September ’17 Newsletter
Every month Healthy Bodies, Healthy Minds & Director Susan Orban likes to connect you with current articles, events, and resources to help you keep your family healthy and informed!
Fun, “moving”, indoor activities
What if the hokey-pokey IS what it’s all about? And other indoor activities for a rainy day.
It’s fall and it’s been raining for both days of the weekend. Your kids are even tired of playing on the computer!
Yes, indeed, there’s a lot of fun activities you can do, with the emphasis on “active”. Basketball, for instance, with a stuffed animal and a laundry basket. Musical chairs. And the hokey pokey, a crowd pleaser at any age.
Lots of ideas and activities from the Shasta County, CA WIC office on our website.
More sugar in soda than we thought possible
Do you really want your kids drinking 60 pounds of it every year?
Okay, the statistics really are hard to believe: how can soda be THAT bad for you? After all, we’ve been drinking it FOREVER and we still have (most of) our teeth and we’re not (too) overweight.
But that’s you. Consider your children and their future health risks, from obesity to diabetes. Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta reports that drinking just one 20-ounce bottle of soda a day for a year is the equivalent of eating 6,570 cookies or 61 pounds of sugar!
Children’s Healthcare offers some realistic alternatives for you and your child.
Mental wellness begins at birth
Your baby & toddler absorbs everything – good or bad – that’s going on!
What does that mean for your baby? Positive experiences promote emotional wellness. Stressful experiences – especially ones that go on and on – can contribute to emotional difficulties, developmental delays, and behavioral disturbances. Child Trends, an organization that studies all matters child-related, reports that infants and toddlers form about 700 neural connections per second.
Sadly, experts estimate that at least 1 in 10 children through age 5 suffer emotional or behavioral disturbances.
Child Trends reminds us of 5 very do-able and sensible ways to nurture our very young ones.
We offer “Incredible Years” for parents of 6-10 year olds
Free proven parenting groups based in Wakefield and Westerly
Here’s a state-funded, tested program that brings you together with other parents to encourage good child behavior (and decrease problem behavior); help your child do well in school; feel more confident (and calm) as a parent; and get social support from other parents.
The program is free to parents in South County and is being offered at the Peace Dale Elementary School in Wakefield and the Tower Hill School in Westerly. It’s designed for parents with school aged children, grades 1-4. Childcare will be available for children 6-8.
For more details, contact Rebecca Allen at (401) 789-3016 x2334.
