Are you solo parenting but ready to enter the single parent dating scene? The following tips will help you to prepare for your first date.

1. Who will care for your kids?

Hopefully, you have a way to access free babysitting whether through family members or trading childcare duties with other families. If you don’t have this situation, you will need to find reliable babysitters. Try to find at least two so that you have back up if one is not available and be sure to use both regularly so that they see you as a steady client.

2. Who will you use for your emergency backup?

Always provide your sitter with another number of someone who could be there quickly in case of an emergency if you cannot be reached. If you have older children who can stay home alone, make sure they know who to call if you are not available.

3. When can you date?

Maybe the other parent takes your kids one night a week which would be ideal for a night out. Often, you will have to get creative about finding time. If you work, consider using your lunchtime or sneak in a quick meeting before or after work while your kids are still at childcare. If you have a child that attends sports practices or music lessons, you may be able to squeeze in adult time for the hour or more that your child is otherwise occupied. Visits to houses of friends and sleepovers can also offer opportunities.

4. Where will you meet?

Unless you have been seeing someone for awhile and are ready to get him or her involved with your kids, you will probably want to meet outside of your home if the kids are there. In the early days of being with someone new, meeting at your destination can be a good idea so you are not riding in a vehicle with a virtual stranger. Or, you may want to have him or her wait in your driveway rather than come into your home.

5. How much time will you devote to dating?

If you have met someone wonderful, you may be tempted to spend all of your free time with him or her. Your children still need your time and those undone household tasks can quickly get out of hand. Decide how much time is realistic to spend away from home and keep to it as much as possible even if your significant other pressures you for more time away from your kids. You will quickly grow to resent a new love interest if you end up neglecting your other responsibilities.

By following the tips above, you should be ready to begin your single parent dating adventure.

Being a parent is not easy. Carrying this thought with you creates a propensity to say or do things to convince your child that this is not a role that you welcome or enjoy. This is irrespective of how you communicate or your own personal feelings on the matter.

Adults have more sophisticated, three-dimensional and layered beliefs, and require such beliefs to be distilled and communicated clearly. Children are more one-dimensional and have a simple, uncomplicated belief system. A parent who does not understand this creates a risk of alienating a child.

A young child is unable to comprehend sarcasm, innuendo, nor wit. Diverging from straightforward communication requires the parent to take a nurturing role to explain meaning and intent. Communicating negative emotional content without this guidance will guarantee that your intention and message will be misconstrued by your young child.

That child who apprehends a different meaning from your words, and sees you blowing hot and cold, will learn to question not the intent of the words but the very relationship they have with their parent. This will gestate in small ways but will grow over time. Eventually, that relationship may become dysfunctional. The child will grow up and will filter much of everything that is said, irrespective of the child’s growing maturity of thought.

A parent who seeks to guide a child in a nurturing fashion first needs to resolve inner feelings of turmoil of being a parent. It is of course not easy, but it is a burden which will bear fruit in indirect ways. A parent need not let off steam and inadvertently offside their offspring with unintentional words. A parent should share the feelings of anxiety, frustration or guilt occasionally. Explain how it feels and what you are doing about it.

With an awareness that the ambiguity of words may extrapolate toward a dysfunctional relationship, a parent should be careful and process what is said from the perspective of the child. Using this perspective helps guide the parent into explaining the difference between what is said and what is meant.

There may be many reasons why parents and kids can’t be together, with divorce, military service and business travel being a few of the more obvious ones. In all cases, however, the pain of separation is palpable for parents and kids alike. Kids miss their parents and may feel abandoned. Parents miss their kids and may feel guilt and concern about their kids’ emotional well-being.

As parents we want two things. First, we want our kids to grow up to be emotionally healthy and successful adults. Second, we want to experience all the joy and satisfaction of being an integral part of the adventures on their paths to adulthood.

Nothing can replace a hug or a kiss on the cheek, or being at your child’s kindergarten play, or cheering along the sidelines at their first soccer game. Yet, technology is easing the challenges of distance parenting, making it easier for you and your kids to stay connected. Cell phones are abundant. Access to computers has become commonplace, whether at home or at the local library. Moreover, as the capability and prevalence of technology increases, the cost of its use decreases. A capable laptop computer can now be had for less than the price of a typical plane ticket. It is now routine for kids and parents to stay connected by phone and email.

