Parent Express for 30-Mar-2009

Robert Heinlein, the sci-fi writer had defined love as "a condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own." I think that speaks volumes about how parents love their children—bottom line—we want them to be happy.

In our featured article Adrian Kalikow, a parent educator and PCI coach in training, challenges us to think carefully about what we really mean when we say we want our kids to be happy. She goes into depth and details that can guide us to accurately gauge our child's happiness quotient—and ultimately our own, as well. I know you will enjoy reading it and absorbing Adrian's practical wisdom.

To Authentic Happiness—Each Day—No Matter What!

Gloria DeGaetano, Founder and CEO

Apply Now for Summer Term!

Application deadline for Spring Term start is March 1, 2009.

This is the best time to apply for a summer start on your Parent Coach Certification®. The Parent Coaching Institute is undergoing explosive growth. Early applicants will have the best opportunity for acceptance into the program. Early Applicants can begin their course readings, preparing well for the phone classes for Course 1, which begin the week of June 15.

Phone classes are in the evening time, usually at 5PM (Pacific Time) to accommodate the work schedule of our students. Summer brings with it vacations and sometimes students have to miss a phone class or two—no worries. PCI phone classes are always recorded so students who have to miss a call for one reason or another, can listen in and stay current with coursework.

Please send in the basic application as your first step. Download the application here. Once we receive this document, we will contact you for a phone interview.

Transcripts and letters of reference can follow the basic application by a few weeks.

Questions? Please call: (425) 401-1519.

The deadline for application to begin this summer is May 15, 2009. Spaces are limited. Early applications receive first consideration.

Learn more about our acclaimed, graduate-level, distance-learning Parent Coach Certification® Program by clicking here for more information.

Check out our Video About the PCI Parent Coach Training Program and see what professionals think about their training with the PCI.

Working with a parent coach who has received Parent Coach Certification® through the PCI is giving yourself a valuable gift as well as a sound investment in your family's future. PCI Certified Parent Coaches® are caring, thoughtful professionals with years of experience working with parents. They have successfully completed the PCI Parent Coach Certification® Training Program—a comprehensive academic, one-year, graduate-level program in collaboration with Seattle Pacific University. Through a series of coaching conversations that can be either by telephone or in-person, PCI Certified Parent Coaches® help you re-discover your dreams and design your life for more joy and satisfaction.

To find a PCI Certified Parent Coach® in your area, please click here or call (425) 401-1519 for a referral to a PCI Certified Parent Coach® selected especially for you.

Visit www.parentappreciationradio.com to listen to programs featuring PCI Certified Parent Coaches® and other experts from around the country discussing topics of interest to moms and dads.

Programs are available as podcasts. Listeners can download individual episodes directly, listen to them from this site using a Web browser, or access them via the iTunes podcast directory. iTunes subscribers will automatically pick up new episodes as they become available!

What Does It Mean to Be Happy?

by Adrian Kalikow
M.Ed., PCI Parent Coach in training

I wish I had a nickel for every time I have heard a parent say, "I just want my kids to be happy." This seems to be the wish of every 21st century parent, that elusive quality of "happiness."

When I challenge parents, however, to explain just what "happy" means, it is often difficult for them to describe. Does it mean avoiding disappointment? Will their child be happy if all of his or her wishes come true? Does happiness come from never being scolded, always being accepted, no matter how he or she behaves? Will a child be happy if he or she is shielded from struggles, if everything comes easily?

I would like to argue that constant success and acceptance of all behaviors are not likely to lead to a child's true feeling of happiness. Of course, a child should always be praised for hard work and acknowledged for improvements in behavior. First and foremost, a child should feel love from his or her parents, expressed in warm hugs and encouragement, even at the most difficult times. However, there is much benefit to be gained by a child who is allowed to struggle sometimes, knows his or her limits and is expected to stay within them, and who receives honest criticism from those who love him or her the most.

