Dad, be prepared to navigate the challenges of the journey with a lifelong commitment so you can thrive at every stage of your child’s life.
Chores to Careers: Cultivating a Strong Work Ethic in Your Kids
Invest in your children’s future by helping them develop a strong work ethic. Chores are character-building opportunities and your work provides examples.
“The Worst Dad Ever”: Patience & Poise for Fathers
Part of our kids’ job is to test their fathers’ patience. We need to balance teaching them a lesson with keeping our poise as they grow and learn.
Why I Had My Son Ditch School to Take Some Cuts in the Cage
Is it ever OK to skip school? One dad shares insights about balancing academics and athletics, and the value of strategic skill development.
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...
16 Ideas for Father-Child Holiday Traditions
Create memories with your child this Christmas through traditions. From simple outings to creative projects, find inspiration to make it truly special.
Time: Are You Spending or Investing?
As fathers, we need to invest every minute of our time wisely. Strengthening bonds with our children is clearly one of the highest-yield investments.
Dad: Water Your Daughter’s Heart with Positive Words
Dr. Michelle Watson Canfield: Like a plant needs water, dad, your daughter needs your encouragement & affirmation. Nurture her heart. Help her thrive.
5 Ways Dads Can Protect Their Kids from Digital Dangers
by David Tucker: Discover 5 essential strategies for dads to create a safe plan for their children as they interact with media and the digital world.
Raising a Future Adult: 3 Ideas for Dads
Dad, are you preparing your kids for adulthood? Invest in their future by setting goals, creating meaningful connections, and teaching life skills.
Dad Hacks: Use These, Share Yours
Dads can use tips and tricks to make our demanding role a little easier. Some are practical and everyday, and others more serious and life-changing.
Fit Fatherhood: Inspiring a Healthy Lifestyle for Our Kids
Good health isn’t the most important factor in effective fathering, but it can impact your ability to be the kind of dad you want to be.
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.
Winning Battles or Hearts? Influencing Your Children’s Character
When there are behavior issues with your kids, do you find yourself “laying down the law” more than you’d like to? Maybe there’s a better approach. Jerry is a partial-custody father who’s going through some big challenges with his 12-year-old daughter, who stole some...
Chores to Careers: Cultivating a Strong Work Ethic in Your Kids
Dad, here’s one important thought that can help guide your fathering efforts: You’re raising a future adult. It might be difficult to imagine right now, but one day your child will be “adulting” in significant ways. Will she be responsible and kind? Will he follow...
“The Worst Dad Ever”: Patience & Poise for Fathers
Sometimes our children can bring real challenges to us as fathers. Sometimes they say crazy things, but with passion and conviction. Maybe they make decisions based purely on emotion, with no real thought about long-term consequences. As dads, these are real tests of...
Why I Had My Son Ditch School to Take Some Cuts in the Cage
by Jay Payleitner School is important. Fathers need to emphasize that. Making school a priority is a lesson learned early. The first day of school is a big deal. Playing hooky is not an option. Even being in class when the bell rings shows proper respect for teachers...
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...