Last year, the Florida State legislature attempted to gag pediatricians from discussing gun safety with families. That law, referred to as the docs n’ Glocks Law, was overturned by a Federal Judge this past September after strong rallying by the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

Judge Marcia Cooke’s ruling was a huge victory for gun safety education and for pediatricians. Her ruling validated what pediatricians in Florida, and every other state in our Nation, have been attempting to explain for a very long time: this issue isn’t about gun ownership but about gun safety.

The recent  tragic death of a Texas 8th grader, Jaime Gonzalez, is a grim and very real reminder of how serious events can become when any type of gun is involved.  According to reports, police could not discern that the gun was a pellet gun and the events unfolded in a way that forced them to act so that the school student body and staff would be safe. That’s their job. Playing Monday morning quarterback isn’t going to change the event. However, we can prevent future events by recognizing that we need to do better in providing gun safety educations in our schools, for parents in their homes and for pediatricians in their offices.

For some reason, gun safety education is one of those topics that everyone agrees is important, including pediatricians, yet no one takes enough time to truly do justice to when they have a family, or group of students, in front of them. With kids still bringing guns to school, we have to stop assuming that someone else is providing that important talk and step up.

Parents need to have the talk with their kids, whether they own a gun or not.

Schools need to have gun safety education in their health and safety courses and in their Open Circle times.

And, pediatricians need to fit it into their busy office visits.

We should be having it at home with our kids.

Communities and schools can think outside the box and post information and links to resource on websites and in newsletters. Drama classes could organize skits. Art classes could make posters. Both of these avenues have been very successful with other hard to discuss topics such as drug and alcohol use and abuse and high tech issues.

As long as you do more today than you did yesterday, the students in your community will more safe tomorrow and the likelihood of another school gun incident will go dramatically down.

This is a New Year’s Resolution we can do something about – and we owe it to the Jaime Gonzalez’s family to do just that.

My high school daughter left for school the other day in her sneakers. If it weren’t for the fact that our driveway is a bit of a hill and we’re surrounded by mounds of snow, and the day before were slammed with 6 more inches of snow and an ice storm significant enough to close school for the afternoon and evening I’d think nothing of it. I’m not entirely sure, to be honest, how she made it up our hill, down the next hill to the bus stop or traversed around her open campus school that day…but she did!

I asked her about her footware decision when she arrived home later that day. She was honest about her choice. “It boiled down to function vs. fashion”, she told me with a smile. “My boots would have been better for the ice but simply didn’t match my outfit. The sneakers were truly the only choice. You know how that goes.”

Thinking as an adult, boots seemed like the best option. However, having been a teenage girl, I saw her point. However, as an adult, the boots truly were the better option…and the safer one for the cold, the ice and the snow. It occurred to me that if I didn’t handle the situation in a way that resonated with her teen sense of style, the sneakers would win out next time, too.

So, this is how I responded:

“I see your point. Boots wouldn’t have worked with that outfit. Perhaps next time we have an ice storm you could consider a more boot-appropriate outfit so you don’t slide into a building or down the hill into oncoming traffic?”

Then I added: “Remember, your sister ended up with a whopping case of frostnip a few years back when we went skiing wearing ski boots and the proper socks. And, those toes still bother her today when it’s really cold outside.”

Without us locking horns or having a big fight, she’s been wearing her boots again. With teens, it’s all in the approach and once in a while us parents luck out in how we accomplish that. This time, I got through and won the boot battle sans battle.

It’s tough to get kids to wear winter-appropriate garb, The best approach is to help them understand from a young age why the weather can be dangerous and that we’re not just being parental nags when we force upon them all these clothing rules. Use books, the internet and other adjuncts to teach them why you are doing what you are doing so they have a frame of reference. It helps kids to know there’s actual fact behind our edicts. And, it helps if we practice what we preach. We can’t very well expect our kids to don their finest winter grab if we don’t do the same.

