Glossary

Parenting glossary: 301 terms and decisions explained

Each entry is defined in a sentence or two. Follow the link for the options, the evidence and questions to ask each other.

A

A child who is ahead · Decision: How you would respond if your child is far ahead of their classmates: enrichment, a gifted program, subject acceleration or skipping a grade.
A partner sleeping over · Decision: Whether a teen's boyfriend or girlfriend may stay the night at your home.
Achievement pressure · Decision: How hard you will push your child to excel at school, sports or music, from letting them lead to holding very high expectations.
Acting alone or with other parents · Decision: Whether you set phone and social media rules on your own or agree on them with other parents, a pledge or the school.
Adult-centred or child-centred home · Decision: Whether your child fits into an adult-run household or the household is organized around the child's needs and schedule.
Affection and consent · Decision: Whether a child must hug or kiss relatives, or is always allowed to choose, which shapes how they learn about their own boundaries.
Age at starting group care · Decision: How old your child is when they start spending time in group care, from under six months to not until preschool.
AI companions and chatbots · Decision: Whether your child may use AI chatbots and companion apps, from none before 18 to supervised general assistants to open use.
AI for schoolwork · Decision: Whether and how your child may use AI for homework, from not allowed to research help only to following the teacher's policy.
Alcohol · Decision: What you allow around alcohol: none until the legal age, small sips on occasion, supervised drinking at home, or permissive with safety rules.
Allergen introduction · Decision: Whether and when to give common allergy-causing foods such as peanut and egg to your baby, and how to keep offering them.
Allowance model · Decision: Whether your child gets regular pocket money and on what terms: none, a set amount unconditionally, pay tied to chores, or a mix where basic chores are unpaid and extra jobs earn money.
Announcing the pregnancy and the birth · Decision: When and how you tell people about the pregnancy and the baby, and whether you share on social media.
Apologies · Decision: Whether you require a child to say sorry on the spot, coach them to, model it, or leave it to them.
Appearance: hair, clothes, piercings, tattoos · Decision: How much say your teen has over how they look, including permanent changes like tattoos.
Attachment parenting · Approach: The "Baby B's": breastfeeding, babywearing, bedding close, belief in the baby's cries
Authoritative · Approach: High warmth plus clear, explained limits
Authority: obedience or negotiation · Decision: How much children are expected to simply obey versus how much rules are explained, chosen or negotiated with them.

B

Baby and toddler classes · Decision: Whether you enroll your baby or toddler in classes such as music, gym or early learning, and how many.
Baby budget and income drop · Decision: Planning for the cost of a baby and for any drop in income if one of you takes leave or cuts back. The choice is how detailed a financial plan you make before the birth.
Baby gear · Decision: How much equipment you buy, and whether you go minimal or fully equipped, new or second-hand.
Baby sign language · Decision: Whether you teach your baby simple hand signs for things like milk or more before they can talk.
Baby-proofing · Decision: How thoroughly you childproof the home: gates, locks and anchors everywhere, only the most dangerous hazards, or minimal changes with teaching and watching.
Babysitters and who may care for the child · Decision: Who may look after your child when you are out, and how soon you start, from regular sitters to family only.
Babywearing, strollers and contact naps · Decision: How you carry your baby: in a carrier or wrap, in a stroller, or a mix, and whether you let the baby nap on you instead of in a crib.
Backtalk · Decision: How you respond when a child answers back or speaks disrespectfully: zero tolerance, correcting the tone, or letting some of it go.
Bassinet or crib · Decision: What your baby sleeps in at first: a bedside bassinet, a crib from day one, or a portable play yard.
Bed-sharing · Decision: Bed-sharing means your baby sleeps in the same bed as an adult. Major health bodies disagree about how to handle it: some say never, some give conditions for doing it as safely as possible.
Bedtime structure · Decision: How firm bedtime is: a fixed early time and routine, a flexible window, or letting the child decide when they are tired.
Behavioral parent training · Approach: Praise and rewards, planned ignoring, consequences, time-out, calm consistency
Birth plan philosophy · Decision: How much you want to spell out in advance about your birth: a detailed written plan, a short list of priorities, trusting the care team, or no plan.
Birth setting · Decision: Where you want to give birth: a hospital, a birth center attached to a hospital, a freestanding birth center, or at home. It affects who is present and what is available if something changes.
Birthdays and gifts · Decision: How big birthday celebrations and gifts are: family only, a few friends, the whole class or a venue, and whether you ask for no gifts.
Boarding school · Decision: Whether you would ever send a child to live at school, and from what age.
Body vocabulary · Decision: What words you use for body parts: the anatomical names, family nicknames, or avoiding the subject.
Body, weight and diet talk · Decision: How you talk about bodies, weight and diets at home, from avoiding weight talk entirely to treating weight as a health measure when a doctor raises it.
Boredom and downtime · Decision: Whether you fill your child's time or deliberately leave unstructured space, including letting them be bored.
Breastfeeding duration and night weaning · Decision: How long you hope to breastfeed and whether and when to stop night feeds. These are separate decisions that tend to change once the baby arrives.
Building a village · Decision: How you build a support network beyond family: paid help, swaps with friends and neighbors, parent groups, or an intentional community.
Bullying and friendships · Decision: How you respond to bullying and friendship problems: coaching your child, monitoring, going to the school, or changing the setting.
Burnout prevention · Decision: What you will do to avoid running yourselves into the ground: scheduled rest, lowering standards, or buying or asking for help.

