Author: Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

Two-Week Check-In (Mary’s Version)

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

It’s been two weeks since my son officially became a second grader and so far, things are off to a good start.  Thank goodness.

Last year was a bit of a mess. The first two months of his first-grade year were tumultuous, with frequent reprimands and constant negative feedback from the teacher. He started to loathe going to school, feeling like he was a bad kid and couldn’t do anything right. And then she abruptly quit, leaving his class to have a substitute teacher for the next three months. Turns out there were more kids in the same boat. Fortunately, the school was able to find an amazing educator who brought back his love of learning and school in the second half of the academic year.

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A Bundle of Nerves: Kids and School Anxiety

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

If you saw Inside Out 2 over the summer, then you know that Anxiety is the main antagonist but not necessarily the villain. The film does a great job explaining this complex emotion and why it has a notable presence in our kids today. Being former gifted kids, we’ve definitely felt academic anxiety in high school; but is this really occurring for our elementary kids?

Fears and worry are typical for kids as they grow and experience the world, especially when it comes to school. A 2023 survey reported that 86% of school-aged children worry, mostly on a regular basis (once a week or more), with majority of their concerns (64%) being school-related.

Although the term anxiety has become a catch-all for any emotion related to apprehension or unease, it’s helpful to know the variations and their differences:

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The Audio-Visual Club: Kids and Audiobooks

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

“I want people to stop saying, ‘I didn’t really read it, I just listened.’ Stop that. If you listened, you read it. There’s no right way to absorb a book.” – Reese Witherspoon

I enjoy reading a physical book. My husband, however, does not. He prefers putting on his headphones and listening on Audible. He told me that he’s “read” three books over the summer. He’s not the only one in my social circle to count listening to an audiobook as reading. Friends will tell me they’ve read a 560-page novel over the weekend (you what?!) and then clarify that they listened to it during their road trip. Even Patti will simultaneously juggle multiple books for her book club and Child(ish) Reads posts, a feat made easier with paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats.

As audiobooks become more mainstream, it got me thinking about the trickle-down to kids. Is listening to a book the same as reading one? Can children benefit from this type of auditory medium or would it hinder their ability to read? Inquiring minds would like to know.

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Tone of Voice and Parenting

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

You know when you tell your kids to do something repeatedly and it falls on deaf ears. And then you end up yelling at them because you’re at your wits end? Then how about when your spouse says the exact same thing and they do it right away? Okay, great. I’m not the only one.

While my children appreciate my animated vocals during play or a soothing one when they need a cuddle, they definitely don’t hear my tone as one of authority unless I’m screaming to the top of my lungs. This got me thinking about how kids interpret tone of voice.

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Money-Driven: Kids and Money Management

| Mary Stoffel, MOT, OTR/L

Welcome back to #throwbackmonth! For those not familiar, to get us back into the blog-writing groove for the month of July, we pick a past post each week to spotlight. Then we do a deeper dive on that topic to revisit the content and talk about some other things that may be related. On Tuesday, we picked our double post on Introducing Chores and Chores by Age.

When my son first started showing interest in helping around the house, I was ecstatic. Awesome, he wants to do chores. That means he’ll ALWAYS want to do chores. Haha, silly me.

Now that he’s 7, he groans when he’s reminded of his duties. Although he understands that chores are a part of his daily contribution to the household, he’d obviously much prefer to be doing something (anything) else. While research shows that chores provide positive outcomes for kids (like autonomy, self-control, empathy, and overall success), it can be difficult to get them to participate and WANT to do it. Jennifer Aniston wants you to WANT to do the dishes….

One motivator that we are all familiar with is paying our children for their hard work (aka an allowance). I’m sure we’ve all received payment for doing good deeds around the house, from doing dishes to maintaining a tidy bedroom. In fact, a survey conducted by the American Institute of CPAs found that 4 out of 5 adults say receiving an allowance taught them financial responsibility. But are money incentives really teaching responsibility? Yes, but not in the way you’d think.

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