Fashion is seasonal. Sometimes we have to be the ones to remind our kids of that – and be strong enough to enforce it. They might not “feel cold” but we have to remind them that there’s a reason that cold weather shelters open during cold advisories and recess gets cancelled. Even ski slopes issue advisories and shut down when necessary.

Function or fashion? Sometimes you can have both but when it comes to weather safety, function has to win out, all the time.

(Image: http://www.shoes.com/ProductImages/shoes_iaec1230091.jpg)

Have you noticed how just about everything is occurring earlier in the lives of kids than it did when we were kids? Today’s kids are expected to achieve milestones earlier than the past and fine-tune their preferences for the future without having any life experience to base those preferences on.

Nowadays, this trend is including very young developmental tasks such as potty training. I’m hearing from parents concerns and questions about how to potty train some incredibly young kids. We’re not just talking about young toddlers between the age of 1-2. Some parents are starting to ask if an infant a few months old can be potty trained.

Potty training is as much biological as it is emotional and social. When you think about potty training in terms of biological processes that need to occur and then get executed and mastered by very young kids, it’s easy to see why there is not only a great deal of confusion but a mis-match between what we hope will occur for our kids and what they can actually occur. The frank reality is that most kids simply are not ready to potty train until they are ready – and that may be around 2 years of age, or 3, or even 4 for some kids.

Pushing, pleading, begging, bribing didn’t help our kids achieve potty training any quicker than it was meant to be. In the end, success occurred when we followed their lead and didn’t expect them to do something they truly could’t.

Talking to parents about this issue since I became a pediatrician, I can vouch to the variability of when kids achive potty training success as well as one truism: a parent’s desire for a child to be potty trained is meaningless if the child isn’t truly ready. As a parent, this was my experience, too.

Parenting a toddler is challenging enough. Why add more chaos to the mix by pushing something that the child is not ready for? Instead, we collectively need to learn more patients and to truly get to know where our kids are with their ability to tackle a new task, whether potty training, starting school or any new milestone, actually.

A child’s days of diapers and Pull Ups are numbered but how many that child needs before becoming fully potty trained will be unique for that child. So, avoid the pressure to push the process earlier than it’s meant to occur. Your child will be better off by taking this approach – and so will you.

Disclosure:

I have partnered with Pull-Ups® to serve as a Pull-Ups® Potty Training Partner. I have been compensated for my time commitment to the program, which includes writing articles for Pull-Ups.com, and offering tips and advice on the Pull-Ups®  Facebook page. However, my opinions are entirely my own and I have not been paid to publish positive comments or endorse the product.

Did you catch Harry’s Law the other night? If not, you missed a fantastic episode on teen cyberbullying.

The episode covered the complex social dynamic that typically leads to bullying and teen bullying:

*socially awkward teens being taunted by the “popular teens”

*closeted gay teens and the impact of tht

*the ways teens act out when feeling marginalized from taunts to blogs

In this episode, a teen feeling marginalized and taunted by other teens began a blog to direct her anger. Over time, the blog grew and her targets grew. Her last victim was a girl named Hannah, a girl who had previously picked on her who also turns out to be a closeted lesbian. This teen, Sela, outed Hannah in her blog and Hannah ended up committing suicide.

Given this is a legal drama, I’m sure you’re not surprised that charges were brought against Sela for Hannah’s death. Harry was brought into represent Sela.

The court room scenes are with watching, especially the closing argument of Harry. In her statements, she points out some issues with the big picture that are compelling and often not discussed openly when situations like this occur in the real world. The main issues she raised include:

1. “Snarky” blogs and mean-spirited journalism is the norm in today’s society. She gave the examples of the Huffington Post, Daily Beast and Perez Hilton

2. “Cruelty sells and sells big”, which is why these media outlets exist and thrive.

3. The message to not discuss “gayness” openly is entrenched in our society. Harry pointed out that men and women can serve in our armed forces and be killed protecting our country but, until recently, could not admit to being gay. Hannah sadly grew up feeling she had to keep her sexual orientation a secret due to the current norms of society.