In the last few years, computer video technology has made it simple and cost-effective to have face-to-face calls with your kids via computers equipped with webcams. Since it has been suggested that about two-thirds of all communication is non-verbal, video communication can be a far more effective and satisfying way of communicating with your kids, and they with you. And in the future, you may be able to have more convenient and spontaneous video calls with each other by using only your handheld phones. For now, web-based video phone services such as Skype (skype.com) can get you going by computer.

More recently, technology is being configured to go beyond voice and video communications technologies by giving us tools needed to be even more interactive and more closely connected with our kids. Virtual visitation is becoming a reality. By using a multi-functional tool such as etendi BRIDGE (www.etendi.com), we can now have video calls and simultaneously play online games together, help with homework, and view and discuss photos, videos, or other images together. This tool also encourages parents and kids to build and share online photo collections or scrap albums. When not online together, parents and kids can leave short “thinking of you” notes, as well as longer messages. A shared calendar is also included and helpful for both parents to maintain a shared parenting plan.

Now more than ever, technology provides long distance parents the opportunity to love their kids across the miles.

Being a single parent involves many difficult challenges. It’s even harder than it looks. Single parents deal with challenges all day, every day. Many of those challenges arise from being not only single, but also a parent. There are children to care for. And because you are the only parent, everything you do carries greater weight.

No matter what you do, as a single parent, you must think of its effect on your children. You must be diligent in keeping up with their activities and their thoughts as they grow up in a single-parent home. In fact, the biggest challenge of being a single parent is the effect of your status on your children.

The transition to a single-parent family is difficult for kids. They may feel abandoned or insecure. They may feel isolated and different from other kids, even if there are more single-parent families than ever before.

Your children may resent you for the loss of your spouse, or they may have unresolved issues with the missing parent. As a single parent, it’s your job to keep them talking about what’s going on with them and what they think. Even though they may resist, you need to get them to talk to you about their worries, their fears, and their anger.

And you need to let them know they’re all right. They’re normal kids despite their circumstances. They aren’t responsible for the change, and they don’t have to make up for it. You should give them as normal a childhood as possible and be a role model. Even when they don’t act that way, they look to you as their example of what a grown-up is and does.

Your kids need to know you’re there for them, no matter what. You have a busy schedule trying to earn a living and manage the household. But you must never be too busy for your children. Even when you are in financial trouble, the job can’t take priority over the kids. They need to know how important they are to you. They need to know you love them more than anything else.

You’re going to have to build a new relationship with your children. As a single parent, you’re the only source of affection and guidance in the home. Even if you weren’t close before, you’re going to have to get close now. One good way to do that is to do lots of fun family activities.

Another way that will help the whole family is to assign specific chores to your children that will help keep the household running efficiently. Giving them responsibility will help them feel that they belong and that they are important. It will also give them a sense of accomplishment necessary to build a healthy self-image.

Single parents need to admit that they need help and then get help. You can’t do everything by yourself. Trying to may ruin your health, your attitude, and your relationships with your children. Getting to know your neighbors is a great way to find people who can help you look after the kids when you must be away. Neighbors can also help with household repairs and yard work.

Your neighbors may also be adult companions and role models for your children, but you must be careful. Get to know your neighbors well before you allow your children to be alone with them. Remember that the world is a more dangerous place than it was when you were a child. There’s no substitute for good parental judgment.

Time is the enemy when you’re a single parent. You probably have to work, and that means being outside the home a lot. Unless you have help, it also means your children may spend a lot of time at home alone. You’ll need to take extra precautions and lay out specific rules for time you’re not there.

Children who are alone a lot are vulnerable to drugs and criminal behavior. Gang activities are sky-rocketing. You’ll have to find a way to monitor your kids while you’re not home. This difficult challenge must be met head-on or your children may pay for it with their very lives.

You may have a challenge with your children’s attitudes about you as well. They may blame you for their situation or think you’re not doing things right. They may not show you the respect you want and expect. And they may feel cheated if you can’t attend special events like birthdays, PTA meetings, parent-teacher conferences, recitals, and other events that parents usually attend. These time pressures are especially difficult for single parents.

If you can’t make the time to make at least some of these events, it’s time to have a talk with the boss. Maybe you can work out a special work schedule or do some of your work at home. If you can’t find a solution with your current job, you may need to look for other more flexible working arrangements. If both are impossible, it’s important that your children know and understand why you can’t be with them. Be honest. They’ll understand the truth better than no explanation at all.

