Sheri Mitschelen

During the holiday season, we put our dollar bills in the Salvation Army’s red kettle as we go into the grocery store or give a one-time check to one of the many organizations whose appeals stuff our mailboxes. Giving these gifts around the holidays are wonderful expressions of caring. But what about the rest of the year? If our children see us do this once a year, what message does that convey to them?

There are so many ways to teach your children to make giving to others an all-year practice.

Here are just a few opportunities to engage in with your child that can teach them about the gift of giving.

1. Help your neighbors out. You and your child can bring their garbage cans in or take their newspaper to their doorstep in the morning. If you have elderly neighbors, bring them a meal or a pot of soup. These little things go a long way in teaching your child about giving back to and caring for your community.

2. Volunteer with your child. You and your child can make giving real by volunteering at a local organization. Here are just a few that are in need of help now and all year round:

In Fairfax County, 89,000 people, including 38,000 children struggle with hunger, especially on the weekends when they don’t have access to free breakfast and lunch at school. Once a month in Herndon, you and your child can help by volunteering at the Weekend Food for Kids program that provides nutritious food for kids over the weekend. For more information, click here.

FACETS is a program that helps homeless families in Fairfax County find homes. If you would like to get involved in their holiday gift drive now or activities at other times of the year, click here.

3. You and your child can pick out a favorite local, national, or international charity and sign up for monthly giving. Have fun exploring websites and making a list of the charities that interest you most and let your child decide which one to give to. Make a ritual of sitting down with your child to write your check once a month and to discuss how important it is to share what you have with others. Heifer International and UNICEF are two such organizations.

Note: Crossroads Family Counseling Center has volunteered to collect gifts for Our Neighbor’s Child (another place for you and your child to volunteer!). ONC provides gifts to 2,000 children of low-income families in western Fairfax County. If you would like to join us, please feel free to take one of the ornaments from our giving tree in the waiting room. You can also contact Martha FitzSimon with any questions, martha@crossroadsfamilycc.com and 703-850-6649.

Providing praise and encouragement is one of the most important everyday interactions parents can have with their children to improve behavior. As simple as this may seem, sometimes it is easier to focus on the negative and the behavior we dislike. But research shows that the behavior we pay more attention to will be the behavior that is likely to be repeated. A simple smile, encouraging phrase, or hug goes a long way in decreasing negative behaviors and improving a child’s emotional wellbeing and self-esteem. According to Carolyn Webster-Stratton, founder of the Incredible Years Series for parents, teachers, and children*, praise and encouragement can give children the motivation they need to complete difficult tasks, develop a positive self-image, and guide children through the many small steps it takes to master new skills.

Three effective praise and encouragement how-to’s
1. Use labeled praise: Being specific in your praise is important for children to understand what behavior you like. For example: if a child is playing and sharing nicely with a peer but we simply say “good job,” it may not be understood what the “good job” was for. Instead, try “good job sharing with your friend” or “I like how nicely you are sitting and playing with your friend.”

Other examples of labeled praise:
• I like how you put your shoes by the front door.
• You are such a big girl for getting into bed right away.
• What a nice job of getting dressed for school.
• Wow, you are picking up all your toys like you were asked.
• You are so proud of how you built that tower all by yourself.

2. Deliver praise with excitement: Coupling our words with our expressions is important. The majority of our communication is through nonverbal behavior, so say your praise with excitement and a smile. This is especially important for children who may be inattentive. Praise provided in a low, monotone voice may not be heard or understood as easily as praise with excitement.

3. Be timely and consistent: Praising behavior immediately is crucial. This is particularly true for younger children in order to ensure the positive reinforcing behavior is there. If a child begins picking up his toys, rather than waiting until it is complete, praise immediately while the behavior is still happening. This gives more motivation and clear expectations of what you like and want. It is also important to be consistent, e.g., praise the behavior every time it happens. You can begin to praise less often once the desired behavior is more frequent.

