What Great Parents Know About Children 

In this 14-part video series, family psychologist Dr. A. Lynn Scoresby explains that the parents who understand child development can use this information as they parent to increase their influence and effectiveness. He explains the fundamentals of physical, emotional, cognitive, moral, and social development for children through different ages and stages and offers suggestions for how parents can use this information to have the most fun and find the most success raising their children.



1. Introduction

Dr. Scoresby introduces this series, which features important knowledge about child development that can help you level up your parenting strategies. He also includes clever parenting techniques he's seen in his years as a family psychologist that parents have integrated with their knowledge of how children develop for maximum impact.



2. Emotional Development in Early Childhood, Part 1

Dr. Scoresby defines the three parts of emotions parents should know about and pay attention to. Emotional development is crucial for parents to understand because it is the basis of most social relationships and the self-knowledge children acquire about themselves.



3. Emotional Development in Early Childhood, Part 2

Helping children manage emotions is often the most interesting—and wearying— task parents face. Dr. Scoresby talks about the importance of helping young children identify emotions, since emotions are related to behavior and this is one way they learn about themselves and other people.



4. Social Development in Early Childhood, Part 1

Dr. Scoresby talks about how humans are inherently social. Babies like to look at the human face the most because they learn about themselves and the world around them by watching. From birth to 5, play is children's work. When they play, they're practicing many different social characteristics.



5. Social Development in Early Childhood, Part 2

While some social development happens naturally, most does not. Dr. Scoresby explains that if you want the most success for your children, you can learn how to promote their social skills in a variety of ways.



6. Attachment

Dr. Scoresby talks about how attachment style is a significant and vital part of a child's life that leads to success—or fails to do so.



7. Cognitive Development in Early Childhood

Watching your child's brain development is one of the most enjoyable parts of parenthood. Dr. Scoresby talks about how you can use your knowledge of cognitive development to find more innovative ways to parent.



8. Physical Development in Middle Childhood

Sometimes it seems like you just feed kids and they grow naturally. But developmentally speaking, physical development is the foundation of every other form of development. There are things parents can do to help their children develop physically so they can be body confident and successful in other areas as well.



9. Emotional Development in Middle Childhood

In this stage of a child's life, Dr. Scoresby says, kids move away from their family a little as they attend school, interact more with friends, and participate in other activities outside of the home. He talks about how kids ages 6-11 are learning a self-concept, gaining self-esteem, developing emotional understanding, and learning to regulate their emotions. Parents can use this knowledge to help their children develop healthy emotions.



10. Cognitive Development in Middle Childhood

Middle childhood is when children leave the years of imaginative play and the basics of cognition for the rest of their lives are being formed. Learn what this type of brain growth means for your children and how you can use it to level up your parenting.



11. Language Development

Language centers in the brain continue to grow throughout a person's entire life. Dr. Scoresby talks about how significant this is for parents to understand because the more words, grammar, and language structure children understand, the better adjusted they will be to their environment—the better at coping and ultimately succeeding.



12. Moral Development

Dr. Scoresby talks about how parents can influence their children's moral development because it is a function of social interaction. He emphasizes the importance of knowing how to help people and not hurt them, understanding people, compassion, and empathy.



13. Social Language

Dr. Scoresby explains the significance of helping children learn the right language for certain situations. The better at this they are, the more they will understand themselves and find success with other people.



14. Social Understanding

Dr. Scoresby talks about how vital social understanding is for children because it explains how children over time begin to understand themselves, other people, the nature of relationships, and their relationships between themselves and other groups, like friendships. There's hardly anything more crucial to a person's happiness than the ability to understand the world from a social perspective.