Child in Mind – Dr. Claudia Gold’s blog “speaks to parents, professionals who work with children, and policy makers. I aim to show how contemporary developmental science points us on a path to effective prevention, intervention, and treatment, with the aim of promoting healthy development and wellbeing of all children and families.”

Children’s Needs – See our information page (with citations) about children’s needs for intimate, nurturing relationships and time together with their parents.

Child Flourishing (video presentation) by Bruce D. Perry, MD, PhD – The impact of trauma on the developing child.

The Evolved Nest “Early years are when virtually all neurobiological systems are completing their development. They form the foundation for the rest of life, including getting along with others, sociality and morality.”  Drawing on many fields of science, The Evolved Nest concept illuminates the conditions that optimize human development and well-being, as well as sociomoral intelligence.

Baby GooRoo – “We focus on health, nutrition, and safety, with an emphasis on breastfeeding. Our content is science-based and thoroughly researched.”

Chores and Children – Backed by science, Peter Gray (researcher and author) offers some great insights into why young children want to help. There are so many benefits to respecting their natural instincts — and you’ll be building a stronger relationship while you work together! Toddlers Want to Help and We Should Let Them

GreenspanFloortime Dr. Stanley I. Greenspan, a renowned expert on childhood development and the importance of emotions and relationships between child and parent, developed the Floortime model. His work is carried on by his son and colleagues, who explain: “For Parents/Caregivers who want to actively participate in their child’s program, The Greenspan Floortime Approach® has proven highly effective helping children on with developmental delays, like Autism Spectrum Disorders. With it, you can help your child improve their ability to build relationships, improve communication, and become flexible and creative thinkers.”  Please note the important differences between the original, Greenspan Floortime and the DIRFloortime; Jake Greenspan explains: GreenspanFloortime is Not DIRFloortime, and Why That’s Important. “Floortime is only Floortime if the child is Relating, Communicating and Thinking.”

Hug Your Baby – Newborns: what are they telling us? “Based on child development, lactation and pediatric literature, HUG Your Baby’s trainings and resources help parents (and the professionals who care for them) understand a baby’s body language in order to prevent and solve problems around eating, sleeping, crying, and parent-child interaction and bonding.” See the video “Understanding and Caring for Your Newborn.”

The Natural Child Project – The Natural Child Project says:  Our vision is a world in which all children are treated with dignity, respect, understanding, and compassion. In such a world, every child can grow into adulthood with a generous capacity for love and trust. Founder and director Jan Hunt, B.A., M.Sc. Counseling Psychology, offers information and support, celebrating attachment parenting, unschooling and child advocacy.

Parenting Counts – a product of the Talaris Institute, offering parents research-based information about child development. See their Developmental Timeline with tabs for Physical, Social, Learning, and Communication.

Pre-to-Three: Policy Implications of Children’s Brain Development – Congressional Testimony by Diane Fisher, PhD (1997). Diane was a member of the Board of Directors of Mothers at Home (later renamed Family and Home Network) at the time of her testimony to the Senate Subcommittee on Children and Families.

Sleep – The Mother-Baby Behavioral Sleep Laboratory at the University of Notre Dame offers this information site on mother-infant co-sleeping, featuring the research of Dr. James J. McKenna. There’s information for parents and for health care professionals, as well as background on the scientific controversy over cosleeping and misconceptions spread by the media. See also The Evolved Nest.

Stress and the brain – Dr. Bruce Perry’s series of short videos on the impact of COVID-19, stress, human brains. A great learning opportunity for adults and children (ages 10 +). You can discuss and personalize with examples from your family, people living through tough times, coping, feeling effects of stress, etc.

The Thoughtful Parent – Amy Webb, PhD, writes “If you are looking for strategies to support your child’s development using research combined with your own innate intuition, this is the place for you.” In addition to the resources on her website, Amy offers connection for parents through Parenting Against the Grain, for those who want to be ‘informed by research, guided by love”.

Time With Children – A selection of expert advice about parent-child time together.

Wholehearted Family Policies – by Family and Home Network for the State Child Care Administrator’s Meeting, 2004, Child Care Bureau, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Like our other resource topics, this is a work-in-progress. Focused on the social/emotional aspect of dealing with difficulties, including illness, elder care, death and grieving.

Talking with Children

Here’s an essential book for all families: first as preparation for life’s inevitable losses and second, as a resource on your bookshelf for times of crisis. Giving Hope: Conversations with Children About Illness, Death and Loss by Elena Lister, MD and Michael Schwartzman, PhD, with Lindsey Tate. Read our review of the book.

And from Julie Marrast, parent coach, author and founder of Parenting Through Feeling, a summary of advice about talking with a child about death. Julie earned a Certificate in Home Hospice Association’s program: Talking with Kids about Dying, Death and Grieving. She is a Hand-in-Hand Parenting coach, and recommends these resources:

“Mommy, do kids die?”