*Michelle Walker and Martha FitzSimon will be leading a pre-school group based on the Incredible Years Series at Crossroads Family Counseling Center. For more information, please contact Michelle directly at 703-341-7839, michelle@crossroadsfamilycc.com.

Going to school for the first time can be overwhelming for both the parent and the kindergartener. A parent’s worried expression and a child melting down and clinging to her parent at the classroom door are nearly inevitable scenes at schools around the country. It’s called separation anxiety and it’s quite a natural and normal feeling for both parent and child.

There are ways that you can prepare yourself and you child so that this life transition becomes a positive experience, whether there are meltdowns or not.

First, check in with yourself and how you are feeling about this separation. Are you feeling anxious? Just as it is normal for your child to be feeling anxiety about this transition, it is also normal for you. Your feelings as well as your child’s feelings are important and, when feelings arise, it is beneficial to tune into them. Take a few minutes to breathe into them calmly. What you are doing is giving your emotions the attention they deserve, rather than keeping them bottled up inside. You will likely find that just stopping to pay attention to your feelings and breathing are all you may need to do to feel calmer and more in tune.

One reason it is so important to pay attention to how you are feeling is because children have a radar. You may say one thing, but if your heart or facial expression say the opposite, on some level that will register with them. If you are calm, confident, and optimistic about how you will handle the separation, not only do you transmit that to your child but you are also letting your child know that you have faith in her abilities. You are also modeling how to deal positively with changes.

Parents are a child’s world and, at this age, they really do listen to what you say and do. So talk with your child about how much your child is going to do and learn in kindergarten. Convey a positive and warm attitude toward the school and teachers. And, most importantly, just as you check in with your own feelings, listen and watch for your child’s feelings and how they express them in words, behavior, art and play. If you see anxious feelings about kindergarten coming up, talk with your child about them and listen to them in return.

We all feel less anxious when we know what to expect. Here are a few practical tips to help prepare for kindergarten that will ease separation anxiety:

• Visit the school and your child’s classroom before school begins and, if possible, meet with your child’s teacher and the staff. Play on the school playground. Walk around the school, pointing out interesting things and encourage your child do the same.

 

• Play separation games such as hide-and-seek. When your find your child, give her a warm hug and let her know that you would look forever to find her and that you are so happy to see her.

 

• Read books with your child about separation. This list includes some wonderful ones.

 

• Make sure your child has plenty of sleep each night. School-age children require 10-11 hours of sleep per night. Poor sleep can lead to mood swings, behavior problems, and even learning difficulties.

 

• You and your child can lay out their clothes the night before each school day. Have other items, such as shoes, jackets, and lunch boxes in their place where they are always found the next day.

 

• In their lunch box, place a family photo or something to remind them of the connection to the family.

Remember that separation anxiety is a normal feeling. It shows that there is a strong bond between you and your child. Acknowledging the feelings and preparing for the first days of kindergarten will help you and your child experience this new stage in both your lives.

Written by Martha FitzSimon an intern at Crossroads Family Counseling Center. She is in her final year of George Mason University’s master of social work with a concentration in clinical practice.Early in her career, she worked with adolescents with hearing impairments, vision impairments, and both hearing and vision impairments. She also has experience working with families struggling with grief and loss issues. Martha has a BA in English and an MA in journalism from the University of Texas at Austin. She also holds a certificate in photography from the International Center of Photography.

This is a follow up story regarding our blog in September, 2015.

By Lynne Shallcross

Letting children try something that provokes anxiety can help them learn coping skills, researchers say.

Children of anxious parents are more at risk of developing an anxiety disorder. But there’s welcome news for those anxious parents: that trajectory toward anxiety isn’t set in stone.

Therapy and a change in parenting styles might be able to prevent kids from developing anxiety disorders, according to research published in The American Journal of Psychiatry Friday.

The researchers, led by psychiatry professor Golda Ginsburg, a professor of psychiatry at UConn Health in Farmington, Conn., looked at 136 families. Each family had at least one parent who had been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder and at least one child in the 6-to-13 age range who had not yet been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder.

