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Have you heard the latest parenting advice? Why, of course you have.from experts to other parents, people are always ready to give parenting advice. Parenting tips, parents' survival guides, dos, don'ts, shoulds and shouldn'ts.and let's not forget the new ones that come out everyday.
So, how do you figure out what really works? How are you supposed to know whose advice to follow? And then there is that famous line.."Isn't parenting just common sense anyway?" You may ask, "How can the experts really know what it's like to be a parent in my home?" All great questions, and each deserves an answer.
In a new booklet, the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) suggests you try RPM3, a non-prescription, no-frills approach to parenting. For over 30 years the NICHD has conducted and supported research in parenting and child development. They talked to the experts, to parents and to children. They collected statistics, identified myths, and tested suggestions. The result is RPM3, which stands for: *Responding
to your child in an appropriate manner
*Preventing
risky behavior or problems before they arise
*Monitoring
your child's contact with his/her surrounding environment
*Mentoring
your child to support and encourage desired behaviors
*Modeling
your own behavior to provide a consistent, positive example for your child
The RPM3 guidelines aren't meant to be just another parenting how-to book, telling you what to do. Instead, RPM3 separates the useful information from the not so useful so that you can make your own decisions about parenting. RPM3 provides 30 years of research to tell you what really works, not just stories told about what people think about parenting. RPM3 confirms something what every parent already knows..that parents do matter!
The first section of the booklet explains each item in RPM3 - responding, preventing, monitoring, mentoring, and modeling. These lessons describe how RPM3 can help you make daily decisions about parenting. The remaining sections of the booklet give examples of how some parents have used the lessons of RPM3 with their own children.
"This booklet gives parents the tools they need to make their own decisions about parenting. Most parents work very hard at being good parents, and most of them do an excellent job," explains Dr. Sharon Ramey, founding director of the Civitan International Research Center at the University of Alabama and scientific advisor for "Adventures in Parenting".
Rather than giving a formula for parenting, this booklet gives parents the framework for making decisions about parenting that is based on decades of research. "Not every approach works the same way for every child," explains Dr. Ramey. " We hope that 'Adventures in Parenting' will give parents a number of things to consider when making decisions about their children."
"Adventures in Parenting" is available free-of-chare by calling the NICHD Information Resource Center at 1-800-370-2943, or you can print-out a copy that is available online at www.nichd.nih.gov. |
