Planning for Examinations

What a grueling time Examinations are! An Examination assesses not only a student’s intelligence, but also his memory retention, organizational skills, and pressure management techniques. More often than not, students who ace the tests are the ones who have a healthy balance of all these qualities. Considering how important the examinations can be, it is well worth getting some lessons for.
Like most things in life, your performance in the assessment tests is determined largely by the amount of preparation you have done. So the planning part should start right from the preparation. Pareto Principle, the ever-green ever-applicable one, says 20% of efforts yield 80% of the results. I would extend it to say that 20% of the syllabus generates 80% of the questions. The trick is to identify this 20% and master it. Master it thoroughly so that is no chance of missing an iota of the 80% of marks. Then go on to the rest of the syllabus. Keep ample time for revision of key concepts before the examination. This will keep these ‘key concepts’ fresh in your mind, and greatly aid your performance. Take enough rest and sleep the night before your exam so that you are in good shape for the big day.
Group studies never worked for me. I always ended up chatting away the time intended for studies, mainly because the effort required to cope up with the disparity in two peoples’ study levels was too much. If you are lucky enough to find a study mate who is at par with you, and is willing to share her insights truthfully, great!! Otherwise, one’s own company is good enough to help.
The floor of the examination hall is the place where your nerves are checked. Proper planning can do wonders here. I have seen students who frantically write away supplementary copies after copies even after the last bell has rung. I have also observed students who spend a leisurely hour at first few questions, only to realize that no time is left for the last ones. I have also met students, who, no matter what the subject is, will always have last 2 minutes free for a quick revision of the answer sheet. How do they do that?
They realize from the beginning that time allotted is limited. Instead of dividing the available time equally among all the questions, they give each question a time proportionate to its value. So a 20 mark essay question in literature will get substantially more time period than a 1 mark multiple choice question. Difficult questions are invariably attempted at the end, so that they don’t steal the time of other questions. And lastly, they always keep a reasonable time for revision , so that any silly mistakes or errors can be given attention to.
That really is all that is needed for a good result from the time management angle. And this technique is, luckily, not tough to master. If you are not one of those lucky people who are born with the innate talent of time organization, just practice the above tips with your practice papers at home, and soon you’ll find this taking over your natural style of chaos.

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A for Apples, T for Tantrums

Each and Every Parent goes through a period of tantrum handling. (In fact , my 20 month old daughter is lying on ground right besides my chair right now, throwing a tantrum, demanding that I hand the computer over to her immediately). Each and every child throws a tantrum once in a while. It’s a natural way of communicating extreme feelings for kids, who have not developed adequate speech skills yet! However natural it might be, it still manages to throw parents out of gear, and the feelings range from desperation to ashamedness and anger. It’s takes a big heart and some knowledge of tantrums to handle the situation correctly. As any parent would vouch for, children throw tantrum when you most want them to be well behaved. In a shop grocery shopping, in a fine dining restaurant or when you have an important phone call to attend to. They instinctively seem to realize that mom/dad is not completely available to me at this point of time, and immediately demands that attention!! While shopping, kids often act up asking for one, or one hundred different candies or toys or so on. In fact, if observed carefully, we find that tantrums come mostly when the child is tired, exhausted , hungry , sleepy, bored, or even over-stimulated. It is just that these little adults are trying to exercise their power of choice, which they don’t have. It is a frustrating , confusing world for them, a world where mom and dad impose their will on him all the time. He wants to be an unique individual in his own right, and the process is more difficult for him than it is for you. Be sympathetic. Be sympathetic. Easier said than done, of course. However there are a few dos and don’ts that can help you sail through ‘quietly’ through this turbulent period :
Precaution is better than cure . Try stopping a tantrum before it starts. Keep in mind the limits of your child while planning a day out. Keep in mind that he might be tired after a movie, and going grocery shopping then is like sending an invitation to the tantrums. In a shop, if their demand is reasonable and not outrageous, maybe it can be accepted.
When the tantrums do start, as they invariably will at times, remember that it is not a time to loose your cool. Be calm. Let the child go through it safely. If you, an adult, are not able to control your emotions, can you expect more from your kid ?
Do not worry about onlookers. Those who have kids would understand, Those who don’t, will understand later when they do have one. Remember, kids with a tantrum are not bad, they are just ‘over-worked’. They deserve firm love, not another scolding.
Do not give in to their demand. Your response would determine future frequency of the tantrums. Do not make tantrums a rewarding experience for them. The difference between a boy who keeps asking for gratifications to a mall (I want this, and that , and thaaaaat) and a boy who calmly goes through it, is whether their parents gave in to their tantrums when the boys were 2 years old, or not)
Voice what the child is going through, and what he wants. “Oh!! You’re so upset, because you want that Barbie, aren’t you??” It helps them in two ways: One, they know that the parents understands their demand and feelings, and secondly, they learn to put feelings in words for the next time.
Give moderate amount of choice. So don’t say: “What do you want for dinner?” (for your own sake!) but “ Do you want parantha or rice today?”
Kids eventually grow out of tantrums, as they develop better strategies to get stuff out of their parents. (Yeah! That’s true, it never stops!!) So just take it as another developmental milestone and do not attach extra importance to it.