It’s important to remember that you can’t just give time to your kids. It must be quality time that helps them grow and mature. They need to know that you love them and that you need them. Never give them the idea that they’re a burden to you. Tell them often how much you love them. Listen to them. Ask them questions and listen to their answers. Show your interest in them as individuals. Even when time is limited, you can make the time you spend with them special and positive. It’s worth the trouble. And your reward is the love and respect of well-behaved, responsible children.

Even when life deals you and your children a bad hand, you can make life together enjoyable and productive. You can build healthy relationships with your kids and watch them become happy, productive young adults.

Despite the many hard challenges of being a single parent, you must always maintain your perspective and honor the most important priorities. It won’t always be hard or unpleasant. You’ll have many happy times and lots of love and laughter in your single-parent family as long as you keep a healthy positive attitude and keep on working toward a better life for you and your children.

Imagine cuddling up with your small child to look at a picture book together that is interactive, musical, responsive and talks to you?

This is the experience that people are having who are engaged in that relatively new pastime – playing computer games with babies.

JumpStart’s Knowledge Adventure calls it “lapware”, Kiddies Games’ logo is “Hop on the lap and tap”, and Sesame Street’s “Baby and Me” opens with an animation of a baby monster hopping onto the lap of a Daddy monster to play the computer. Playing computer games with your baby is being promoted as a fun activity that a child and their caregiver can share together. And rightly so, because whatever the activity, physical, loving closeness is an important ingredient that infants need for healthy intellectual, emotional and physical development.

Reading a bedtime story to a small eager child is a tradition in many homes. As the children get older, this may be replaced by watching TV together. Our parents’ families listened to the radio together. Playing on the computer with a small child may become a new type of family tradition. Home computers and internet are making their way into more and more homes. Some parents use the computer in their work and are delighted to share the computer for a fun activity with their kids. Other parents want to make sure their children become computer literate. Well-designed, interactive, educational computer games engage small children as much as the television and are more educational than TV because they incite the child to interact and think, rather than passively watch and listen. These are the reasons for the increasing popularity of toddler computer software. Although a relatively small industry, software for infants has been cited as being a very fast growing industry.

What type of computer software is available for babies, toddlers and preschoolers? There are free games on websites and there are download and CDROM software that you can buy. Most software for this age group is games, but computer story books also exist. Wonderful websites that offer free games of which many are suitable for preschoolers (preschoolers are able to do directed clicking with the mouse) are:

[http://www.sesamestreet.org/sesamestreet]

http://www.noggin.com

http://www.cbc.ca/kidscbc

http://www.abc.net.au/children/games

http://www.meddybemps.com

Great free sites for babies (whose skills tend to be more limited to banging the keyboard) are:

http://www.kiddiesgames.com

http://www.toddletoons.com

CDROM or download software that you buy is usually better than free internet games. The games are usually superior (more graphics, more music, more involved games for older kids) and the software takes over the entire screen, which is more appropriate for very young children who click anywhere and everywhere on the screen. Some of the well-known producers are:

Reader Rabbit software from http://www.learningcompany.com

JumpStart software from http://www.knowledgeadventure.com

Fisher-Price software from http://www.knowledgeadventure.com

Sesame Street software from http://www.encoresoftware.com or http://www.amazon.com

[http://www.babywow.com]

Computer game softwares for this age group make conscientious efforts to be suitably educational. To judge their effectiveness for your child, try them out with your child. If your child finds that it’s fun, then it’s probably educational. For a baby, fun usually means that the game responds in some way to random keyboard presses and mouse clicks, and that the game continues in a positive way even when no input is forthcoming from the baby. A preschooler will need more of a challenge or more educational content, but the game should be designed to be always fun, reactive in a positive way and self-resolving when the child does not get the correct answer. At this age, it is more important that computer games contribute positively to self-esteem, rather than conscientiously correcting incorrect answers about educational concepts that the child will master when they’re older anyway. The KiddiesGames.com software is meticulous about adhering to these rules.

