Parents hear a lot of concerns about television and media exposure for very young children. Screen time for children is definitely on the increase. Children are watching 35 hours of television and other media a week, on average.

As your child reaches their second year in life they’ll begin to develop a view of themselves as separate and independent from you. This is mostly due to toddlers having gained control over their physical movements. Your toddler can now pull away from you and explore things that were formerly out of reach.

Nothing is more touching to new parents than the cry of their baby, but your crying baby may present a dilemma to you. If you respond promptly to crying, you might feel you will spend all of your time responding to crying. A good understanding of the causes of crying and the consequences of letting children cry without a prompt adult response will help you approach crying children in the best way possible.

There are some tools that parents use to help a toddler recognize the time has arrived for picking up their things. You can use an egg timer to ding in five minutes after giving your toddler a five-minute warning that clean up time is arriving. Giving your toddler a visual or noise-maker signal when you want them to switch gears will help your toddler develop a natural routine for picking up their toys.