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Communicating with kids

I never thought communicating with kids can be an issue. I never thought I would read, learn or write about how to talk to children. It is almost like teaching how to breathe or eat! (Now a days, there are a lot of books on those too!). I thought that the fact that every parent wants to rear their child in the best possible way, that all parents love their child as much as they can, is enough to have a loving, caring and nurturing relationship. So, It was with a lot of skepticism and doubt that I started reading “How to Talk so Kids Will Listen & Listen So Kids will Talk” by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish. I changed my opinion soon after starting the book. After going through more material on the same subject, and looking around with new knowledge in me, I have understood that our age old parenting skills (that we inherited from our parents, and they from theirs..!) are simply not appropriate for the new-age parenting. The era today demands parents to be more of ‘friends’ than ‘parents’ and proper communicating techniques can help us achieve that friendship with our kin.
So, should we think about how, what and when should we talk to our kids? You would answer ‘Yes’ if you would listen to yourself yelling, shouting, repeating, judging and scolding your child on a typical day. Sometimes the old way of parenting does so much damage to the relationship that all lines of communication break between a parent and a child. It is especially painful, when you consider that no other relationship can be as genuinely full of love as a parent-child relationship can be. I once met a pre-teen girl, who was so angry with her mom, she would turn a deaf ear every time her mother spoke. She was convinced that her mother actually hated her. The mother, on the other hand, was so proud of this girl, and always wanted to spend more time with her. This kind of misunderstanding builds up slowly, over a long period of time, and is fed mostly by a parent’s damaging conversations with kids.
Knowingly or unknowingly , we all eventually become a little bit like our own parents. We carry the old methods they used with us, and we use the same ways on our kids. The changes that have come with the new-age information are few and awkward. For example, most educated parents now don’t spank their children, at least not as freely and often as their own parents did. The spanking has however, been replaced by time-outs, and derogatory and damaging scolding, which does nothing to address the root cause of an undesirable behavior. The parent-child relationship is becoming more friendly and open day by day, and is a great positive change. If we start seeing our children as friends for life, we would never dare say most of the things that we say to them today. Take a few examples: Monologues that would send any friend to sleep, Accusations that would break the strongest of friendships, and expectations that are too unreal to be met in the real world. Yet, we do it all with our kids, still secretly considering them as dependent , small babies, maybe hoping that our support(?) will make them attached to us for a little longer!
How to go about this makeover, to ensure that a healthy relationship grows between you and your children ? Well, to start with, make an honest assessment of yourself and your partner as parents, from the child’s view. Think about what kind of a family environment are you providing your young ones to grow in? Then, answer a key question : what is the aim of your parenting ? What results do you want from the time and effort you put in this relationship? In general, the aim of parenting is to develop the kids into self-sufficient adults who can foray into the world with a rare confidence that good parenting brings.
I would not go into details of how to improve your relationship with your child here. But, if you have the problem singled out , and are ready to work on it, then half the battle is already won for sure. Have no doubt, your kid loves you and respects you, but as always, he also need you to show him how to go about building a perfect mature parent-child relationship.

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Feding Nourishment to your preschooler