The Death Question: When your child asks “Will you die?”

And for general information and support about parenting and emotions (starting with your own emotions), see Hand in Hand Parenting’s 6-week course for parents.

On our website—read Julie’s pointers about talking with children about death.

An age-by-age guide to talking with children about death

Tragic events

Dealing with tragic events – A collection of ideas and resources for taking care of yourself and your children in the wake of national or local tragedies.

Responding to Grief, Trauma and Distress After a Suicide: U.S. National Guidelines – from the Suicide Prevention Resource Center, funded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

Illness, seeking help

Kate Bowler has a podcast and has written several books, including Everything Happens for a Reason: and other Lies I’ve Loved and No Cure for Being Human (and Other Truths I Need to Hear).

Find Help – search available help in your zip code area, for help with food, housing, bills, and more.

211 – a service of United Way, dialing 211 puts you in touch with a service professional in your area who can help you find available services.

Courageous Parents Network – “Courageous Parents Network is a non-profit organization and educational platform that orients, empowers and accompanies families and providers caring for children with serious illness. Here—in videos, podcasts, printable guides, Guided Pathways, and blog—you will find wisdom from families and pediatric care providers to help you get through each moment. And be the best parent you can be.”

Don’t Look Down: why children don’t fight cancer by Louise Dillon Bennett. “The victory is not in fighting, but in enduring, showing up every day knowing that you have no choice. The courage is not in fighting cancer but in living with it. The Beads of Courage [UK] is a wonderful organisation that doesn’t give rewards for ‘beating cancer’ but marks every needle, test, tablet, anaesthetic, operation and transfusion. It’s a visual representation of everything that has been withstood. What counts is not the willingness to fight, but the willingness to stand, with both feet solidly planted, and look cancer in the eye.” In the U.S., see: Beads of Courage.

Meal Train – a way to organize friends and family to help with meals, rides, chores, etc.

Caregiver Action Network – “Caregiver Action Network (CAN) is the nation’s leading family caregiver organization working to improve the quality of life for the more than 90 million Americans who care for loved ones with chronic conditions, disabilities, disease, or the frailties of old age.” See their guides and resources.

Engaged Patients – “Engaged Patients is a national campaign under the guidance of the Empowered Patient Coalition non-profit with the vision that all patients and their loved ones have free access to the tools and the resources they need to be fully informed and participating members of their health care teams.”

Laurel’s Kitchen Caring – Recipes for Everyday Home Caregiving by Laurel Robertson, Carol Flinders, Brian Ruppenthal (ISBN 0-89815-951-2). More than recipes, this can help you think about a loved one’s specific needs and offer food and comfort). Published in 1997, this book is still available.

Babies and children

NICU Parent Network’s webinar series – free online webinars produced in association with the National Perinatal Association. Many topics covered – for NICU parents and staff.

Healing Hearts Baby Loss Comfort – this website has resources centered on baby loss and grieving, some of which are of help for other kinds of losses and grief. The resource list includes organizations, camps for siblings and also a book list.

Share Pregnancy and Infant Loss Support – for parents and all family members as well as professionals. Local groups and online communications.

Star Legacy Foundation is a nonprofit “dedicated to reducing pregnancy loss and neonatal death and improving care for families who experience such tragedies.”

The Compassionate Friends – supporting family after a death.

A Haven – “Helping children grieve through a family centered approach” – see their informative resource pages.

Dougy Center – “find support, resources and connection before and after a death—for children, teens, young adults and their families.”

Hand to Hold – helps families before, during, and after a NICU stay and infant loss

CuddleCots – when a baby dies, a cooling bassinet can provide a way for the baby’s body to stay near the parents for a bit longer, offering time to grieve, to take photos or hand/footprints, to clip a lock of hair. Some hospitals offer these, many of them donated by parents who experienced a loss and raised funds to purchase one for other parents. We’re grateful to Saul’s Light, an organization in New Orleans working to support parents whose baby is in NICU as well a grieving parents, for bringing these to our attention.

End of Life planning, funerals, grief

Go Wish cards – a way to talk about what’s most important and make choices. 

Questions – for memories and laughter – from Rachel Stafford (Hands Free Mama) – a list of questions she developed when they learned her father-in-law was dying. 

Funeral Consumers Alliance – a nonprofit organization offering guidance and resources for those planning a funeral.

“We don’t ‘move on’ from Grief. We move forward with it” – Nora McInherny’s Ted Talk, viewed by over 4 million people.

How do You Help a Grieving Friend? (watch this 4-minute video from Refuge in Grief).

The following resources can help parents with problems big and small, as they break generational patterns and heal, strengthen their relationships with their children and learn new ways to raise their children with calm, love and connection.

