you are a parent who has a child (adopted) of a different race than you. one evening, when your daughter has a friend over, they come to you to show you vulgar, racist messages being sent by bullies via Snapchat. After the fourth one of these you see, you record a copy on your own phone as evidence to use for showing to the bully parents. They ( Read more... )

Community will ticket parents of chronic bullies.

Good idea? Bad idea?

You have a younger sibling who is in grade 8 who has a horrible attitude and is constantly disrepectful. You no longer live at home, but you talk to your 5 siblings frequently. Your Father and Step-Mother have, as your other siblings have grown up after you, taken a decidedly hands-off approach to parenting and often have your 13yo sibling ( Read more... )

Prompted by some of the comments tellychron's post and an experience of my own a few weeks ago --

How much leeway can be reasonably expected from strangers with regard to a child's behavior in public, when one generally can't tell from a glance whether bratty behavior is because the child is being a brat or because the child may not be neurotypical?

( anecdata! )

Your 6 year old will not eat when everyone else eats.  If you're having lunch, she wants to go play.  The second you clear the table, go to your favorite chair and pick up a book, she comes to you and says she's hungry ( Read more... )

You have several children, at least three. Two of them hate each other. There is no particular reason that you can see for this conflict, and when asked individually they each say that they just can't stand the other, there is no reason, they just don't like the other. Apparently, they just have personalities that are severely incompatible ( Read more... )

You are the single parent of a preschool-aged child (4). You work full-time. Your child has serious medical issues that require constant medication, blood checks, and specialist involvement ( Read more... )

My youngest is a monkey, and my oldest is not. It's not uncommon for Youngest to continue playing semi-rough after Oldest has had her fill of that kind of play. Most of the time, I let them work it out with indirect supervision - I'm listening more than watching and step in if I hear something off ( Read more... )

My 7 year old daughter was invited to a birthday party taking place after school today. Since she'd spent last night at her dad's, and I think taking a birthday gift to school is super-tacky, she didn't take the gift with her to school, and I'd also bought the gift without her. Point being, she didn't know I HAD picked up a gift, though we'd ( Read more... )

I grew up before caller-id, answering machines, and CPS being called if you left a child under age 12 home alone. Learning phone etiquette was a big deal. I was taught that I was supposed to answer the phone with a pencil and paper ready. "Hello, this is the Last_Name Residence, My_Name speaking. May I please ask who's calling?" I was to take ( Read more... )