Feeding a child more than 2 years old is more like a struggle than anything else. These little ones have a mind of their own, and there is not much way to get around it. Add to it the dilemma of keeping something new and interesting in Tiffin box everyday , providing a balanced diet to the rapidly growing body and brains, and you have the saga of every mother in your hands!! There are a few key things to remember. Firstly, make it a cardinal rule that junk would not be allowed inside the home. Do not buy and keep chips, candies, cold drinks etc in home. If you must keep them for your own use, please keep them out of children’s view. This would help you in two ways: one, kids would not have access to harmful food, and it will therefore immediately save you from a bad habit formation. Two, whenever you go out and decide to let the kids have some fun with junk, they’ll be so happy and thankful, that it would be very easy to manage them.Second important thing that every parent aims for is a balanced diet. However, it is extremely difficult, if not impractical, to provide a balanced diet in each and every meal. The focus should rather be on providing a wholesome meal over a full week. So, if your kids had pizza one day, make it up with a protein full of lentil soup the next day. Make sure that they are having enough of all essential ingredients- carbohydrates, proteins, vitamins, minerals, fats, and yes- water. I do not advocate calorie counts for young kids. They are growing up; and need enough calories for a typical action filled day. If you sensibly censor the junk-intake, and provide the child with a variety of healthy choice naturally, the kid will grow up with healthy food habits for sure. One mistake parents often do is to divide food into “may have” and “should have” parts. “You may have candies later but you should have your veggies first” or “You’ll get dessert only of you finish the cabbage; it’s good for you!” What the child really hears is : “Eat the vegetables and cabbage; it is not tasty, you would not eat it yourself, so I’m bribing/pushing you for it.” If the parent will treat nutritious healthful food as normal daily routine, so will the child. Even nutrition conscious parents often miss out on the importance of proteins. Kids meal is generally full of starch and carbohydrates, and lacks in proteins. For example, if your child has Bread and jam or butter in breakfast and roti-sabji in the lunch, he is not getting any protein at all. Protein comes from dal, pulses, milk , milk products, egg , fish, chicken , meat and nuts. So , in the above example, we must add milk in the breakfast and dal in the lunch to make it a balanced meal. The problem increases manifold when this nutrition has to be packed in a small container, to be opened after a few hours and still has to look attractive enough for the kid to eat all by herself. When your kid starts preschool, keep the initial lunch-box limited to his favorite finger foods that won’t get him messy. Only after he is firmly rooted into eating himself nicely in a preschool environment, you should start experimenting with the tiffin. Try to keep the contents visually appealing. For example, a cheese sandwich can be cut in interesting shapes using a standard cookie cutter. Paranthas should be stuffed to avoid keeping separate accompaniment with them, and are ideally kept as rolls for ease of eating. Instead of keeping regular idlis, you can keep small cocktail idlis that kids would so love. Infact, a friend of mine mixes vermilion, beetroot juice or spinach puree to the idli batter, and makes idlis that are naturally colorful, and nutritionally enhanced. Such minor changes go a long way in catching children’s imagination.And remember, whenever you get tired, bored or stressed out keeping tabs on the food of your kids, you can always hand them a packet of Lays, and relax with the knowledge that this break is a very well deserved one for both of you!

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Feeding your baby in the first year

One thing that baffles most young parents is feeding their child. How much is little? How much is enough? What is normal and what is not? What is ideal ? We explore food and feeding in these series of articles designed according to the age of your child. Here, we discuss the feeding patterns and requirements of babies 0 to 12 months old. The first few days after birth
It is a well-established fact that the best thing for a new-born baby is mother’s milk. Science simply can’t compete with nature here. However, misunderstandings and lack of knowledge, sadly, lead many first-time mothers to believe that their milk is inadequate in either quality or quantity. They, therefore start formula milk, depriving the baby of the innumerable benefits that breast milk offers. It is absolutely essential that an expecting mother reads and learns about breastfeeding, to avoid such a thing happening to her.
The first instances of milk that a mother produces is called colostrum. Colostrum is a thick, yellow-orange milk like liquid that is divinely good for the new-born baby. It is low in fat, and high in carbohydrates, protein, and antibodies. It is also very easy to digest, and has a laxative effect. All this increases your baby’s immunity and eases his transition from the womb to the world. Colostrum is produced very little – a few spoons at maximum. This makes new mothers worry, and they introduce supplementary milk to compensate. What they should know is that colostrum is so concentrated in nutrients that even its few drops will give your baby what he needs for his first few days.
The first few weeks
The production of breast-milk is a classic case of demand and supply. The more a baby sucks, the more milk is produced by the mother’s body. If you introduce external food during this time, the baby would suck less at mother due to less hunger. This would result in less production of breast milk. The baby would soon be hungry and irritable, and would need to be soothed by a bottle. This vicious cycle, once started, is very difficult to break. External milk is difficult to digest, low in nutrients and prone to contamination due to usage of bottles etc. If you do feel that your milk supply is insufficient to support the baby, try feeding her at shorter intervals to stimulate the production, and augment your own food and liquid intake. One more important thing that expectant mothers should learn before delivery is that even though breast-feeding is the most natural and fulfilling way to feed your new arrival, it helps if you learn the technique. The milk glands are located in the muscles of the breast and not in the nipple. Which is why the baby must suck the whole areola and not just the nipple. It is vital to ensure this, to avoid baby cutting on the nipple and hurting it.
The next two months
In most cases, the feeding pattern is now set and the mother-baby duo are now comfortable with the feeds. This is the right time to introduce a bottle if you intend to shift the baby to the bottle after a few months any how. The baby’s mind is not so made up at this stage as it would be at age 1 year or so, and starting the bottle then to wean from the breast would be a very difficult task. Working mothers should also wait at least 2 months to start bottle, so that breast feeding is well established and is not disrupted by a bottle or two a day. A bottle a day would help you tremendously when you want to avoid breast feeding, like in a public place or if you want a 2 hour break from the house for a parlor visit, your partner can take over peacefully, with the knowledge that a bottle can be used if needed in your absence.
Introducing Solids
While 4 months was considered an appropriate age to start solids earlier, now experts have revised it to 6 months of age. Remember, there is absolutely no hurry to start solids. Let the delicate tummy of your angel develop enough to withstand solids. When you do start, start with simple, easily digestible fruits, vegetable or cereals. Start with one at a time, and do not introduce new tastes and textures too soon. One new introduction a week is reasonable. While this gives the baby time to adjust to new tastes, it also gives you opportunity to see if a new food is unsuitable or irritable for your little one. Apart from commercially available cereals, consider mashed carrots, beans, daal etc. Do not go to combination food for the first few months. After the baby turns 10 months old or so, you can start combination solids-like idli, khichdi, mixed vegetables etc. Do NOT give
Hard foods that can cause choking if swallowed whole are an absolute no till age 3 years. Some examples are : hot dogs, raw carrots, peanuts, whole grapes, popcorn, and round candies. Use your common sense and err on the safer side when in doubt.
Very soon, your baby would reach a stage when she’ll like to eat everything herself, and in the process, spill everything too. My advice at this stage would be – be patient, let the baby be – she’s only learning to use a spoon, and invest in lots of bibs and a large plastic mat. You are going to need them a lot in the second year, as we’ll see in the following article of the series.