Prevention / Resilience / Parent well-being / Parent-child relationships:

Greenspan Floortime Approach – Dr. Stanley I. Greenspan was a renowned expert on childhood development and autism. He urges parents to enjoy interactions and be playful, offering fascinating information about how important emotional development is to intellectual development. “Dr. Greenspan determined that it was our emotional health and relationships that drive our behavior, thinking and communication. Because so many professionals focus on surface behaviors and symptoms, never addressing the core components of a child’s emotional and cognitive health, he wanted to make his work available for all children. Floortime is both an intervention for children with special needs and a general support for healthy child development. Floortime meets children where they are and builds upon their strengths and abilities through creating a warm relationship and interacting. Floortime is only Floortime if the child is Relating, Communicating and Thinking.” See the Greenspan Floortime Approach website and for short video explanations of the approach, see The Learning Tree interactive page (allow a few moments for the videos to load).

Shanker Self-Reg  Overstressed? Dr. Stuart Shanker says: “There is no such thing as a ‘bad kid’. In Self-Reg we pause to ask, ‘Why am I seeing this behavior?’ and ‘Why now?’ before we react.” In his Self-Reg book and with abundant free information on the website, Dr. Shanker helps people of all ages think, act and feel better.

Dr. Bruce D. Perry – in this inspirational one-hour video, Dr. Perry explains ‘big picture’ societal factors in social and emotional development in infants and young children. He says: “We have slowly been neglecting two of our most powerful biological gifts: the power of relationships and the brain’s malleability in early childhood.” 

Stress and the brain – Dr. Bruce Perry’s series of short videos on the impact of COVID-19, stress, human brains. A great learning opportunity for adults and children (ages 10 +). You can discuss and personalize with examples from your family, people living through tough times, coping, feeling effects of stress, etc.

Community Healing Network – CHN’s mission: “to mobilize Black people across the African Diaspora to heal from the trauma caused by centuries of anti-Black racism, to free ourselves of toxic stereotypes, and to reclaim our dignity and humanity as people of African ancestry.”

Life Teachings – online program by Dr. Elana Miller. “Get practical tools to feel happier, less stressed, and more joyful. earn new methods to cope with stress and anxiety, get access to worksheets and video lessons, and connect with a healing community outside of your inner circle.” Modest monthly fee for this online program. Dr. Miller says: “I’m an integrative psychiatrist and 2x cancer survivor passionate about helping people use holistic approaches to reduce anxiety, cultivate joy, and live connected and meaningful lives.”

SMART Recovery – Self-Management and Recovery Training. A nonprofit organization offering free information and group meetings (including online), their mission: “To empower people to achieve independence from addiction problems with our science-based 4-Point Program.” Among the problems: alcohol, eating disorders, marijuana, gambling, prescription drugs, heroin, sex addiction, smoking. They offer a self-empowerment approach, with peer support for young adults: “no blame, no shame.” Family and friends can find help here, too – and people struggling to set boundaries for all kinds of reasons, whether or not addiction is an issue. From their website: “In SMART we focus on learning coping skills that work well short- and long-term. We base our ideas on what addiction science has shown to be effective. We have adapted these ideas into SMART’s tools for change. We are not much concerned with the past, except to learn from it. We focus on present-day events and the causes of self-destructive behaviors. We concentrate on what to do about them to achieve a positive lifestyle change, especially in the areas of our lives that are related to harmful addictive behavior.”

Karen Levine, PhD offers free downloads on her website about how to playfully help children overcome anxiety and fears: “Treating fears and phobias using interactive play, humor and unbundling combined with gradual incorporation of the feared thing.” See also the recording of a radio show about Halloween fears. Dr. Levine also offers online telehealth consultations and counseling to children and families.

Hands Free Mama – inspiration and encouragement to let go of stress and perfectionism so you can focus on the things that really matter.

No Bad Kids – course and book by this title by Janet Lansbury.

Little Hearts / Gentle Parenting – “Let’s raise kids who won’t have to recover from their childhoods” says L.R. Knost. She offers great guidance for all parents in the book The Gentle Parent – and for countering messages about spanking and “Christian parenting” see the book Jesus, the Gentle Parent.

Hand in Hand – this great nonprofit organization helps parents connect and support each other; their tools can also help with a parent’s traumatic stress (see “Using These Tools..” article below).

Celebrate Calm – Kirk Martin found himself repeating his father’s harsh parenting, and realizing that he needed a different way, he found himself helping other families. He and his son Casey have helped hundreds of thousands of parents.

Raising Teens – from the Harvard School of Public Health, Center for Health Communication, this free report (available online as a pdf download) identifies 5 basics for parents: Love and Connect – Monitor and Observe – Guide and Limit – Model and Consult – Provide and Advocate.