Roughly half the families received eight weekly sessions of family therapy, while the other half received only a 30-page handout describing anxiety disorders, without specific strategies for reducing anxiety.

After one year, only 5 percent of children from the families who received the family-based therapy had been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder. Among families who received just the handout, that number jumped to 31 percent.

“The basic question was, because we know that anxiety runs in families, could we prevent children from developing an anxiety disorder whose parents had the illness?” says Ginsburg, who conducted the study with colleagues from Johns Hopkins University. The answer was yes, at least over a year.

The researchers will now continue to study these same families, thanks to funding from the National Institute of Mental Health. They will look at whether the children of the families who received the therapeutic intervention go on to develop an anxiety disorder later on in adolescence or early adulthood.

The message from the study’s findings so far, Ginsburg says, is that the focus needs to shift from reaction to prevention. “In the medical system there are other prevention models, like dental care, where we go every six months for a cleaning. I think adopting that kind of model — a mental health checkup, a prevention model for folks who are at risk — is I think where we need to go next.”

All humans feel anxiety. It’s normal, and in many cases, it’s a good thing — it makes us run when we see that bear coming toward us or study for that tough exam that’s coming up tomorrow.

But in people with an anxiety disorder, that dose of healthy anxiety goes awry. People might feel levels of anxiety that are out of proportion to the situation or feel anxiety in a situation where there is simply no threat. Ginsburg likens it to an “alarm clock going off at the wrong time.”

In children, excessive anxiety can come in a variety of ways. Some might struggle with separation anxiety, where they’re afraid to go anywhere without their parents.

Others might struggle with social anxiety, afraid of anything from raising their hand in class to eating in front of others in the school cafeteria. Still others struggle with overwhelming worry. They might think, “If I fail this test, I’ll fail this grade, fail out of high school, never go to college, never get a job and become homeless.”

Whatever the form that the anxiety takes, it’s a combination of overestimating the risk of danger — whether that danger is in the form of embarrassment, a dog or a test — and underestimating one’s ability to cope, says Lynne Siqueland, a clinical psychologist who specializes in treating anxiety disorders in children and adolescents and was not involved in the study.

There is no single cause for anxiety disorders, Ginsburg says. They’re the product of an interaction of genetic and environmental factors. But the disorders do run in families, she says, and there are certain parenting behaviors that can promote anxiety — like modeling anxiety in front of your kids. Modeling might be direct, like jumping up on the kitchen table when you see a mouse, or indirect, like overcautioning your kids to be careful when there’s no danger.

Ginsburg has recruited participants for many clinical trials; she says it was easiest to recruit families for this one. “The parents who suffered with anxiety themselves had it since they were children, and they did not want their children to suffer in the same way that they did.”

The first two therapy sessions were with the parents alone, where they discussed the impact of the parents’ anxiety disorder on the family and how often they do things that could inadvertently raise levels of anxiety in their children.

In the remaining six sessions with the entire family, the therapist worked with the family on how each person could recognize anxiety and use coping strategies to deal with it.

One key strategy is helping parents understand that kids have to face their fears, Ginsburg says. Sometimes parents help their children avoid anxiety-provoking situations because they’re worried it’s too much for the child, “when in fact they need to help them face their fears in order to reduce their anxiety,” she says.

Siqueland, who provides workshops for parents on how to help their kids cope with anxiety, agrees. Armed with the right information, Siqueland says, parents can help their children prevent anxiety or coach their kids through it when it happens. If your child is scared to walk into that first soccer practice alone because he doesn’t know anyone, don’t throw the car in reverse and speed back home, she says. Sit calmly with him as he musters the courage to walk in.

The biggest message Siqueland tries to impart to parents she works with is not to try to prevent anxiety, but instead promote their child’s competence in handling it. If your child doesn’t like to go play at friends’ houses, they need to go play at more friends’ houses, she says.