What types of skills are learned by playing toddler computer games? Obviously, computer software is not suitable for practicing gross motor or even fine motor skills. However, there are many types of educational concepts that computer games can help a child master, including shapes, sounds, cause and effect, identifying and naming things (such as objects and colors), increasing vocabulary, language concepts, the forms of letters and numbers, counting, pattern recognition, detail observation and word construction. At KiddiesGames, we strive to offer games for small children that are out of the ordinary, such as foreign language exposure and practicing the positions on the telephone for dialing emergency. The reactiveness and interactiveness of computer software is, of course, superior to that of books, and can be superior to that of toys, especially in the area of language. Infant computer games are also being cited as excellent resources for children with special education needs, because such games are simple, happy, brightly-colored, patient, controlled by the child and allow the child to make things happen.

An official recommendation from the American Academy of Pediatrics at http://aappolicy.aappublications.org/cgi/content/full/pediatrics%3B107/2/423 is to “Discourage television viewing for children younger than 2 years, and encourage more interactive activities that will promote proper brain development, such as talking, playing, singing, and reading together.” This has been taken as advice to avoid exposing those young children to the computer. However, well-designed infant software actually encourages those great activities of “talking, playing, singing, and reading together”. By carrying out the play activities proposed by the computer game, the caregiver is actually prompted with a framework or script for carrying out those “talking, playing, singing, and reading” activities with the child. Experts are now saying that while computer games for infants should not replace toys and blocks and books and should not be used as an electronic babysitter, that they are yet another valid toy resource. For example, a summer 2004 newsletter from the Hawaii State Health Department at [http://www.hawaii.gov/health/family-child-health/eis/summer2004] encourages playing with lapware. The emphasis is not on acquiring measurable skills or getting correct answers, but is on open-ended exploration on the part of the child – which is another way of saying “having fun”. Children are programmed to learn and practice what they learned by playing and having fun.

Playing computer games with your small child is not yet a family tradition. However, it is an enjoyable, sharing activity that is becoming more and more popular.

Anyone who says step parenting is not hard work has not experienced it for themselves. The good news however is that the hard work and patience could pay off and potentially lead to a happy family unit. It does not have to be doom and gloom for a step family all the time.

There are some ways in which one can become a successful step parent and one of such ways is through bonding with the step children.

So how does one bond with one’s step children?

Getting involved in activities

As a step parent, one of the quickest ways to bond with the children is by showing an interest in their hobbies and activities at school. Get to know what they like doing and make time to ask questions and if possible join in if they allow you. For activities at school, you could go with your spouse to attend say for example the cricket classes and stay to cheer them on, etc.

Doing things together

Another way of bonding is by doing things together. This would not involve your spouse, just you and your step children. Do not be put off if on the first or second occasion, they refuse to engage or even allow you to go out with them. If you persist, one day they may relent and allow you to be a part of their interests.

What you choose to do with the children does not have to be anything complicated. It could be something as simple as preparing a dish together or going to see a movie you know they like. You might even decide to do something outside your comfort zone probably like playing a computer game with them.

Keep the memory of their birth parent alive

This is mainly for if the other birth parent is deceased. Try as much as possible to keep the memory of the parent alive by making references to them and saying nice things about them. You could also help them with pictures and other keepsake items they have. This is a sensitive topic, but if the child wants to talk about their dead parent, then do not discourage them at all. By being understanding and willing to help them – you are creating a bond and you would have found yourself a new friend as well.

On the other hand, if the other parent is alive and your step child wants to talk about them, allow them to do so and make sure you never make a disparaging remark about them. Encourage them to talk about their parent if that is what makes them happy.

For these two situations, if your step child sees that you can be trusted with such things as their other parent; they will begin to warm towards you because they will find that they have someone in the house they can talk to. In addition to this, your step child will not see you as a threat in terms of their biological parent and you may find that they connect more with you because of this.

Whilst there are various ways to bond with one’s step children, these are just examples of some of them.

Before I got into coaching high schoolers for the first time, plenty of my friends with coaching experience gave me plenty of horror stories about what it would be like dealing with the player’s parents. Luckily, for the most part, the parents that I had were great. There were a few sporadic issues throughout the season, but nothing major. After coaching, I moved onto working in the field of college baseball recruiting, which a completely different level of dealing with high school baseball parents. Between the two experiences, I have certainly developed a solid list of do’s and don’t to help parents out with following their young athlete, and hopefully assisting him in advancing to the next level, whether it be as a collegiate student athlete, or even as a pro.

