Keep Calm and Color On

on November 1, 2015 at 6:48 PM /

By Elaine Spencer, Psy.D. Licensed Psychologist I walked into Michaels Craft store the other day and was pleasantly surprised to see the front display was advertising coloring books for adults and I thought to myself, “Wow! Coloring really is the new craze!” So What is This New Coloring Phenomenon All About? The simple answer is that coloring can actually be therapeutic. If you were like me as a child, you spent hours with your coloring books and your parents probably thought you enjoyed coloring because ‘that’s what kids do’. We now know that children are on to something because not only is coloring...

Problematic Behavior in Children Linked to Soda Consumption?

By Dr. Wendy Rice

on June 3, 2014 at 9:00 AM /

In a very timely study released in the Journal of Pediatrics this month, researchers from Columbia University, the University of Vermont and Harvard studied behavior in approximately 3,000 young children and found that problematic behavior was linked to soda consumption. They used a very well accepted child behavior rating scale, one that I have personally used in my practice for over ten years, to obtain parents perspectives on their children’s behavior over the past two months. They found that 40% of kids had at least one soda per day and 4% drank as many as four or more. They found that aggression, withdrawn behavior and attention problems were highly associated with soda drinking and the behaviors were incrementally worse...

Parent Report Card Preparation Tips

By Dr. Wendy Rice

on April 9, 2014 at 1:37 PM /

Find out how you can support your child and not freak out when it's time to read their report cards. If you are a parent, four times a year, pretty much without fail, the envelope arrives in the mail for you. As a child in New York, my parent’s got theirs in a thin, white envelope with green edges and a black dot-matrix print. You would fold the end and pull at the tab for the big reveal. Butterflies would ravage my stomach as my mother pulled that tab. For some families, report card time is as ominous as another winter or summer storm. ...

Help for Those with ADHD – Assistive Technology

By Dr. Wendy Rice

on March 21, 2014 at 3:22 PM /

By Wendy Rice, Psy.D. Licensed Psychologist Recently, Jamie Kaplan, Recreation Therapist from the James A. Haley VA Hospital presented to the Tampa Bay ADHD Support Network about Assistive Technology. We wanted to be sure to share his message and great ideas just in case you weren’t able to make it to the meeting. Jamie is working on his master’s degree in Assistive Technology in Special Education at Bowling Green State University, but he already has so many certifications in this area it is surprising they let him into the program! Jamie spoke about why kids with ADHD often seem to love video...