4. Harry points out the situation is a suicide, not a homicide.

5. Her final points:

a. “This is who and what we are as a nation so please let’s not lay this on Sela”

b. The responsibility for this situation is on many hands. “Don’t blame 1 kid with a snark blog”.

You can watch the closing argument yourself here. Start at 30:35.

Sela was found not guilty.

This episode drives some important points home:

1. Cyberbullying is multifactorial and we have to remember that.

2. Everyone loses in situations like this and everyone needs help – the perpetrator, the victim, and the families.

3. More times than not, these cases are not criminal and should not be treated as such. Instead, we need to focus on prevention and education.

4. Mean-ness is pervasive in our society. Perhaps if we work on that, these incidents will not only become less frequent as story lines, but as real life situations.

I have a theory that we were nicer as a society before technology took over to the degree it has. I’ll post more on this soon.

The headline could have easily been from TV drama or sitcom, but was very real: Infant born at 35,000 feet.

Aida Alamillo was as surprised as anyone that she went into labor en route to Boston. At 35 weeks, she was cleared to fly and within the airline guidelines for flying while pregnant.  Her son, as many babies do, had other plans and he was born mid-flight. Thankfully everything went well due to three nurse passengers and mom and baby are both doing well in a San Francisco hospital.

Aida and Kevin are lucky. Being so far away from medical care, many complications could have emerged that would have been challenging to handle on an airplane. This is one of the reasons most airlines and the American College of ObGyn don’t advise travelling past 36 weeks, or in the last month of pregnancy. Aida was within those guidelines but barely.

So, what should you do if pregnant and needing to travel near term?

1. Talk to your Ob/Gyn and make sure it truly makes sense to travel so close to term.  While 36 weeks is a general ball park for ceasing travel, your Ob/Gyn may have an earlier cut off based on your history.

2. Consider the “what ifs”. What if you go into labor early, on a train, boat, car or plane? Will you be near a hospital or 911 services? If not, perhaps you can travel earlier or delay your trip.

3. Know the airline guidelines for travel while pregnant.

This headline got me wondering about medical emergencies inflight and how they are typically handled. From what I could find in reports and studies, the data about inflight medical emergencies is spotty at best. It appears that births are quite rare but other emergencies such as heart attacks, panic attacks, fainting, asthma, are not.  Given this information, I would have expected airlines today would train personell on how best to handle these situations should they occur. As it turns out, that’s not the case.

According to a recent JAMA article, the reality of how airlines handle medical emergencies is quite different from what most of us would have predicted.

If a medical emergency does occur, there are many obstacles to handling it including the availability of the flight crew and emergency medical kit. As noted in JAMA article:

“Other reports have recounted physicians having challenging experiences with in-flight medical emergencies. Like physicians in these other reports, these physicians faced challenges in providing care: the physical space was difficult to work in, the emergency medical kit was not immediately available for use, the physicians were unfamiliar with its contents, and the flight attendants were absent for much of the episode.”

The article goes on to further note an issue with flight attendant medical emergency training:

“Judging from events such as the emergency landing on the Hudson River, as well as other incidents, flight attendants are well trained in emergency landings and evacuations. Because of improved aviation safety, most individual flight attendants will never experience an emergency landing or evacuation during their careers. By contrast, in-flight medical emergencies occur frequently. Yet the kinds of approaches that have improved flight safety have not been extended to providing optimal care for passengers who become acutely ill while on board airplanes.”

The best advice for safe air travel in general is to know your own health history and to consult your primary care physician if you have any questions about whether air travel is safe for you. And, if you are pregnant, recognize that babies don’t check calendars. When it’s time, it’s time…even if your physician said it was ok to travel, the baby may truly have another plan in mind!

Today’s school backpacks are an amazing amalgam of fashion and function – with sometimes a dash of technology as many seem to come either prewired for ear phones or with a special place for them.

As our kids move through elementary school and beyond, the look of this bag becomes as important as what is inside – and perhaps even more so. Today’s backpacks remind me of Hermione Granger’s purse – they all seem to hold an endless array of stuff. The thing is that pile of necessary stuff packs on the pounds setting the state for a lifetime of back woes…unless we change the equation starting today!