As a coach, I really only had one rule for the parents, and it was rule I stole from my high school coach who now coaches a DI in Florida. That rule was, “you can talk with me about anything except playing time. If playing time enters the conversation, the conversation is over.” For some reason, when a player does not start or play an entire game or play their position of choice, a parent can twist this into the coach having an “agenda” against their child. That is almost never the case, especially the higher up you go. When coaches are paid to win games, they are trying to do just that. Sometimes a player may be in a slump, sometimes a coach plays a matchup, sometimes he may simply feel another player is better, but it is almost never because the coach doesn’t like a given player or parent. Keep in mind that a good coach will communicate to his players why he makes a certain decision, and what they player can do to improve and get more playing time. Invariably, players understand these things better than the parents. Here are few other general principles to go by:

o Be seen and not heard – Especially at games. Cheering on the players is the best thing you can do. Yelling at a player, coach, or umpire is not going to have a positive impact. Don’t coach every pitch from the stands. Players become distracted by what their parents are up to in the bleachers and it absolutely affects their play. Practices are the time for coaches to be vocal, games are for the players.

o Don’t try to “pitch” your son to a high school or college coach — It is extremely difficult, if not impossible to view your own son’s play objectively. That is for the coach to do! If your son has talent, the coach will see it. That is what they are paid to do. Believe it or not, coaches see just about everything that happens on the practice or playing field and it doesn’t take long to get a feel for a player’s skill set.

o Coaches aren’t perfect – Keep in mind, that coaches will make mistakes. I do realize that many coaches carry themselves as if they don’t, but I can speak from experience and say I have mis-evaluated a player, especially early in the season. Some times a player simply improves, but sometimes he may have been better than the coach thought all along. Either way, coaches will usually correct their error and adjust the lineup accordingly. Even if they wont admit they were wrong, the lineup will show it.

o Be careful when you “angle yourself” in – Many parents volunteer their time to help with practices, concessions, scorekeeping, etc. Be sure that if you do this, you maintain the proper boundaries with the coach. Often times, parent that have additional responsibility feel it is acceptable to overstep and volunteer their input on how the team should be coached.

o Encourage and empower! – As much as a parent wants to help because they know best, whether it be on the playing field or in the recruiting process, the ultimate goal is to make the player self sufficient as a young man. If a player wants additional playing time, or wants to play a different position, he should simply go to the coach in private and ask what he needs to do to accomplish that goal. This will go miles longer than if it came from a parent. If a player shows the initiative to stay after a practice and do the extra work, coaches will reward the good example if possible so that it is seen by other players. You also want to empower your son when it comes to the college recruiting process (there will be following articles on this). Many parents feel this is their time to get more involved, however, a player is perfectly capable of initiating contact with college coaches by phone or email. Our website has detailed step-by-step instructions for them on how to do so. Coaches will seek out the parents when it is time.

In short, do your best to empower your son as a young man and high school athlete. Work with them to develop their skills, but don’t be overbearing. Teach them to carry themselves with proper etiquette and work ethic, and when in doubt stay out of the coaches way. When I go to watch my relatives play, I find a spot as far away from everyone else as possible. I noticed parents of my more talented players did the same. If you’d like additional information, visit our website, blog or MySpace and Facebook Pages for continued updates. Check back regularly for guest content.

Being a single-parent comes with a number of challenges that, from the eyes and mind of the child, may be interpreted as lack or loss of love. Take for instance a woman who brings forth a child after being raped by a stranger. Not only does she not know her abuser, she feels a surge of hatred for him. If she is a Christian, she wants very much not to pass on the blame to this lovely gift but, through the pregnancy as the “uninvited” seed grew and now that she has to nurture the child, she sees nothing but pain and anger especially when she looks into the eyes of this child who may be a replica of her father, the abuser.

Another example would be a woman who after going through divorce discovers she is pregnant. Though all ties have been severed from her ex-husband, she now has to carry the seed he sowed in her to full term and nurture the child alone. To get any benefit, she has to go through the legal system and cope with the challenge of her ex-husband insisting on a paternity test after which, if confirmed, she has to through a legal counsel demand, fight, for all she can get to support this child she would rather not have. If the paternity test is negative, she would have to endure the shame as her secrets become public knowledge as she searches out the child’s real father. I volunteer for an abuse program; on one of my visits to a Foster Mum she quoted the biological Mum as saying, “I never thought my life will end like this with two children and no husband at this young age.”

