Toddler Tales: Wisdom and Insights for the Parenthood Journey

The parenthood journey with a toddler is a unique and exciting experience filled with challenges, joy, and endless surprises. First-time parents find it amusing yet challenging to deal with toddlers as parents have a huge responsibility to treat and bring children with wisdom, patience, care, and most importantly love. The toddler age is very sensitive, and the way parents treat them at this stage affects their growth and development.  This is why you must have seen first-time parents asking for tips of wisdom from experienced parents of toddlers. If you are also concerned about being a good parent who plays a constructive role in the upbringing of children, then follow these effective parenting tips for toddlers. These tips will impart the wisdom and insight that you need for the effective upbringing of your toddlers and navigating the toddler years with ease.

• Acknowledging stages of toddler development: Toddlers undergo various stages of development during which they experience significant emotional, physical, cognitive, and social changes. They undergo major transitions in all these development phases. As a parent, you should acknowledge that your toddler will undergo these changes and you need to work on building a strong parent-toddler bond during all these phases. For instance, the movement of toddlers increases with time. From crawling, they got to walk, run, and then climb. Emotionally, as toddlers age, they yearn to become independent, and they might throw more tantrums. Cognitively, they become more curious to explore the world around them which means that they will question more. Socially, they want to interact more and build friendships. At all these stages they need your assistance and wisdom-filled care. When you acknowledge the stages of toddler development you can welcome the transitions they undergo and understand how to handle toddler tantrums. By being able to deal with their tantrums constructively, you can become a great parent who helps greatly in toddler’s development.

• Treat toddlers with flexibility and patience: Toddlers can be quite aggressive sometimes and even test our boundaries. In any such challenging situation where toddlers show you tantrums, you need to treat them with patience and flexibility. Rather than reacting to their tantrums and emotions, you need to develop an understanding of toddler emotions and reactions. By understanding their emotions, you are creating a positive home environment where they can grow into positive adults. With constant support, you can ascertain that they are growing in a constructive environment. Toddlers are quite unpredictable too and you cannot always judge their behavior. The best practical advice for first-time toddler parents in such situations is to be flexible and adaptable to deal with the situation with grace and positivity.
• Engage in effective communication: Effective communication is very necessary in a parent-toddler relationship. It involves emotional expressions, positive body language, and a calming tone of voice that offers a sense of security to toddlers. Toddlers do not speak properly until the age of 2 and find it quite difficult to express their thoughts and feelings in words. You need to opt for effective communication techniques for toddlers and parents whereby you indulge in active listening. It involves giving full attention to your toddlers while they are communicating with you and validating their feelings. You also need to create a positive environment for your toddlers where they can confide in you and share whatever they feel or go through. They should be able to trust you that you will understand their emotions and extend the support and cooperation they need. Non-verbal communication holds a substantial chunk of effective communication. Wondering what non-verbal communication means? It includes smiles, hugs, and playtime through which you are communicating with your toddler without speaking.

• Encourage learning and exploration: Toddlers have an innate need to explore and learn. All parents need to do is give them the right encouragement by offering them a safe environment. There are many strategies for encouraging toddlers to learn and play that you can opt for as a parent. For instance, you can indulge in simple yet effective activities with your toddlers like drawing, coloring, building blocks, or playing with a water gun. For extended learning opportunities you can take toddlers to outdoor trips such as zoos, parks, or a museum where they can learn and explore to another level by interacting with other toddlers and engaging in social development.
• Nutrition-filled eating habits: Intake of proper nutrients is essential for toddler development. In toddler years the physical body and mental development rely heavily on food intake whereby food should be healthy and filled with nutrition to keep up with the body’s needs. As a parent, it is your responsibility to instill healthy eating habits in toddlers. Mostly toddlers have a tough time with their parents and run away from eating. You need to find a way to feed them whereby they enjoy their meals and at the same time focus on the nutrition factor. You need to feed them vegetables, lean proteins, whole grains, and most importantly fruits in any form that they love to consume. Some toddlers prefer to eat raw fruits, while others will be more prone to drink shakes and some others would want to eat fruit purees. It is your responsibility to meet the unique eating habits of your toddlers to make sure that they are getting the required level of nutrition with each food portion. Also, you should look for any possibility of allergies and consult a pediatrician for a clearer and more in-depth examination. Such check-ups help you ensure that you are feeding the right food to your toddlers, which is crucial for their fundamental development.
• Never ignore your toddler for work: Toddlers need undivided attention and care from parents. They tend to become quite cranky and throw tantrums if both parents are working round the clock and do not give them the love and attention they crave for. The Insights into toddler behavior and development show that toddlers who are neglected by their parents become aggressive and cranky. This is why you must balance work and life with a toddler. Of course, work is important, but you can make some arrangements where at least one of the parents is there to take care of the toddler and attend to his/her needs.

• Maintain a routine: It seems impossible to make a routine with toddlers since they are very moody but still, you need to focus on maintaining a routine regarding their feeding and sleep time. You can follow various tips for managing toddler sleep patterns to ensure that they get proper sleep. The better their sleep pattern is, the better their growth and development will be.
• Prepare them for schooling: As toddlers progress through the years, you need to work on preparing toddlers for preschool When toddlers enter preschool, they can get overwhelmed and confused at the same time. This is why you must guide them and prepare them to attend preschool. Also, while choosing the school for your toddlers make sure that you consider one of the top ICSE schools. A good school matters a lot in your toddler’s development. If you want your toddler to get enrolled in one of the best ICSE schools on Bannerghatta Road, Bangalore then do consider the Pre-Primary Admissions at Sherwood High as it is included in the top pre-primary schools celebrated for effective toddler development.

Conclusion: Parents undergo daily challenges and joys of raising a toddler. They come across many surprises and challenges when raising a toddler and first-time parents often rely on the lessons learned from parenting toddlers. In this article, we have shared some wisdom-filled tips for parents to create a strong parent-toddler bond and play an effective role in their development and upbringing.  These tips include acknowledging stages of toddler development, treating toddlers with flexibility and patience, effective communication, encouraging play and exploration, feeding them nutrition-filled food, maintaining work-life balance, maintaining a healthy sleep routine, and preparing the toddlers for preschool.  Along with the efforts you put in at home, make sure that you choose the right school for your toddler that plays a constructive role in their development. If you are open to suggestions, then do check out for admissions at Sherwood High which is a leading ICSE school in Bangalore.