Imagine a group of children and parents on a playground. There is a jungle gym with high bars for climbing and swinging. Some parents direct their children toward the safer equipment, not allowing them to go near the jungle gym, which might threaten their safety. Other parents accompany their children to the jungle gym, carefully spotting them as they climb and swing, allowing them to try new skills, while carefully supervising their safety. Still other parents sit on a bench engrossed in conversation with a friend, while their children climb and swing freely, with no oversight.

Which parent are you?

Read the Rest of the Article…

PCI Obtains 501(c)(3) Status
The Parent Coaching Institute is now a charitable organization as designated by the IRS. We received our official notice on March 17, 2009. With this new status many positive pathways opens up for our ability to expand our parent coaching services and PCI graduate support. If you are affiliated with a family support agency, we invite you to contact us if you are interested in offering free parent coaching services to the moms and dads you serve. Our phone number is (425) 401-1519 or you can email gloria@thepci.org. If you or someone you know would like to co-create with us new, innovative forms to help moms and dads, please see our letter inviting you to participate in our exciting campaign to do just that!

"Happy Kids Begin with Happy Parents"
PCI Certified Parent Coaches® in the Chicago area were featured in the March edition of Chicago Parent. "Whether you're feeling overwhelmed, overloaded or overmatched, the best plan begins with you and ends with your child, not the other way around, parent coaches say." Emily McBean and Cathy Cassini Adams make it clear that our best parenting begins by making sure we are our best selves.

Join the Campaign to Say: No Makeover for Dora
The announcement that Mattel and Nickelodeon are teaming up to create a tween Dora the Explorer line, featuring fashion dolls, accessories, and a link to new online Dora world, has generated a lot of commentary, outrage, and activism. Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, Hardy Girls, Healthy Woman and Packaging Girlhood have launched a petition demanding no makeover for Dora. More than 8,000 people have already signed the petition which reads, in part, "If the Dora we knew grew up, she wouldn't be a fashion icon or a shopaholic." You can sign it too, and be sure to check out Packaging Girlhood for more about the campaign.

Back issues of Parent Express are available on the PCI Web site. There you can read articles by Gloria DeGaetano and PCI Certified Parent Coaches®, and easily send past issues to friends and colleagues via e-mail.

"I have facilitated parenting groups for twenty years and the PCI training has taught me far more about how to ask questions, how to formulate them, and how to time them than any other training I have received in my career."

Are You A "High Hopes" Parent?

by Gloria DeGaetano (www.GloriaDeGaetano.com)
CEO and Founder, The Parent Coaching Institute

Happiness and hopefulness go together. But in these troubling times with our current economic crisis, global warning, and the high stress that accompanies such complex problems, it can be quite a challenge to be hopeful in our everyday lives. Parenting from a place of hope, however, has been researched and found quite transformative. This article gives five important qualities of hopeful parents—qualities that can have profound positive effects on children and family life—hopeful!

Quick…what song won an Academy Award for best Song of the Year in 1959?

If you know that piece of trivia, congratulations! It was the song, High Hopes in the movie, Hole in the Head (not the most famous movie, I admit). The song became more popular after Frank Sinatra recorded it in 1961.

In the wake of today's turbulence, the lyrics seem banal:

Next time you're found, with your chin on the ground,
There a lot to be learned, so look a - round.
Just what makes that little old ant
Think he'll move that rubber tree plant?
Anyone knows an ant can't move a rubber tree plant,
But he's got high hopes, he's got high hopes…

And an ant probably can't move a rubber tree plant by itself, but if it kept hopeful enough, it's probability of success increases, because with a hopeful attitude, inspiration has a place to strike. And with hope, resiliency reigns. Without it, despair can paralyze and slow down effective solutions to a standstill.

High hopes may seem like a myth when we look around today at all the suffering, fragmentation, unhappiness, and outright fear, terror, and paranoia. Yet, brain research continues to amass data that hopeful people are more effective problem solvers. What's more, it is very clear that what we pay attention to grows. And conversely, what we fail to give our attention to, shrinks. If we focus on our hope, our hope grows. If we are awash in despair…well, that, of course, washes out our hope.

Read the Rest of the Article…