At 22, she had suffered the loss of her first child’s dad and has to live with rejection from the second child’s dad. Despite her pain, her financial incapability and lack of educational qualification, she has to wrestle the government to regain custody of her children. How well can such a woman speak the love languages without passing on the hatred she feels, for those responsible for her situation, to her children?

Another example will be a high flyer Dad whose wife was responsible for everything – nurturing of children, management of the home, grocery shopping, food, laundry etc and he just blesses God for such a wonderful wife who has made it possible for him to make money far away from home without fear that his family will come to ruin. But one day he received a call that his wife was in an accident with their second child and they did not survive it. First he feels guilty that it happened because he was not there, he feels a sense of great loss as his 4-person family is suddenly reduced to 2; to make matters worse, he has to plan a burial not the 5th birthday of the first child for which he was looking forward to being around so he can really let her know that though Dad works out of town, he loves her so much. To be there for the remaining child, he had to relocate back to town, even though that meant getting a lower paying job, sign up for a parenting class and employ a nanny to help him with picking her from school and engaging her till he returns from work. Three months down the line, he is thankful to God and his church family for helping him to cope with the great loss but now he has to deal with friends and family who seem to have closed that chapter of his life as they begin talks about him taking another wife since he needs a companion and help with raising the remaining child.

In all the above situations, it is very difficult for the parent and of course the child(ren) not to have a feeling of fear, anger, anxiety, denial, blame in varying degrees. It would be more challenging for a single-parent to use a child’s primary love language to help alleviate the pain. But it can be done if the single-parent looks up to Jesus who is the author and finisher of our faith (Hebrews 12:2). Through diligence, dedication, Godly character; a single-parent would succeed.

Year in, year out, a single-parent must audit his/her role in the life of the child, improve his/her strengths, seek opportunities to give the child a father or mother figure, as the case may be, eradicate the threat that may come to the parent or the child by virtue of being a single-parent family and work on his/her weakness to translate them into strengths. Not having a job may be a weakness for a single family as there is only one source of income but where such parent takes advantage of food stamps, open kitchen, available low income jobs (cleaner, clerk, grocery shopper etc) and free community education centers, s/he can prepare for a better future.

Also joining a church community will expand the pool from which the child can draw communal love (God Parents, Teachers, Pastors etc), positive leadership influence and role models. While fulfilling a child’s need for love, the single-parent must not mortgage his/her need for love because seeing you loving and being loved will go a long way to balance love in the life of the child. If a single-parent’s child’s primary love language is act of service, enlisting the child in the Scout Group and being a part of the activities will go a long way to fill the emotional tank of the parent and increase the resource pool from which s/he can draw strength, stability, unity and love.

News reports often contain dire reports on the effects on kids being raised in single parent families. Certainly, there are drawbacks to living with only one parent. But, there are also many advantages for kids who are raised in a one-parent home.

Conflict-ridden homes have been shown through research to be the worst living situation for kids. If the prior two-parent living environment included ongoing conflict, a change to living with only one parent can have positive effects on the kids such as a gradual lessening of anxiety. Kids learn how to do relationships from observing the adults around them. It’s often better for the kids to see no relationship with the parents living apart than to have a poor relationship model when the parent stay together.

Kids who live through the breakup of their parents learn how to handle hardship and being different from their peers. Even though your home may not represent the cultural ideal living situation, it can still be filled with love and shared good times.

Single parents often end up spending more time with their children than they did when they were with their former partner. Cooking duties may be reduced, since kids are often satisfied with simpler meals. Some partners are not very involved with housework and if this was the case, there may be more time due to having one less person’s laundry to do and messes to clean up after.

Having two homes can turn out to be an advantage for your kids. They get to see other styles of living and get exposure to other personal beliefs if stepparents are involved. If the circumstances at the other home are less than ideal, the child will be able to compare the two homes and make decisions about which model works best for her when she reaches adulthood.

Stepparents can also be a benefit. A child may feel comfortable confiding in a stepparent instead of a parent when the going gets tough. Your kids could gain an extended stepfamily which offers more opportunities to get establish strong ties with other people who care about your child. They may even get exposed to new experiences that shape their choice of livelihood or recreational interests.

Kids in single parent families tend to become independent faster than other kids. The sole parent probably has a job and many other items to tend to, so the kids often have to learn how to do things for themselves such as fix a snack or finish a chore. Kids that have two parents or especially, a stay-at-home parent may not have as many opportunities to take part in the daily household tasks. Kids also learn that they should not be completely reliant on a future mate, since they could also end up living alone or parenting on their own.