Backpack’s are one of the leading causes of injury to children with more than 7000 children injured last year due to overloaded backpacks according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Back experts recommend that backpacks weigh no more than 10-15% of a child’s weight but many kids carry at least 20% of their weight. The type of injuries caused by backpacks are more varied than you may realize. The most typical injuries are shoulder and back strain from improper backpack use and overloading. Shoulders and backs are not the only part of the body at risk from backpacks, however. Many children each year actually injure their feet, toes and legs from tripping over heavy backpacks put on the ground to give their owner’s backs a break. Head trauma and lacerations have also been reported from children using their backpacks as impromptu balls. Backpacks indeed put the entire body at risk.

Helping our children not only choose a proper backpack but wear it correctly will dramatically reduce a child’s chance of injury. Leading orthopedic experts agree that most back and shoulder pain in children is avoidable by simply wearing the backpacks correctly and resisting the temptation to sling the back from one shoulder. Additionally, the straps should hold the bag close to the body fairly snugly. Spreading the contents throughout all the compartments will help distribute the weight more evenly in the bag but in the end it’s the overall weight that matters.

Just like with clothes, backpacks are actually sized. Just like we would never have our children wear adult sized shoes, we need to be careful they are not hauling adult size backpacks. In addition to the weight of the actual pack, a fully loaded backpack may end up weighing more than your child!

True outdoor stores such as LL Bean and Eastern Mountain Sports, as well as popular retain stores, have backpack lines designed just for children and teens but similar lines. So, before you pull out your wallet and head for the cash register, check the tag of the backpack to make sure it’s designed for your child’s age.

What features of a backpack should you look for beyond the age specifications on the tag?

• wide shoulder straps with one for each shoulder so the bag’s weight can distribute evenly over the child’s back and not place too much strain on any one shoulder joint.
• Padded backs and waist straps to help distribute the load in the bag more evenly.
• Wheels: while many kids refuse wheeled backpacks these are the best way to avoid strain on the back. However, these are only a good option if your child’s school is on one floor.

Keep in mind that part of the issue is the amount of material our kids need to trek to and from home each day as well as to each class. The school day doesn’t seen to allow kids to return to their lockers easily so many end up lugging a heavily load all day long…and on one shoulder!

Keep in mind that while most backpack injuries are weight and use related, some are due to tripping over packs put on the ground. A few kids a year do break toes and sprain ankles and wrists from tripping over heavy backpacks put on the ground to give their wearer a much needed break. The solution for this is for kids to not only pay more attention to where they are walking but for kids to pay more attention to where they leave their backpacks…at least until we collectively fix the weight problem.

So, as you embark on back-to-school shopping, add backpack fitting to the list and have kids try a few on for size and comfort. In the end, your child will find a backpack that provides the fashion statement they desire with the safety and fit features you know they need.

(Originally published 2008; updated 8/22/2011)

Looking for some homework helpers for the new school year? Here’s a list in progress of sites that have helped my kids over the years.

Ask For Kids

Great search engine for kids of all ages.

Ben’s Guide To US Government For Kids

Huge assortment of topics and web sites for fun and learning.

Fact Monster from Information Please

True fun with learning for teens and tweens.

FirstGov for Kids

Government Sponsored Web sites on oodles of topics. You name it, you’ll find it here.

High School Ace

Homework helper for High School students.

Homework Spot

Great site for older elementary school and middle school students.

KidSpace

Online Library for Elementary School and Middle School students from The Internet Public Library.

Teenspace

Online Library for Teens from Internet Public Library.

Kid Info

Has sections for younger elementary school kids and older kids on every topic their school covers.

National Geographic for Kids

Everything adults love about National Geographic done kid-style! Covers many nature and social studies topics.

Reading Rainbow

Targets ages 4-8. Has games, family activities and ideas to help your young child learn to love reading.

Refdesk.com

Online reference desk for kids of all ages.

