Practical Parenting

A resource for parents to learn, lead and love their children through all steps of their lives.

Natacha

Creative Way For Children To Share Their Feelings While Being Stuck At Home

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A friend of mine who lives in the UK, has twin daughters aged 10. She came up with a brilliantly creative idea to help the girls identify the positives of being at home in lockdown. This was also an opportunity to explore and discuss casually about how the girls are feeling about it all. She asked them to write 5 negatives and 5 positives of the lockdown. After which they shared and discussed their feelings and thoughts and then put a positive spin on it and created signs for themselves to put around the house.

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Review of a Sensory and Emotional App

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You have to get this App. It is not only something that I can use in therapy but an App you can also use in the comfort of your own home. And it is SO easy! But MOST IMPORTANTLY, it helps your child (and the parent) to understand EMOTIONS. 

I have said it before to parents, “If you can name it, you can tame it”, therefore help the child notice what emotion they are expressing and then teach the child the name of what they are expressing, you will have already put their feeling at ease (even if just for a bit), because they feel noticed and accepted, instead of being shunned away or told off.

The founder/creator of this App, Julie Kurtz from the Center for Optimal Brain Integration, gives a nice explanation in the information section of the app, about how it works. There is also a brilliant explanation about how important it is to help the child understand how emotions make your body feel on a sensory awareness level (this is vitally important). Recognising when your body feels (felt sense/ sensory awareness) a certain emotion, eg: “when I feel angry (emotion) I feel as hot as the stove (felt sense/ sensory) and I feel like I am going to explode like a volcano (felt sense/ sensory)”.

Do yourself a favour – help yourself to help the children understand. 

(This App can also be used for children with Autism, the objective being for children to be able to identify and express nonverbally).

https://www.optimalbrainintegration.com/app-1

Natacha Latouf

Successful Online Consultation

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Online – virtual – internet – platforms – linking – broadband – connecting….. all these terms can bring about palpitations and dizziness.

It is all very overwhelming, especially for me who only recently on the 27th March 2020 (day 1 of Lockdown for SA), got connected with some social media platform called Facebook.

It took a crisis for me to get connected!!!

This is the time of social distancing with no contact with the regular people you are used to seeing, talking to and shaking hands or giving hugs to.

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