The opportunity to celebrate each holiday twice is often the favorite benefit of kids. Christmas at two homes can often result in more gifts than the kids would have gotten had the parents stayed together.

A home with two biological or adoptive parents does provide many advantages. But, a one-parent home can also offer positive benefits for the kids. You can sympathize with your kids about the loss of their two-parent home, but focus on the advantages of your new lifestyle and fill your home with love. Your single parent family can be a successful family!

Teens can freely access the Internet from computers at school, at their friends’ homes and in public places such as libraries and even from cell phones and video game consoles. Internet is everywhere, that is why kids and teenagers (and their parents, too) should be well aware of its dangers to avoid them.

Here are some figures from the telephone survey made by the Pew Internet and American Life Project:

65% of all parents and 64% of all teens say that teens do things online that they wouldn’t want their parents to know about.

These “things” usually means visiting sites parents find “questionable” or “inappropriate”, for example, so-called adult content. And, of course, chatting online with strangers.

What kids say in chat rooms, whom they communicate with and what they post on web logs and other public Internet places can get them into much more serious trouble than just viewing porn.

81% of parents of online teens say that teens aren’t careful enough when giving out information about themselves online and 79% of online teens agree with this.

Sometimes, teenager post online their first and last names, postal addresses, phone numbers, pictures and give lots of personal information about themselves. It enables a predator easily identify and find this teen.

Unfortunately, sex predators teem in cyberspace. Sometimes they immediately start sexually explicit conversations with children. If a kid or a teen is forewarned and taught to end such a conversation immediately, he or she is relatively safe, except for moral damage from such a talk.

But there are others. They gradually allure their future victims by attention, affection, kindness, and even gifts. These individuals usually devote much time, money, and energy to this process. They listen to children and pretend to empathize with their problems. They are aware of the latest music, hobbies, and interests of children. Some time later this person may succeed in arranging a face-to-face meeting with the kid — you can guess what for.

Such crimes are on the rise, so there are now even special units where law enforcement officers pose as children in chat rooms to lure predators into a trap.

The problem is so serious that Federal Bureau of Investigation had to launch Crimes Against Children (CAC) Program in 1997; and,unfortunately, the officers from Crime Against Children Unit (CACU)have plenty of work. So every parent should read and memorize tips from “A Parent’s Guide to Internet Safety”

There are very simple rules any teen should learn by heart. Remind your children again and again: “don’t believe everything you are told on-line; never reveal your name, age, birthday, graduation year, nickname or any other personal information while chatting; don’t agree to meet face-to-face anybody you chatted online with.”

Parents ought to talk to their children about online dangers. Moms and Dads must encourage their sons and daughters tell them about their online acquaintances, without fear of being scolded of punished.

But should all parents use monitoring software? It’s a difficult question. Software for parental control is a useful tool, only if applied right.

My opinion is that monitoring software is “strong medicine”. Like any medicine, it has its own side effects that can be worse than the disease. Any medicine, if overused, can do harm. Computer monitoring is the last resort, when all the other means are exhausted. Don’t do it just because you think you should.

Using monitoring software will be appropriate if you feel you are losing control of the situation, or have lost it already.

For example, your teenage son or daughter seems to be completely withdrawn from family.

You don’t know his/her friends well enough–maybe you even haven’t seen them and doubt whether they exist at all. You have no idea whom he/she is chatting with. Your teenager receives phone calls from people you don’t know or is making long-distance calls to numbers you don’t recognize.

Your son or daughter gets letters, gifts or packages from people you haven’t heard about.

Every day he/she spends hours on the computer, especially at night. When you enter the room he/she changes the screen. Maybe you found pornography on your child’s computer. If your child uses an online account that belongs to someone else, you also should be alarmed.

Don’t keep the computer in your child’s bedroom. In fact, nearly three-quarters of home computers are located in a place like living room., according to the survey. A wise thing to do. If your child uses the Internet in a living room, it is easier to watch what he or she is doing online.

And, of course, there is a great variety of monitoring software products. Their purposes may vary from simply recording the time the computer is on/off to logging every keystroke your kid makes. Use one of them if you are sure it is absolutely necessary. But remember that your kid might be more technically savvy than you. Lots of them can erase their traces.

At any case, you must let your growing son or daughter know that you do care for his or her safety — both offline and online.