“That is kind of an ‘aha’ moment in the parent workshops,” Siqueland says, “that kids who worry about these things need more practice, not less.”

Another message Siqueland gives parents: Anxiety is very treatable. “Kids are not doomed to distress.”

With Thanksgiving approaching  this month it’s a time to spend with family and think about the things we are  thankful and grateful for. A 2012 study published in the industry journal Personality and Individual Differences found a sense of gratitude is an essential ingredient in a happy life, but it does not come naturally to children.and that gratitude was one of the biggest predictors of life satisfaction, no matter what demographic.

Five ways you can work to instill Gratitude in your children:

1. MODEL IT YOURSELF–Make sure to share the things you are grateful for in your every day conversation.  Saying to your child, “”I’m so thankful to have your help”, “ I’m thankful for the beautiful trees.”  Children model their parents in every way, so make sure you use “please” and “thank you” when you talk to them. (“Thanks for that hug — it made me feel great!”) Insist on their using the words, too. After all, “good manners and gratitude overlap,” says New York City etiquette consultant Melissa Leonard. 

2. INTRODUCE GRATITUDE AS A GAME–  Christopher Smith recommends focusing on small things by playing a game where each person shares something that they are grateful for. You can play this game while in the car by naming things that you see; you can play this game sitting in a waiting room by naming things that start with different letters of the alphabet. By making it a game, you are allowing your children to learn about all the things they can be grateful for while not making it too serious.

3.  WRITE GRATITUDE LETTERS–This is a version of the thank you note. You can leave notes for your children saying the things you are grateful for about them. You can also teach your kids to think about writing a letter to somebody like a teacher or a family member who has done something for them. This teaches them that it is not just about when somebody gives you something material but when somebody really does something for you. Help your child write the letter – you can dictate for them if they’re younger. Or write or type on a card,  Dear:_________   I’m thankful for____________  and their name.  It does not  need to be a long letter.  People appreciate just being acknowledged and the thought.

A leading researcher in this field, Dr. Martin E. P. Seligman, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania, tested the impact of various positive psychology interventions on 411 people, each compared with a control assignment of writing about early memories. When their week’s assignment was to write and personally deliver a letter of gratitude to someone who had never been properly thanked for his or her kindness, participants immediately exhibited a huge increase in happiness scores. This impact was greater than that from any other intervention, with benefits lasting for a month

4. ENCOURAGE GENEROSITY-Generosity is the desire to give what you have to others. You can do this by donating food or used clothing and toys to a local food bank or Homeless Shelter.  You can also encourage your child to share their toy or a piece of food with a friend or sibling

A book that discusses generous behavior is:The Bernstein Bears and the Joy of Giving

5.  VOLUNTEER- Volunteering with children is a great way to teach them to give back to others.  An additional benefit of volunteering with your child is the bonding that occurs. If you child is interested in a subject it may be possible to use that subject as a springboard into volunteering: Children who construct a lot of forts or buildings with blocks may enjoy helping out a construction organization such as Habitat for Humanity; and  children who love animals my enjoy helping animal organizations such as the Humane Society.   If you can’t commit to doing something outside the house as a family, figure out some way your child can actively participate in helping someone else.  Even if it’s as simple as making cookies for a sick neighbor. For more information go to http://www.compassionatekids.com/volunteering.shtml.

A fun Fall family activity that can teach gratitude is cutting out colorful leaves and having your children write on the leaf what they are grateful for.

Enjoy this season of change and the beauty of the colorful leaves while remembering to practice gratitude.

At Crossroads Family Counseling Center we are thankful for our co-workers and grateful for the opportunity to work with the children and families that we serve. Happy Thanksgiving!

Written by:  Sheri Mitschelen, LCSW, RPT/S, Owner and Director of Crossroads Family Counseling Center, LLC  a Licensed Clinical Social Worker (LCSW) in the State of Virginia and a Registered Play Therapy-Supervisor (RPT-S).