To care for and protect children as they grow…the topic of parenting can be so complex yet, distilled in this definition of what it is to nurture, it seems so simple. Surely there’s nothing more important in the role of a parent than to care and protect?
Parenting is under the microscope these days and parents can be bombarded with lots of messages about the ‘right way’ to parent.
Children should be socialised and given interests and development opportunities through after school clubs…but they should be allowed time for free play.
Children should not be left unsupervised…but they should be allowed to take risks to develop resilience.
Children should limit screen time within guidelines by age…but they should interface with a number of educational technologies to cement learning.
Even with just these few examples, it’s easy to see how parents can become confused by the advice that orbits them and, indeed, even paralysed by concern that one false parenting move could have a lifelong affect on their child.
But, nurturing a child comes with knowing a child’s needs – which are sometimes unique from their friends and classmates, sometimes not. And one area where children’s needs, and parenting experts’ advice, tends to converge is on the matter of sleep: children need sleep.
Join us in part II of our Nurture Me blog to learn more about how to nurture your child’s sleep.