Smart Parenting Podcast

Heather is a white settler queer woman with a passion for outdoor play, nature, and social justice, and fully supports the work of the Child and Nature Alliance of Canada (CNAC) has undertaken to repair relationships with the Indigenous communities and people we have harmed by imposing a settler colonial way of being with the Land. As the Executive Director of CNAC, Heather follows the lead nature gives us - empowering others to thrive. We talk about the basics of forest schools, related research, and their impact on child wellbeing. 

Julia Imanoff helps humanity flourish by promoting healthy social connections, especially those between parent and child. She is a Perinatal Nurse Specialist, Doctoral Student at the University of Calgary, Co-founder and CEO of COLO Families, and a busy mom of 2 small boys. As a researcher, she is interested in experiences that can help or hinder parent-infant relationships. For example, her Doctoral research explores women's experience of traumatic births and the subsequent impact on parent-child/family relationships. She has also co-founded and launched a nurse-led program to help families develop meaningful connections to promote healthy childhood development. COLO Families is an organization that exemplifies her passion for helping others flourish.

Julia brings a full range of expertise as a Mindfulness Facilitator, Baby Sign Language Educator, and Perinatal Nurse Specialist to support parents in their efforts to connect, play, and grow with their children. 

https://www.colofamilies.com/

Sample of Mindful Practices:  

https://ca.ctrinstitute.com/stress-reduction-exercises/

Mindful Parenting books (we also have parenting book recommendations on our site)

• Everyday blessings: the inner work of mindful parenting – Myla and Job Kabat-Zinn
• The Whole Brained Child – Daniel J. Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson
• No-Drama Discipline – Daniel J. Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson

Emotional regulation books:

• Happy Hippo Angry Duck: a book of moods – Sandra Boyton (recommended 0-4 years)
• A Little Spot of Anger: a story about managing big emotions – Diane Alber (recommended 2-6 years)

Andrew Fuller is a clinical psychologist, family therapist, author, speaker and creator of Learning Strengths ™. Andrew has worked with more than 500,000 young people on core elements of resilience - connect, protect and respect (CPR) and building The Resilient Mindset, which he define as "the happy knack of being able to bungy jump through the pitfalls of life to rise above adversity and obstacles”. Having worked with people who were at their last hopes, Andrew has always been inspired to help people create futures they can fall in love with.

Links:
www.andrewfuller.com.au

www.mylearningstrengths.com

www.badapplepress.com.au

Ben Furman is a Finnish psychiatrist and internationally renowned teacher of solution-focused brief therapy and coaching. You can find more information about Ben at his website www.benfurman.com and about the Kids’Skills method that he developed with his colleagues in the 90s at www.kidsskills.org. Ben also has a YouTube channel with a playlist focusing on Kids’Skills which can be reached at www.youtube.com/benfurmantv. He has authored some 30 books many of which have been translated to multiple languages. His most well known books include Kids’Skills in Action, Never too late to have a happy childhood, Solution talk: hosting therapeutic conversations. His latest book is a small self-help book entitled Seven skills of life, available also on Amazon for Kindle. We discuss solution-focused therapy, how it's done, and the potential benefits. 

Chandan Narayan is an Associate Professor of Linguistics at York University. His work broadly focuses on speech sounds and their perception by adults and infants, the nature of how caregivers talk to infants, and how speech acoustics and perception contribute to language change. We talk about how infants and children learn language, the use of "baby talk", how speaking multiple languages impacts learning, and how to promote language development in children. 

Julie started homeshooling her daughter in 2003 and thought it would last until their daughter was in grade 2 or 3. That journey continued for another 17 years, teaching her eldest right through high school and her other 2 kids through grade 10.  It’s been the best investment she and her husband have ever made. Family is important to Julie. So are good books, cinnamon buns, peonies, lattes and great friends…in no particular order. We talk about the benefits and challenges of homeschooling, and Julie shares some of her experiences. 

Website link:

https://www.juliehall.ca

Julia Beth Kowaleski is an accredited music therapist (MTA) and has advanced training in neurologic music therapy (NMT).  She is founder of Julia's Place Music Therapy and current president of the Music Therapy Association of Ontario. We discuss music therapy, neurologic music therapy, and how these therapies are implemented. 

Links:

www.juliasplacemusictherapy.com/

www.linkedin.com/in/julia-beth-kowaleski

http://www.musictherapyontario.com/

Elisabeth Neumann is a researcher and writer passionate about Okinawan longevity. She is currently writing a book on how women across the world can live longer, healthier lives based on the traditional Okinawan model. We discuss the research on longevity, and how to promote longevity in our lives, and the lives of our children. 

Ravi Singh is the founder of Webformers, a boutique Digital Marketing Agency based in Vaughan. He helps clients plan, organize and execute their entire online digital marketing strategy, including everything from web design, pay per click marketing, search engine optimization and other services that help clients professionally build their online presence, generate new leads and convert those leads to sales. He is also a father and devout Sikh. He plans to raise his daughter in the Sikh faith. We talk about the Sikh faith and way of life, his thoughts on education, and how to raise children in faith in a secular society. 

Website: webformers.com