AAP Recommends Some Schools Start Later

Having trouble getting your teenager to get up and prepare for school in the morning? There is a reason why that it happening – and it isn’t entirely your teen’s fault. Some of it has to do with developmental biology. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is recommending that the start time of the school day be later for middle schools and high schools. The purpose is to combat sleep deprivation in teens. The AAP published a new policy statement in August of 2014. They are recommending that schools delay the start time of class until 8:30 in the morning … Continue reading

Protect Your Allergic Child from Valentine’s Day

Does your child attend an elementary school that will be having a classroom Valentine’s Day party? Typically, those parties involve a ton of sweets, treats, and goodies that do not have ingredient labels and may contain things your child is allergic to. What’s a parent to do? Here are some options to protect your child from Valentine’s Day. Parents want to protect their child from all potential harm. Food allergies make that difficult. Not everyone understands what your child could experience if he or she encounters peanuts, gluten, eggs, or milk. Your child might not entirely understand exactly how this … Continue reading

Resources for Avoiding Allergens in Halloween Candy

Halloween is just a few days away. Most children are excitedly looking forward to going trick-or-treating and getting lots of candy. If your child has food allergies, some of that candy can be dangerous. Here are some resources to help parents figure out if there is an allergen in the candy that your child brought home. Let me start this blog with a bit of a “disclaimer”. Parents need to use their best judgement about whether or not a particular Halloween candy is safe for their child to eat. Always read the ingredients that are on the package. Use the … Continue reading

Is Your Home Based Business Ready To Weather The Storm?

As Hurricane Sandy makes its way up the East Coast, many home – based professionals are likely to be thinking about what they need to do in order to get ready for the storm. Of course, what each home – based professional has to do to prepare will depend upon where he or she is located. On the more severe end of things, people who have to evacuate their homes must decide if their work is something that they can take on the road with them, or if they must do their best to get everything stored safely away before … Continue reading

Is Your Home on Lock Down?

Today, as I was walking to my daughter’s school to pick her up, I glanced to my right at the top of my street and noticed that there were about a dozen cop cars. I asked a bystander what was going on, and he didn’t know, but said that guns were drawn. I immediately worried about getting my daughter from school even though it was in the opposite direction. I soon found out that her school was on lock-down. As I walked to school, I just knew that everything was going to be fine. I said a little prayer we … Continue reading

Is Anyplace Safe?

Too much violence has been happening lately, sparking a lot of interesting discussions with my teens. First it was the massacre in Colorado at a Batman movie premiere and now it has hit closer to home. This past Sunday, just a couple of hours after we left church, another place of worship located just two miles away became the scene of another tragic shooting. A Sikh temple was the target. The gunman took the lives of six people before an officer shot and killed him. As of this writing, there are still a lot of unknowns, such as why a … Continue reading

Does Your Child’s School Bus Have Air Conditioning?

Summer weather can include excessive, and dangerous, heat. In many parts of the country, the heat doesn’t dissipate just because a new school year has started. Does your child’s school bus have air conditioning? It is very important that parents find out the answer to that question. Last Summer, there were several parents in New York who were alarmed because their child’s school bus did not have air conditioning. The children were attending a Summer school program that was designed for students who had special needs. The kids were coming home drenched in sweat. The parents were upset because their … Continue reading

Don’t Assume Your Child’s School Understands Allergies

A little girl in Virginia died from an allergic reaction while she was at school. This tragedy emphasizes how important it is for parents to ensure that the teachers and staff at their child’s school are prepared to appropriately handle a sudden allergic reaction. One cannot assume that they will know what to do. Ammaria Johnson was seven years old, and in the first grade at an elementary school in Virginia. It had been suspected that she may have had an allergy to peanuts. When she went out for recess one day, tragedy struck. She broke out in hives, and … Continue reading

Should Schools Ban Peanuts?

As the new school year begins, so does the debate about banning peanuts from schools. For whatever reason, the mere suggestion that a child will not be allowed to bring a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to school as part of his or her lunch sparks controversy. This is an issue that evokes strong emotions, which are often followed by nasty comments. In the early months of 2011, Edgewater Elementary school, a public school that is located in Florida, created some school policies that set off a powder keg of controversy. Things started with one little girl, who was in … Continue reading

One Out of Every Twelve Kids Has a Food Allergy

Does your child have a food allergy? Then he or she is not alone! A study has found that one out of every twelve children very likely has an allergy to at least one food. This is a higher amount than was previously recognized. An online survey that was lead by Dr. Ruchi Gupta, from the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago finds that food allergies in children are much more common than people realized. In the past, it was estimated that in the United States there were somewhere between 2 and 8 children, out of every 100, … Continue reading