Although pretend play is important, it is still the means to an end, not the end itself. Do not make the mistake of thinking a contrived, pretend drama can substitute for real interpersonal comfort in dealing with important emotional issues.

If you do a little bit of looking at books with your children and inspire them to be curious about the pictures and ... what the word means, but don't get into very structured systematic teaching at too early an age, and you also interact emotionally and have fun with pretend play ... then you have the best of both worlds.

Empathy comes from being empathized with.

If our society were truly to appreciate the significance of children's emotional ties throughout the first years of life, it would no longer tolerate children growing up or parents having to struggle in situations which could not possibly nourish healthy growth.

We need to take a less narrow look at our children’s problems and, instead, see them as windows of opportunity—a way of exploring and understanding all facets of our children’s development. If we can understand the underlying developmental process, we can see a child’s struggles as signs of striving toward growth instead of chronic problems or attempts to aggravate adults.

A new world of complex relationships and feelings opens up when the peer group takes its place alongside the family as the emotional focus of the child's life. Early peer relationships contribute significantly to the child's ability to participate in a group (and in that sense, society), deal with competition and disappointment, enjoy the intimacy of friendships, and intuitively understand social relationships as they play out at school, in the neighborhood, and later in the workplace and adult family.

Attention, learning, and problem solving depend in part on the ability to plan and sequence actions and ideas. The Interactive Metronome(R) helps individuals systematically exercise and often improve basic motor planning and sequencing capacities.