What a great Kids Life Studio® group strategy session we had today! With the United Nations announcing their brand new inaugural International Day of Play, last week, we spent time speaking through ideas to become involved as a global network of Kids Life Coaches.

Global research in the Lego Play Well Study 2024, surveying more than 25,000 children across 36 countries revealed that as many as 73% of children don’t believe adults take play – and how it can help them learn – seriously. 

As Play Based Coaches, we consider ourselves in a privileged position to support children to grow, learn, think, understand and apply their goal setting strategies in a playful but meaningful way. We play with a purpose and its time to get engaged and involved in this ongoing conversation on the declining rates of play in childhood!

We are all "Play Ambassadors" and to celebrate the wonderful work all of us are doing, you can prepare yourself and become involved in...

It was ten years ago almost to the day that I arrived in England with my husband and two suitcases and nothing more than hopes and big dreams for kids life coaching as a profession. Arriving from South Africa, and having just turned 40, I felt tired (moving homes let alone countries, is not for the faint hearted!) but yet I remember a renewed vigour in my outlook. I saw opportunity and I knew that my world had dramatically expanded and that it was the perfect time to reach more children globally. 

Having coached children individually and in groups in South Africa for a decade by then, and having launched independently owned Kids Life Studio® branches across South Africa, I was ready to try a new way of doing things. 

So after offering my final face to face Kids Life Coach Certification training in South Africa, I launched the Kids Life Coach Academy and started working online. Was it easy? Absolutely not! For an organisation, whose highest value is relationships, it...

Okay so let us speak about the elephant in the room here!!! Yes...children as young as age 5 are being diagnosed with Bipolar! But what is it? Why is this happening? AND....can Kids Life Coaching help children who have been diagnosed with Bipolar?

With world Bipolar Day coming up on Saturday, 30 March, I wanted to share a few facts with you. Like....Did you know that this day was Vincent Van Gogh's birthday, who was diagnosed with bipolar after he died?

So why was he only diagnosed after he died you may be asking? Well perhaps a research paper published in 2020, can shed some light on that for you. It speaks of co-morbidities, alcohol abuse, malnutrition, epilepsy and many other things...

So why am I sharing this with you? Well it helps to answer the question "Is Kids Life Coaching for children diagnosed with Bipolar?"

You see, as a research Clinical Child Psychologist, my Masters degree showed me that it is easy to diagnostically label a child according to the criteria in the...

I am so pleased that when I started my Kids Life Coaching journey way back in 2003...I was naive, filled with optimism and perhaps a little too "blue sky" in my thinking! You see, I believed I could do anything for children and that nobody could stop me!

I really truly believed it!

Why?

Well, because I really cared! For me, coaching children wasn't just a career change from my teaching career which I absolutely loved. It was my way to serve my local community, earn an income and make a difference.

With over two decades experience under my belt, I know my stuff BUT what nobody ever told me....is probably not even related to what you think!! 

You see when I first started coaching children, there were no other companies doing what I was doing. I was the first! I pioneered my approach in South Africa (now expanded to countries all over the world!) simply because I believed I could and I wanted to help children. The biggest problems I saw facing children back then was watching too...

For many years, I have been speaking to potential students interested in enrolling in our training. They ask me how our Play Based Coaching System® works. They are interested in our approach and almost always have been led to believe that it involves telling stories to children!

I am not sure where this misinformation has come from. Although there is a lot of truth in the fact that children love a good story book....especially colourful ones with a meaningful and fun protagonist...stories in coaching sessions are simply a waste of time. 

Let me tell you why!

In younger children, stories are meant for bedtime. This is a special time for parents to spend with their children reading to them and perhaps imparting a few incidental "words of wisdom" that teach them life skills.

As a children's author...I LOVE stories....but do I use my own Zeal the Zebra book in my coaching sessions? Nope...not at all! But do I recommend my book to parents and teachers? For sure!

You see, a...

Okay so let us speak about this up front. Parent coaching is not what we do at Kids Life Studio®! It's not that there isn't a time and place for this, but for us we work with the whole family with a strong focus on the child facing various wobbles or challenges. After assessing their lifestyle and stressors, we tailor make a programme to give them skills that can be transferred into the whole family. Parents love this non invasive approach that empowers their whole family to understand their roles and responsibilities. 

So often, we see parents approach us for support at their wits end and really struggling to cope with their child. They are overwhelmed and they want help and they want it yesterday!  They want us to TELL them what to do and how to do it. We reassure them that we have an easier way....

Sometimes they believe us and they patiently allow us to do our magic in our 4 week foundational kids life coaching programme and sometimes they refuse to accept that we...

I remember the day he walked into my Kids Life Studio®. He was angry. A very determined look on his face. His first words to me: "I don't have to do this stupid coaching thing."

My heart skipped a beat and then I leaned into his fear. All bad behaviour in a child is an unmet need and this child was feeling scared. He wasn't sure of what to expect. He had every right to feel the way he did.

Strong willed children are awesome candidates for kids life coaching! We love supporting them because they are not only full of fun and enthusiasm to work with, but they show natural leadership. We support them to channel their energy into willpower to succeed with a toolbox of skills that makes a parents life easier! Who wouldn't love doing that! 

Yet, this child seemed extra resistant and wasn't budging! No amount of encouragement from his parents was getting him to budge. 

So what did I say and do to shift his attitude and get his buy in? Well these 3 things shifted the needle...

In our Kids Life Studio® Coaching programmes, we support children to build their brain health! We do this in a non invasive way that shows them the importance of:

• Feeding it (giving it the nutrition and water it needs for optimal functioning and feeding it with a good diet of information ie. avoiding too much social media!)
• Befriending it (treating their brain with respect and keeping it safe at all costs. This starts with the words they speak and the choices they make.)
• Defending it (protecting their brain from harm when doing contact sport, wearing a helmet when riding a bicycle and avoiding head injuries at all costs and knowing what to do when they get one.)
• Training it (strengthening their brain for success with daily mindfulness practices, lifestyle choices and good habits relating to sleep, exercise and leisure time)

With so much happening in our children's world that impacts on their brain behaviour, we have made it our collective mission at Kids Life Studio® to...

Kids Life Coaching is a relatively new field in the greater scheme of things. When I first started coaching children in 2003, it was unheard of and I was the first Kids Life Coach to launch my own practice. At the time, I had nobody to learn from, nobody to help me and nobody to point me in the right direction. Simply because coaching was reserved for adults and nobody was doing it for children (yet) until I identified the gap and took action. 

Just like you....I saw a need and you no doubt have also seen a need for kids life coaching in your community. It always surprises me as to even after two decades of coaching this field is still growing. In fact, since the pandemic I have seen a growth spurt with the field gaining amazing traction. 

Yet sadly...with every good intention, I see passionate children's change makers launch their own coaching practice the same way I did over two decades ago and even there there is so much help they choose to do it alone!

THEY GUESS THEIR...