The American Academy of Pediatrics offers this great list of ideas for age-appropriate New Year's resolutions for kids! Preschoolers I will clean up my toys and put them where they belong. I will brush my teeth twice a day, and wash my hands after going to the bathroom and before eating. I won’t te

What do you do when your teen announces she’s decided to become a vegetarian? A parent’s first reaction may be to consider this newest revelation a phase that will soon pass — like her choice in music or fashion. But there are many reasons teens chose to adopt a vegetarian lifestyle: better health,

Even during the best of times, parents wonder whether their teens are developing all the skills they need to be successful in life. A problem in this “appraisal” process is that parents see their teens in some of their most regressed and infantile states—when they are at home with their families! Fu

Parents may shudder at the prevalence of sexually suggestive teen clothing and popular stores that target girls with T-shirts like "I do my own nude scenes" and "Milk me," or, for boys, "Rises to the occasion." But the fact is, many teens are sexually active and are more sexually knowledgeable than

Getting School Ready, a column that typically focuses on a child's readiness for kindergarten and grade school, is taking a leap this month. We're going to zip right past the early years and land squarely at the university door. Let's call it Getting College Ready. The irony is, getting ready for

They don’t believe in the tooth fairy anymore and they hung up that SpongeBob toothbrush long ago. But for many teens, new habits and new attitudes may be making them more prone than ever to dental decay. “We see teens all too often who went through childhood cavity-free; then, their diet changes a

From the time a baby enters the world, parents have high hopes for their new arrival. Planning for college often begins early, with the first dollars deposited into a college savings account, and accelerates with every decision -- from preschool French lessons to high school AP classes. As ch

When it comes to getting ready for college, there is no one right road for all students to follow. "Most colleges are seeing an increase in applications and, yes, admissions are competitive," says Jon Wexler, admissions counselor at the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma. "But I would encourage par