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Feeding your Toddler

Congratulations! You have survived the first year of parenting. Your baby is now developing into a personality of his own, with his own preferences, choices and decisions. This will be seen in all his actions, and indeed, in his food habits too. Actually, feeding a 12 to 24 month old baby is quite easy, since they can take pretty much everything now. (Except the dangerous foods catalogued in the preceding article) However, this is the time when food habits develop and become ingrained, and so, this is that golden window of opportunity which will set you free from being a roaming feeding robot or from sitting in front of TV watching cartoons and feeding a 5 year old child three years from now. If you want to inculcate good eating habits in your child, now is the time to start. Now is also the time to stop – bottle feeding. This is typically the age when most mothers wean their child from breast or bottle, and shift her to cup. We shall tackle all these issues one by one. Weaning
Before you embark on the emotionally difficult and tiring journey of weaning, ensure that your child is taking milk only as a supplement to her main diet of solids and juices. Ideally a 1 year old child should be given milk not more than thrice a day. Bring many attractive cups to catch her imagination. Better still, let her choose one. Do not force the issue immediately, lest the child rebel. Introduce the cup slowly, as a friend of the bottle, gently but firmly. Remember- there is no looking back after this. If you give in to the cries of baby for a bottle/breast , you’ll be stuck in weaning-tried-failed-restarted-failed again trap for too long. It will take maximum one week for the baby to get used to the cup, and she’ll forget the bottle/breast totally in another month. Kids adjust so much more better than us adults!! Have faith in them. The only thing you must ensure, as I said earlier, is that your child has a set routine of solids and juices before you start weaning him, so that he does not face starvation in that critical one week period of weaning. Appe Se
1-2 years of age is a period of what I fondly call “Appe se”. Both my kids (and indeed all kids I know ) want to become totally independent at this age: want to dress, eat, play, even cook themselves. “Appe se” was the word my kids used to express that they want to do things themselves ; it was a kiddish version of the Hindi phrase “ apne aap se karna hai.” So when my son started crying “appe se” on seeing a bowl of cereal, I knew I’m in for a long haul of cleaning up!
This, if seen from another angle, is a golden time for parents. If handled correctly, kids take over completely at this age, happy to be independent and ‘big’, and it relieves the parents the responsibility of feeding them for years to come. Of course it comes with the responsibility of cleaning up the house, floor , chair and the baby after the meal is done, but that is going to last only for a short time. Keep a few rules in mind though: While your baby is still mastering the use of her hands and spoon and fork, you can use another spoon to feed her . This way, she won’t get frustrated at her inability to eat food when hunger presses.
Sooner than you’d expect , she’ll master the technique of eating herself, and barring a few spills, will start eating a sizeable amount of meal herself. Now, this is your clue to fade in the background. Let her eat her meal herself- totally. Do not insist that she finishes everything. Or do not feed her less preferred meals, or more of the regular food yourself after she’s done. Respect her decisions. If you continue feeding her even after she is able to do so herself, she’ll soon realize that it is much easier to let mom do the hard work, and will retire from the burden of eating herself. This will also mean that she’ll have her hands and mind free for games while you feed her, and will make her more distracted during meal-times. In essence, your help will backfire into more and more difficult meal times as your child grows. By the age of 18-20 months, your baby should be eating all her meals herself.
This will also help as your angel starts school next year, and will be required to eat herself from the tiffin box.
Balanced Diet
What’s that! Do not fret a lot over eating choices. As long as your son eats a selection of fruits and vegetables, it’s okay if he dislikes some others. Do not force them on him. The choices at this age are quite flexible, and he may like eggplant later if he doesn’t like it now. If you insist on him eating everything, it will only solidify his dislike against eggplant. Of course eating all the veggies is a great habit, but then there’s plenty of time to do that. As long as you control the intake of junk food- noodles, candies, chocolates, soft drinks, chips etc. in your home, your child will create an overall balanced diet from his own choices. Limit the junk food to occasional treats, and your job is done!
School is around the corner. As your baby completes her second year, she’s graduated from toddler-hood to being a preschooler. Most kids would start some sort of play-school in the third year, and that presents parents with more nutrition dilemma. We’ll deal with that in our next article.