C

Caffeine and energy drinks · Decision: Whether teens may have coffee, tea or energy drinks, from none until adulthood to a little to no rules.
Cannabis, vaping and other drugs · Decision: How you respond to the possibility that your teen tries drugs: zero tolerance, clear disapproval with honest information about harm, tolerance, or their choice.
Car access and costs · Decision: Whether your teen has their own car or shares the family car, and who pays for the car and insurance.
Car seats · Decision: How long a child stays in each type of car seat, including rear-facing as long as possible versus switching at the legal minimum.
Care provider and labor support · Decision: Who will look after you in pregnancy and birth (an obstetrician or a midwife) and whether you will add a doula, a trained person who gives continuous support during labor.
Cesarean on request · Decision: A cesarean is a surgical birth through the abdomen. This is about whether you would plan one without a medical reason, versus planning a vaginal birth and having one only if it becomes necessary.
Childhood and teen vaccines (annual flu and COVID, HPV timing) · Decision: Vaccines train the body to fight specific diseases. Beyond the baby shots, children and teens are offered yearly flu and COVID shots and the HPV vaccine, which protects against a virus linked to several cancers.
Choosing a hospital and what to ask · Decision: Which hospital you plan to give birth in, and what to compare: how close it is, how advanced its newborn intensive-care unit is, its cesarean rate, and its policies on visitors, doulas and rooming-in.
Choosing the child's doctor · Decision: Who will be your child's regular doctor: a pediatrician, a family doctor or a nurse practitioner, and what matters to you in choosing one.
Chore philosophy · Decision: Whether children do household jobs and why: childhood is for play and school, self-care only, unpaid contribution to the family, paid work, or working alongside adults from toddlerhood.
Chore start age and enforcement · Decision: At what age chores begin and how firmly you hold to them: from age two or three to the teens, and with routines and reminders or by invitation only.
Circumcision · Decision: Whether to have a baby boy's foreskin removed in the newborn period, or to leave it and let him decide later. Here it is treated as a medical and personal decision.
Collaborative & Proactive Solutions · Approach: Challenging behavior reflects lagging skills, not low motivation; solve recurring problems with the child
Comparisons, labels and birth-order roles · Decision: Whether you avoid comparing children and labels like "the smart one," use positive labels only, or give the eldest more responsibility.
Competition, winning and losing · Decision: How you handle competition: avoiding it when young, focusing on participation and fun, keeping score but praising effort, or treating winning as important.
Complementary and alternative medicine · Decision: Whether you use treatments outside conventional medicine, such as herbal remedies, homeopathy or acupuncture, and how that fits with your pediatrician.
Conscious parenting · Approach: The work is on the parent's own triggers
Consequences · Decision: What happens after a child breaks a rule: letting natural results happen, a related consequence, taking away a privilege, an unrelated punishment, or solving the problem together.
Contact and collision sports · Decision: Whether your child plays sports with tackling or collisions, and at what age, such as football, hockey or soccer heading.
Content, co-viewing and background TV · Decision: What your child watches and whether you watch with them, including whether the TV is on in the background.
Contraception access · Decision: Whether and how your teen can get contraception: not provided, available if asked, arranged proactively, or managed confidentially by the teen.
Cord blood · Decision: Whether to collect blood from the umbilical cord at birth for possible future medical use: do nothing, donate to a public bank, or pay a private bank to store it.