Time For Kids

Great for older elementary school and  middle school students. Covers world news appropriate for kids in a way they can understand.

Yahooligans – web guide for kids

As a new school year is about to begin, I’m reminded of a conversation I had with my oldest teen once she began high school:

“Hey mom”, my 15 year old said as she walked in the living room with that ‘I’ve been thinking about my life’ look that teens get once they enter high school. “How much homework did you have when you were my age?”

“This could potentially be a trap”, I thought. “Answer carefully”, I told myself.

“Well…,” I began cautiously, trying to read the look on her face – trying to see if she was just curious or about to have a HUGE stress out moment because of having too much homework that night.

“It does seem like you have more homework than Daddy and I had when we were in High School. But…our afterschool lives were also not quite as full.”

She gave me a blank look before responding.

“I think we have too much homework and we need more time to be kids. You and Daddy tell me that you and your friends used to do things and have time to hang out on weekends and stuff. My friends and I don’t have that. We even have tons of homework on weekends. THIS – IS – JUST –WRONG!!”

Then she added: “THEY…”, she pointed to her book bag, “ are stealing are childhood!”

I didn’t say anything in response just yet.

“So”, she continued. “Do you think we have too much homework? Do you think our childhoods have been stolen?”

I didn’t want to freak her out, but the truth is I did think she was right and knew the data supported her observation. So, I simply replied. “Times are different today but I have to agree the homework seems excessive. Perhaps there’s a way you and your friends can look into this and see if so much homework is needed.”

“That’s a great idea! Our Principal seems like a really cool guy. We’ll do some research.”

With that, she left, seeming more at ease.

In truth, our kids have much more homework than we had, as well as more overloaded afterschool lives. How much more homework? About 50% more!

Kids need a balance of education, extracurricular activities and free time. Since we were kids, so much attention has focused on programming their lives that no room has been left for our kids to water their own childhoods and to grow them in the direction of their choosing.

We live in a time of excess and the concept of moderation has flown out the window. Our kids can’t keep having every aspect of their lives pushed to the max: homework, afterschool activities, school sports.

TIME Magazine ran a very interesting article on The Myth About Homework that not only echoes my daughter’s concerns but tosses out some intriguing solutions, such as homework limits. The article points out what I’m seeing in my daughter, her friends and teens nationwide: the push on homework is actually backfiring – our kids are getting burned out and turned off to learning.

So, it’s time we support the movement my daughter and so many other teens nationwide are demanding in their lives. This is their childhood and they deserve time to explore more than just books and word problems.

BTW, the data is on the side of the teens with this one. More free time is exactly what their lives need for better learning…and better health!

Do your tweens and teens feel their childhoods are under attack either from too much homework or too many activities…or any other reason? If so, you are very much not alone. There is a solution – speak up in your communities so we can stop the clock on this madness.

My family has a tradition of getting all our back-to-school shopping completed just before our big end of the summer vacation. Lunch boxes used to be big ticket back to school items but since my girls are tweens now, as Hilary Duff once sang, “that’s so yesterday”. Plus on most school days we’re lucky if their lunches make it from the frig to their backpacks!

If only the choice of what to have for lunch these days were as easy as whether to brown bag it or have a fancy lunch box. With the confusing food pyramid and ever changing food guidelines coupled with school days that barely allow for time to eat lunch, it is truly a challenge to get kids a proper lunch.

Let me give you a preview of what’s about to come: don’t view nutrition as one meal but view it as a group of meals that balance out together and function like a bank; lunch may very well be the new breakfast, meaning our kids most important energy meal.

