Jay Payleitner: Some battles with your kids aren’t really worth the trouble. But if you choose a battle, dad, be ready for it. Here’s how.
Young Kids & Behavior Issues: Mean What You Say
These years don’t have to be terrible. You can help minimize difficulties with a commitment to consistency in what you say and what you do.
Dad: Look Below the Surface
As dads, sometimes we get upset and blow things out of proportion when there’s really so much to the picture that we don’t see.
Dad, do you shirk discipline?
When kids misbehave, why do some dads leave it for Mom to handle? As dads, we need to sign up for the entire role of being a father.
Teens: An Example of Fatherly Self-Control
By controlling ourselves, we can foster a closer relationship when it seems like our teens want to pull away.
Leverage Life Moments for Your Kids’ Future
How to Be a Better Dad by Brian Phipps – Paint a picture of a preferred future for your kids, and leverage every life moment to help them accomplish it.
Teaching Kids to Be Responsible
Disciplining kids when they already feel bad for their actions is tricky. Here are two tips for teaching kids to be responsible when they’ve messed up.
3 Tips for Sibling Rivalry
As fathers, we want our kids to learn to get along. But often our goal becomes ending the ruckus as soon as possible rather than helping them learn.
4 Qualities of CALM Fathers
A calm father makes his children feel comfortable and secure, and increases the opportunities to experience the real joys and rewards of fatherhood.
Parenting Challenges: How Do You Decide Which Approach is Best?
Sometimes you’ll get lucky and have great success by going with your gut. But since you want to give your kids the very best, it makes a lot of sense to look outside for help.
16 Things to NEVER Say to Your Kids
Have you ever said one of these to your kids? Dads, our words have power to tear down or build up. We can learn better ways to get the message across.
3 Tips for Dads of “Haughty” Teens
It isn’t that teens have lost their minds, or gone berserk. They’re really just figuring out what life is all about, testing what they’ve learned from Dad and Mom.
Categories
Welcome to the fathers.com fathering library.
On the left you will see how our blogs and articles are categorized. Choose your stage in the fathering journey under Your Kids, click on a specific situation that applies to you, or browse through the items in our hot topics and fathering fundamentals. Also, check out Tools for the Journey – short downloadable pieces with tips for specific challenges.
Fathering is a Marathon: Embrace the Journey
by Ken Canfield, Ph.D. Dad, while you’re in the middle of dashing around as a busy dad, I want to provide some perspective and an important reminder: Fathering is a marathon. Being a good dad is a distance run. It’s a long, trying journey and we must be disciplined if...
Beyond Conditional Love: Rethinking Expectations
When it comes to your kids, dad, What do you expect? We’ve often heard comments like these from grown sons and daughters: “My brother was an all-state quarterback, but I played tennis, and I never quite measured up for my dad.” “I made a B average in school, but Daddy...
Valentine’s Day Tips for Dads of Daughters – and Sons
Your Valentine’s Day shopping and planning for your wife is surely well under way, if not complete—and that’s good! Some may view this "holiday" as just another excuse for greeting card and flower companies to make money—as well as jewelry, candy and clothing...
Entering Your Child’s World: 5 Areas for Dads to Stay Connected
Dad, are you really plugged into what’s going on in your children’s lives? Do you have a good handle on what happens in their typical day, who is influencing them, and how they are processing the things they see and hear? In today’s world these can be unsettling...
Self-Disciplined Kids & the Power of Saying “No”
by Dr. Ken Canfield Dad, are you instilling in your children a strong “internal locus of control”? You’re probably thinking, What does that mean? And I get it. It’s a term that I’ve come across as a researcher from time to time through the years. Some years ago, one...
Everyday Heroes: Dads Have Superpowers!
by Donald Calkins That’s right, dad. Your children believe the world revolves around you; they see you as holding the universe in your hands. While that may be exaggerated, the truth is that most dads have extraordinary influence over their children. I remember going...
Make Every Day Count: A New Year of Fathering
Dad, what will it take to make this year the best ever for you and your kids? The media has a New Year tradition of remembering well-known people who died during the past year. A few years back, one of those people was a man who really seemed to “get it” as a father,...
16 Ideas for Father-Child Holiday Traditions
by Michelle Watson Canfield, PhD, LPC One December back in the late 60s, a father-daughter tradition began. One afternoon, my father drove my younger sister and me—seven and five at the time—two hours away in our turquoise station wagon to cut down our family...
Single Dads: Will it Really be OK this Holiday Season?
by Matt Haviland If the holiday season ushers in an assortment of emotions to most people, that’s even more true for single dads this time of year. Joy, laughter, and anticipation may be at the forefront. What about dread, anxiety, or doubt? “Yes” to all of the above,...
Ways to Give Meaningful Gifts to Your Kids
How do you decide what gifts to give your children this time of year? Maybe your family has settled into an annual routine that seems to work pretty well. Maybe the kids create lists to help you know what they want. Maybe most of the gifts have already been bought...
From Duty to Delight: Transforming Your Fatherhood
What’s the secret ingredient of good fathering? And maybe more importantly for many dads: What can you do if you never saw that kind of father as you grew up? Jeff is a committed dad who has a great perspective on fathering. He’s passionate about being the dad his two...
Time: Are You Spending or Investing?
by Ron Nichols There’s a common expression that we use all the time. It’s pretty harmless in itself, but as fathers we need to think differently with it. It’s the simple concept of spending time. We always say, “I spent a lot of time on that project,” or, “I spent 20...