Child Development

If you have school-age children, you know that there is more to education than simply ensuring your child’s safe arrival at school each day. He needs books and supplies, as well as physical check-ups and inoculations to prevent health problems that could impede learning. As important as these steps are, it is equally critical to ensure the health of your child’s eyes by taking him or her to an eye care professional for regular comprehensive examinations.

Almost 80% of what a child learns in school comes to him visually. Impaired vision can affect a child’s development by limiting both the information he is exposed to and his range of experiences. Buying all the right school books and supplies is useless without the most important learning tool of all: healthy eyesight.

Your child may have already told you that he’s having trouble seeing, or will exhibit such symptoms as squinting, holding a book very close to read, complaining of headaches, rubbing his eyes or using a finger to follow along while he’s reading.

But do not wait for him to display symptoms of poor vision or to tell you about the problem before taking him to an eye doctor. There may be no symptoms, and your child may not even be aware that he has a problem because he might not know what he’s supposed to be seeing.

Also, do not be tempted by your busy schedule to leave your child’s eye examination solely to the school nurse. In-school screenings are brief tests used to identify potential vision problems; they are no substitute for comprehensive eye examinations performed by an eye doctor. According to the National Institutes of Health, vision screenings miss as many as 60% of eye problems.

Prescriptions for kids glasses with plastic frames can be measured in even the youngest and most uncooperative children by using a special instrument called a retinoscope to analyze light reflected through the pupil from the back of the eye.

Most lenses today, especially for children, are made of plastic, which is stronger and lighter than glass. It is a good idea to get kids glasses with resin and PC lenses. Children can be rough with glasses and plastic lenses scratch easily.

Color tints or tints that respond to changes in light can be incorporated into lenses. For children, the tint should not be so dark that the child has trouble seeing indoors.

Frames come in all shapes and sizes. Choose one that fits comfortably but securely. There are devices available to keep glasses in place, a good idea for active children and young children with flat nasal bridges. Cable temples, which wrap around the back of the ears, are good for toddlers.

Why is frames style important for kids? Because when a youngster likes his eyeglasses, he will want to wear them. Today’s impact-resistant children glasses manufacturers are designing frames specifically for children. You will see a wide variety of colors, shapes and styles. Some are scaled-down copies of adult styles, which many children like because they look more grown-up. Others incorporate the latest pop-culture icons.

We should really never judge someone until we’ve walked a mile in their shoes. This saying is ultimately and extremely true when it comes to raising children and teaching them about financial responsibility, and how to properly manage and save their money. Disciplining children can be hard and is challenging as they get older and face a world of temptation that can lead to bad spending habits. However, it can also be rewarding to see our children learn from our good habits, and learn how to save better and better manage their money.

The first and most important thing to teach our kids is about savings. Yet lessons about saving money are not just meant for tough economic times, but they’re meant for all economic times. The reality of saving money is that it never hurts under any circumstances. Teaching our kids that by putting away a little bit here and there, and doing it frequently and often, it will teach them great habits about disciplining themselves with their money.

Also, aside from the encouragement, lessons, lectures, and whatever else, the important thing is to be redundant about it. Teaching good savings habits to our child can in some cases take them into their 20’s as a young adult. The important thing is to have a balance between discipline and encouragement over finances. By putting the rights effort forward we can give the right balance of managing savings, spending wisely, and we can teach them about other accounts and how to wisely invest, and gain true financial growth.

One of the good saving behaviour is considering holidays at the point that we are creating our budgets. In this way, a proper amount of money has been set aside for presents, food, etc.

We can gain some extra funds by controlling our home heating costs. That is important, because experts say a harsh rise in home heating costs is on the way. Of course we can’t control the cold outside but we can control the anticipated increase in heating costs. The key is to educate ourselves on ways to reduce the impact of rising energy prices through simple home-improvement projects. The projects can play an important role in keeping families warmer and utility bills lower during winter months. Surprisingly, we don’t realize that by making a few inexpensive home improvements, we can save 30 percent or more on our home heating costs.

For short-term financial needs, we can try to use payday loans services, especially when we experience disasters in our personal lives. There is a study assessed the impact of payday lenders in communities which experienced a natural disaster by looking at four measures of community welfare: death rates; drug and alcohol treatment rates; foreclosure rates and birth rates. The existence of payday lenders increased community welfare for all four measures.  While financial institutions were beneficial to communities, banks and other forms of credit were no substitute for payday loan products. The study found that they did not provide finance to individuals in distress in the same manner as payday loans.

Fewer people are saving money, credit card debt continues to rise, and the number of bankruptcies remains staggeringly high. This has experts clamoring to create and institute education programs in public schools, but you don’t need to leave financial education to the experts. You can start at home right now with your children by using the guidelines below.

Start Young

According to Lewis Mandell, a leading scholar in the financial education movement, children learn best about money when they are between the ages of 8 and 12. This means you may be missing a window of opportunity if you assume that your children will learn what they need to know in a high school personal finance class. Mandell suggests looking for opportunities at home to weave money lessons into everyday activities. For example, get children involved in making a family budget, or have them help pay the bills. Don’t try to create an in-depth lesson, cautions Mandell, or your children will simply tune out what you’re saying.

Make It a Habit

A recent study indicates that college-aged students with good financial skills all have one thing in common—their parents emphasized the importance of saving money, but more importantly, helped them to make saving money a habit. According to economics professor Angela Lyons, this study indicates that learning to save has more to do with experience than with simply having knowledge. To encourage the savings habit, try asking children to save a portion of any money they receive for baby-sitting jobs, mowing lawns, allowance, or gifts. For very young children, glass jars work well so that they can visualize how much they are saving. You may even wish to match any funds your children sock away to further encourage the savings habit.

Connect Savings to Goals

Even adults can have a difficult time making savings a regular part of their budget when there’s no clear plan for where the money will be spent. However, when you connect savings with goals, all this changes. The same can be said for children. When you talk with your children about what they want to do with their money, a savings account becomes more than just a household requirement. It becomes a means of helping them achieve what they desire. Young children can cut out or hand-draw a picture of what they wish to buy and paste it on a glass jar. Whenever they make a “deposit”, you can discuss how much closer they are to reaching their goal. Older children can put their goals into writing, even carrying them on an index card in their purse or wallet. Studies show that putting goals into writing is one of the most effective ways of getting what you desire.