Raising Teens: parent narratives. Do you ever read parenting advice from experts and wonder how to actually put the recommendations to use in real life? We asked parents to tell us how they have acted on each of the 5 basics for parents identified in the Harvard report.

Thinking About Parenting – People often think of parenting in terms of the effect on the child. But what is the experience of raising a child like for a parent? What factors help or harm? Learn more about the theory developed by Alice van der Pas to help us understand parents’ experiences.

Learning from a Difficult Child – one mom’s reflections on her struggles and on what she learned as she loved and lived with her strong-willed, active and impulsive son. And here are her Other Thoughts About Parenting a Difficult Child.

Screens / media

For reviews, guidance, explanations (“Parents Need to Know”) about movies, games, and various tech: Commons Sense Media.

Claudia M. Gold, MD gives wise advice in her blog post on screen use / screen addiction and parenting, Social Media Addiction: Beyond ‘Just Say No’.

New York Times editor KJ Dell’Antonia writes about a Pew Research report, Teens, Technology and Friendships as well as another report on parents’ actions – and more importantly, conversations with their teens: Parents, Teens and Digital Monitoring. Dell’Antonia’s articles also include links to other sources and this observation by Dr. Marion K. Underwood: “Children who felt like their parents were monitoring their activity online were noticeably less distressed by online conflict,”

Suicide Prevention Resource Center

National Suicide Prevention Helpline: 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

About Spanking

Scientific evidence shows the harm of spanking, yelling, and shaming. While all the resources can help parents learn and grow, these specifically address spanking:

Spare the Kids

Stop Spanking

Beating Black Kids

Parenting Beyond Punishment

Corporal punishment bans and physical fighting in adolescents: an ecological study of 88 countries

The American Academy of Pediatrics published a major policy statement in November 2018. They say: “Research has shown that striking a child, yelling at or shaming them can elevate stress hormones and lead to changes in the brain’s architecture.”

Domestic Violence

National Domestic Violence Hotline – 1-800-799-SAFE (7233) or 1-800-787-3224 (TTY) or 800-942-6908 (Espanol)

A great FAQ page and list of resources offered by author Rachel Louise Snyder at globalgrit.com

National Health Resource Center on Domestic Violence – “a comprehensive source of information for those wanting to educate themselves and help others on the many issues related to domestic violence.”

Futures Without Violence – “Are you concerned about your relationship? Does your partner scare, criticize, or blame you? Does your partner tell you what to do and who to see? Has your partner ever hurt or threatened you, or pressured you to have sex? You are not alone. Abuse happens in every culture, every country, every age group, and it may be happening to you. No one deserves to be abused or threatened. You cannot stop your partner’s abuse, but you can find help and support for yourself.”

Raising Joyful Lifelong Learners by Aletha Solter

Fair Play

Division of labor

Cleaning

Cooking

Mental load

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Carol Fishman Cohen is Chair and Co-Founder of iRelaunch, focused on providing assistance to individuals as they prepare to return to the paid workforce after a break — and on helping businesses establish return-to-work programs. See her inspiring 12-minute TedX talk: How to Get Back to Work After a Career Break. And don’t miss the series of interviews she does with people who spent time out of the workforce (sometimes decades) and then returned to work – they’re fascinating and inspiring.

When the Nest Never Empties: A Handbook for Living with Adult Children and/or Elderly Parents by Cheli English-Figaro, Esq. – Multigenerational families were common throughout human history. In the 20th century many people in the U.S. adopted the nuclear family as the ideal, and now we’re seeing a resurgence of multigenerational living. In her direct, brief handbook, Cheli urges us to reflect on a range of topics, from the challenges to the rewards of living together, and to have “The Talk–The Aging Talk”—with loved ones. Although, as she says, “many people prefer to stick their heads in the sand and pretend they will never lose their independence,” she urges us not to live in a state of denial. Whether you’re the parent of a young adult who has come back home, or the child of aging parents, or an aging parents yourself, this handbook can help!

UpsideHōm – a company that provides support services to people 55+ living in selected apartment buildings. Rent includes a few services (housecleaning, a “manager” to call for help with obtaining services). There are add-on services – meal deliveries, rides, home health care, etc. They partner with a company that provides home health services – PapaPal.

Village-to-Village Network – information and assistance to grassroots organizers of local “villages” that help people age in place, in their own homes and communities.

Short description w/link to new Kindred worldview.

The Power of Parents

Children’s Needs

Power Pause

Erica Komisar

and more…

A collection of essays on the needs of parents; examples from around the world: Early Childhood Matters 2025 (Van Leer Foundation)

Readings, resources

Readings, resources

Readings, resources

Schools

Building / Construction / Land Use

Housing 

Readings, resources

See Word doc – Resources on prevention

Mothers Against Gun Violence (?)

Mothers Against Drunk Drivers

Domestic Violence (move here?)