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Good Night, Sweet Dreams.

Those who haven’t had babies to look after may not understand a mother complaining about her child’s sleeping habits. But the rest of us know how difficult it can get with a baby who just won’t sleep at night, a toddler who still wakes up five times a night, and a preschooler who won’t sleep in his own room because of the blue monsters.
Every age and stage brings with it a unique set of sleep problems, and it may be four to five years after you deliver the baby that you can count on getting a complete undisturbed eight hours of sleep. However, it is exactly the time most couples go for baby no. 2, and that means another round of sleepless nights . It is, therefore, of paramount importance that you instill good sleeping habits in your baby as soon as you can, so that both the baby and you are rested and ready for a fresh day of feeding and changing, plays and giggles. First of all, it is important for parents to understand that sleeping off is not an easy task for a baby. It is not a natural instinct like sucking or breathing that come pre-programmed with birth. Of course, it is a natural need, but it still is a skill that needs to be taught to the baby. Sleeping peacefully requires a lot of trust, and the infant has to believe that world will still be okay once he wakes up. Mom and Dad won’t disappear like the cute rattle that he lost a moment back. (Okay, It’s still under the blanket, but what does a baby know?). The fist couple of months outside the womb are used up just to get accustomed to the hostile environment called world. So a newborn baby pretty much just eats, poops, and sleeps. I sometimes think these are the most relaxed period of parenthood. But once your little baby turns two months old, it is time to start her training in good sleeping habits. Start with searching for your and your partners preferences’ about baby’s night time. Would you like her to co-sleep? Will you prefer her in a separate bed in your own room. Will you want her to sleep in her own room by herself ? Think of these with a long term perspective : Cuddling and rocking your angel to sleep one night may feel heavenly, but doing it 365 night in a row is another matter. Consider also, your and your partners energy levels, need of privacy and togetherness, and your baby’s own preferences. Whatever you two decide, now is the right time to implement it. At such a tender age, your baby would learn whatever you teach her, and a less involved kind of parenting is the best long term way for both the parent and the child. It might take a week or two of training, but consider the enormous benefits. If you spend 30 to 45 minutes everyday carrying, cuddling and cajoling her to sleep, imagine the amount of time and energy you would save if she learns to sleep by herself!Carefully monitor your child through out the day for his sleep patterns. As soon as his energy levels dip and he starts feeling drowsy, put him in for sleep to his crib or bed. Stay there, console him if he cries, pat him, even carry him back if he is very upset. But as soon as he is drowsy again, put him back to bed. Avoid rocking him to sleep. After a few difficult sessions, the baby would soon get the idea that crib or bed is for sleeping. It is amazing how fast these little ones adapt, only if we grown-ups would let them!!If you have already missed this window of opportunity, and your child has now established a different, and difficult sleeping behavior, you might still have troubles, like the ones enumerated in the beginning. But we shall discuss those in a different article. You must, never, underestimate the importance of sleep : A good night’s sleep is absolutely essential for the baby, but more so for the caregiver, because a day waits just beyond the night, and so much needs to be done…

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