Some Thoughts To Ponder

As my kids have gotten older, I’ve realized that helping my kids eat healthy is a balance between offering healthy foods, giving them control of some of their meals, and helping them learn to incorporate the less healthy foods with the healthy foods. Concerning lunch specifically:

1. Given how much of their day is decided by others, especially at school, I give my kids total control over what they have for lunch among the foods we have at home.
2. I’ve started to realize that lunch is not just a meal in a day but a meal that has to get my kids through the entire day including learning and after school activities. It is perhaps their most important energy meal when viewed this way.
3. Fruits and veggies are crucial to their overall growth but don’t always get that energy jolt needed to learn.  So, I tend reserve fruits and veggies for dinner and after-school snacks and add more carbohydrates like pretzels and granola bars for lunch and in-school snacks.  The energy they provide lasts longer for my girls.
4. It occurred to me that getting through a school day is like a mini marathon for my kids but involving both body and mind.  Just like with a marathon, hydration becomes as crucial as energy. So, I’ve put more emphasis on what they drink during the day and how much.
5. When my kids have a sugary snack occurring at school, we don’t pack a snack that day or pack veggie sticks but leave lunch untouched. Lunch needs to happen as planned to learn well.

Kids and Food: The Big Picture

These concepts that have helped me, can work for your kids, too. In addition, you have to remember that kids have simple tastes hence why kids menus have the same 5 foods on them regardless of the restaurant! And, unlike us parents, kids can truly eat the same meal every day without getting bored. I swear my youngest daughter will one day become a ham or waffle!

As I mentioned earlier, considering lunch in the big picture of your child’s overall nutrition is really helpful.  The government’s new food pyramid (www.mypyramid.gov) gives a great visual description of what kids should eat during the day but it can be overwhelming. I know my kids don’t come anywhere close to what the pyramid suggests for a given day but their nutrition is fine if I take into account what they eat over the course of a few days.  So, if one day has more carbohydrates or fewer fruits, I help them make-up for it the next day. If one day has an extra treat built in, we skip dessert.

Your Kids Food Bank

Give and take, and balance. Those are the ultimate ingredients to success. Each meal has its own role in a child’s day. Breakfast jump starts our bodies after a long sleep. Dinner helps us refuel after the afternoon of physical and mental work and gives us fuel to keep our bodies going while we sleep. Lunch, on the other hand, has to catch us up from the morning and get us through the afternoon until dinner. A lot is being asked of our kids through the day, and lunch has to meet all those needs, including physical growth.  In many ways, breakfast and lunch need to be a bit more carbohydrate slanted and snacks and dinner more balanced with fruits and vegetables.

Lunch is tricky because of not only how brief it is in most schools but because of how important it is. Kids have to make up from energy lost from the morning and store energy for the afternoon, and eat it in about 10 minutes. Pre-cut fruits and vegetables and even prepackaged items such as the new 100 calorie packs are very useful for both purposes. The 100 calorie packs also visually teach portion control which is very useful for prepubertal and early pubertal kids who are primed to gain weight entering puberty. Using these items may not seem healthy to you but it’s what the kids like to eat and what they see their friends eating.

Sandwiches tend to be the best way to get grains and proteins done all at once and are easy to eat quickly. Kids tend to not like the taste of the real grainy breads so try the grain or wheat breads that look like white.   My kids can’t tell the difference.

Finally, for hydration with lunch, my choice is water. Kids don’t get enough during the school day and while I understand that school nutritionists view lunch as a way of getting calcium into our kids we can do that at home. What our kids need is water and more of it during school.

My kids hate buying lunch at school but I know many kids who love school lunches. The problem is school lunches are not always as balanced as they should be. On days your child buys lunch, plan dinners higher in proteins, fruits and vegetables and less in fats and carbohydrates to balance out the day better. Be sure you ask your kids specifically what they had for lunch if they buy to help you plan meals better.

Finally, no school year would be complete without the birthday treats and special events but that extra sugar load need not derail our child’s nutrition train. You can plan a healthier lunch the day of the treat or the next day to balance out the extra treat. Or, just skip dessert with dinner that night. I’m a believer that our kids can have a daily treat once a day but if it happens at school, then it doesn’t happen after school. This is how our kids learn to incorporate the sweets into a normal diet without adding pounds.

