Parenting

During Book Week, we will see countless photos on social media of happy kids dressed as characters from their favourite books, while schools hold daily events celebrating the joy of reading.

It’s a fun time for many children, who relish the chance to dress up as Hermione from Harry Potter or Dog Man and talk about books with their friends and teachers.

But what if your child doesn’t like reading?

From 2025, all Victorian government schools will be required to teach reading using a phonics-based approach known as SSP. But what is it? And how can parents help their child learn to read in a way that aligns with what they are learning at school?

One of the most intriguing and, at times, frustrating aspects of raising and educating children is the disparity between a child’s capacity to maintain attention and concentration and the expectations parents and teachers have of that skill.

One of the characteristics of most kids that I secretly admire is, if they don’t see a point to doing something they won’t do it. End of story.

Have you ever asked your child to do something simple but no matter how many times you ask, they keep ignoring you?

Motivation is a slippery customer. Just when you want to rely on it, it puts its feet up, takes a few days off and generally wants to be about as active as a sloth on long service leave. Your ‘get up and go’ has ‘got up and gone’.

Children can have big emotions and sometimes struggle to process them. Here’s what it means for a child to be ‘dysregulated’.

Here, Maggie Dent one of Australia's leading parenting educators, explores the modern tendency of overprotecting children, which can hinder their development and resilience

How gender stereotypes at home may hamper female students’ progression in the classroom, are we robbing our kids of music discovery, and the impact of sleep on teen mental health.