Do parents love their children equally?

I suspect that many parents really do like some of their kids more than others. How couldn't they? Children are simply not the same. Even so, I would expect people to say that they feel the same about all of their kids. At least in our society, you're not supposed to play favorites.

However, according to the book No Two Alike (I finished reading it yesterday), many parents admitted to favoritism:

"In two separate studies, British and American parents of two small children were asked whether they felt more affection for one than the other. More than 50% admitted that they did. The overwhelming majority of these parents - 87% of the mothers and 85% of the fathers in the American study - said they favored the younger child".

Long TV viewing cause shorter attention span

We as parents know sitting too close to the TV is bad for childrens eyes, a new study show too much television may be linked to a bad attention span. According to this large long-term study, watching television more than 2 hours a day early in life can lead to attention problems later in adolescence, an 40% increase in attention problems among heavy TV viewers (>3 hours a day). Symptoms of attention problems included short attention span, poor concentration, and being easily distracted.

The reason? Children who watch a lot of television may become less tolerant of slower-paced and more mundane tasks, such as school or House work. To make things worse, young children who watched a lot of television were more likely to continue the habit as they got older, but even if they did not, the damage was done, the study said.

Another side effect of TV watching - unlike other activities that promote participation, such as reading, games, sports and play, TV watching is inherently lack of participation which might also condition children when it comes to other activities.

Mom, Dad, you're my heros !

When asked to name their heros, young Americans (ages 13 to 24) make their parents the collective top pick, and said family time is what makes them most happy.

20% of youths chose their mothers as heros;

21% picked their dads,

16% picked both parents,

10% chose God,

5% chose a teacher,

4% chose Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

1% chose Al Gore, Oprah Winfrey, President Bush, Tiger Woods, Hillary Clinton, and the late crocodile hunter Steve Irwin.

Good to know ... looks like kids finally appreciate our wisdom.

Baby DVDs hinder infants' language development

A study suggests "Baby Einstein" and other baby educational videos are bad for kids. Researchers found for every hour a day that babies 8 to 16 months old were shown such popular series as "Brainy Baby" or "Baby Einstein," they knew 6 to 8 fewer words than other children.

The explanation? By spending time with "DVDs and TV instead of with people," the babies lose interaction with humans who "instinctively adjust their speech, eye gaze and social signals to support language acquisition." Also, Baby DVDs are worse than educational TV shows, because the DVDs "have little dialogue, short scenes, disconnected pictures and … linguistically indescribable images."

Few kids walk or bike to school

According to a recent study, "in 1969, about 90% of kids in US who lived within a mile of school walked or rode bikes to get there. In 2004, just 48% did that at least one day a week. ....the numbers have dropped as the population has grown while the number of schools has declined and the distance to get to them has grown for many families". But still.

Above could be one of the factor for the high rates of childhood obesity in recent years.

My son, a 6th grader, always take school bus to school, although we live within a mile of school. My husband and me have 2 cars, both work, we believe it’s safer and more expedient (especially in the morning) that way, and we have been trying hard to encourage him doing other physical activities after school. But I rather to have him walk to the school.

Bullying has became an epidemic in school

A study says bullying and victimization were pretty widespread in US schools. Researcher sent questionnaire to school that asked kids whether various things had been done to them, such as if "other students make me cry", "other students look at me in a mean way", "other students tease me", "other students ignore me on purpose". After analysing all the responses, researchers have found 89.5% of children experienced some form of victimization and 59.0% of students participated in some form of bullying.

My take on this? it has always been like this in schools from what I can remember, it just to a lesser degree, and nobody studied it before. Watching Simpsons by students in last few years only make it worse.

I am bored to death in school ...

My two kids (1st and 6th grade) always complain that they are bored at school. In a recent survey, 2/3 of US high-school students say they are bored in class every single day. About 30% of the students indicate they are bored due to lack of interaction with teachers and 75% report material being taught is not interesting. I believe our culture's obsession with external, fast-paced entertainment - TV, movies, the Internet, video games - play a big role in increasing students's boredom.