how we teach so that the children are motivated and eager to listen and learn - and lessons can feel almost like play.
In Original Learning play is not a break from learning but is integral.
Adults are integral to the play - to ensure children are safe enough to play freely - but not limited by OVER protection. That the environment is stimulating but not OVER stimulating. By interacting with care and love. Kindness is ALWAYS the responsibility of the adult as this is something children have their childhood to master.
As adults we weave in wonder, curiosity, joy, knowledge, imagination, interaction, risk, time, reflection and listening into our teaching and interactions with children (hopefully with everyone) to create learning environments for meaning-making, sense-making and world-making (creativity)
My book on this is released on January 3rd The Original Learning Approach