Making Deposits and Withdrawals

Clearly lunch will provide the most benefit if the remainder of your child’s meals are healthy.  Kids need breakfast  and skipping it is akin to trying to start a car without gas.  At the end of a day, kids need a healthy dinner, preferably with the entire family as studies demonstrate huge value to kids for the family meal and time together around the table. It fuels their souls! This may not be logistically possible if parents work late or kids need to eat earlier, but have a consistent time all of you are around the table. Perhaps breakfast works better for your family or dessert.

In addition to healthy eating, regular exercise has to be a priority. After sitting in school all day, kids need to burn off steam and have some unstructured time.  You don’t need a gym or organized sport. Just playing outside and regular walks together as a family can go a long way to staying fit. When I was a kid, my dad and I would go for a walk after dinner. Exercise and family time all wrapped into one – and calorie free!

What about weekends? Most weight experts and programs advocate a 5:2 plan for staying on track and this can work for families, too. You stay on track Monday through Friday with healthy eating and exercise but loosen the reins on weekends.  This is when most families eat out or order pizza. There is nothing wrong with indulging once in a while if the remainder of your week is healthy with food and exercise. If our kids learn this now, they’ll have it well ingrained by the time they are on their own.  But, even on weekends, lunch is still the pivot meal. You can’t skip it just because you are having a bit dinner that night. Eat lighter but still eat lunch.  It is that important.

Lunch: the new breakfast

So, breakfast, watch out, there’s a new meal in town, that may very well be more important than you are.

Here’s to a wonderful school year with new horizons and healthy choices…and perhaps even time for our kids to eat their lunch.

(Originally posted August 2007; Updated September 2011)

It seems the fashion industry doesn’t realize we still have a good half the summer to go! Everywhere I go there are reminders that another school year is around the corner. Although we’d all rather block this from our brains, it’s actually not such a bad idea to at least get into a quasi-back to school state of mind. Doing so will help you and your kids considerably once that first day of school does arrive.

Since the last school year ended, we’ve been on a diametrically opposite schedule from what we live when school is in the mix in just about every way:

• Sleep: Sleep tends to be more free in the summer with later bed times, wake up times and no set schedule.
• Nutrition: Fruits and veggies may be more abundant but people also indulge on more ice cream and treats at barbeques they don’t often eat at other times of year.
• Exercise: Many kids are either not in camp, in “indoor” camps or in sports camps that focus on just one sport and not overall fitness, so kids are actually less active in the summer than in the past.
• Activities and Hobbies: Most kids put on hold the activities they pursue rigorously over the school year – music, art, even some sports.
• Reading: Many schools have reading expectations for the summer so most kids do read each summer.
• Technology: For most kids, especially tweens and teens, they’ve had much more use of technology over the summer than in the school year and likely without the oversight that you’d normally have over the school year.

Making small tweaks now in all these areas will help ground our kids and give them the energy they need to stay on top of school and the increased demands they’ll feel.  To nudge your kids back to tip, top school shape, try these ideas out:

• Sleep: You can change your kids’ biological clocks from summer to school  by moving them to an earlier bedtime and having them wake up with an alarm for at least 3-5 days before the first day of school. The more time their bodies have to adjust to the new time, the better they will feel when they have to do it every day – and the easier it will be.
• Nutrition: In addition to needing three meals a day, kids eat healthier when they help make meals. Try that out this month and then continue it in the school year.
• Exercise: Growing kids need daily exercise, even if they play team sports. And, kids who play sports need a break once in a while or they risk overuse injuries. The goal is 30 minutes of moving a day. If you can get that in for your kids, they’ll feel great and their bodies will benefit.
• Activities and Hobbies: The best rule of thumb is to slide into the school year and see what the work load is like before adding too many new activities, especially if activities are already in place from last year. And, to remind your child it isn’t the end of the world to try something new and drop it if they don’t like the activity or it’s too much for their schedule.
• Technology: Whatever your usual technology plan is for the school year, now is the time to regroup on that and revisit expectations that make sense once homework kicks in. I’ll have more on this soon so stay tuned!

If you enjoy today while being realistic about tomorrow, tomorrow can be enjoyed much more, even if it is the first day of school!