D

Daily limits, ages 2-5 · Decision: How you limit screens for preschoolers: a fixed time cap, a soft cap with quality rules, or no clock and judging by the AAP's five questions (Child, Content, Calm, Crowding Out, Communication).
Daily outdoor and nature time · Decision: How much time your child spends outdoors, from incidental to a daily habit in most weather to outdoor activity as a family identity.
Data-driven · Approach: Read the studies, weigh their quality, then decide by family preference
Dating age and rules · Decision: When your teen may date and the rules around it, from no dating until 16 to group dating first to no fixed rules.
Death, hard news and hard questions · Decision: How you talk with your child about death, illness and frightening news: shielding them, answering simply when asked, or explaining proactively.
Default autonomy stance · Decision: Your general approach to how much your teenager decides for themselves: you decide, negotiate expanding freedom, or let them run their own domain.
Default parent for sick days, school and doctor · Decision: Which of you is called when your child is sick, needs to be picked up or has an appointment, and whether that is fixed, alternates or follows who has the more flexible day.
Default source of guidance · Decision: Who or what you each trust when advice conflicts: your pediatrician, the official guidelines, a researcher or book, or your own judgment. It decides how you settle most factual questions later.
Delayed cord clamping · Decision: Whether to wait a short time after birth before the umbilical cord is clamped, so more blood passes from the placenta to the baby.
Dental care and thumb or pacifier weaning · Decision: When you start dental visits and brushing and how you handle thumb-sucking and pacifier use.
Dessert and sweets · Decision: How sweets fit into meals: earned by eating dinner, scheduled and limited, served alongside the meal, unrestricted, or avoided entirely in the early years.
Diapering · Decision: Whether you use disposable diapers, cloth, or a mix, and whether you would try elimination communication, where you watch for the baby's cues and offer a potty instead of a diaper.
Disagreeing in front of the child · Decision: Whether your child will see you disagree, and how: never, calmly with a visible resolution, or without a filter. It sets what children learn about conflict.
Discipline for teens · Decision: How consequences change for older children: grounding, agreed consequences, contracts, natural consequences or mostly trust.
Discipline in public · Decision: How you handle misbehavior in shops, restaurants and at other people's houses: same rules, removing the child, doing what gets you through, or avoiding hard situations.
Drinks · Decision: What your child drinks: only water and milk, juice within limits, soda and sports drinks occasionally, or no rules.
Driving · Decision: When and how your teen gets a license and the rules for driving, including a written family agreement.

E

Each parent's own time and identity · Decision: How each of you keeps time for friends, hobbies, exercise or simply being alone, and whether that time is protected, requested, or put on hold.
Early academics or play · Decision: Whether young children are taught letters and numbers early or spend their time playing, with formal learning starting later.
Education savings · Decision: Whether and how you save for your child's education. Some countries match your savings: in Canada a registered education savings plan (RESP) earns a government grant, and in the US a 529 plan grows tax-free for education costs.
Elective induction at 39 weeks · Decision: Induction means using medication or other methods to start labor rather than waiting for it to begin. This is about being offered induction at 39 weeks without a medical reason, versus waiting or inducing only if needed.
Elective procedures (orthodontic, cosmetic, ear piercing) · Decision: Which non-essential medical or cosmetic procedures you would allow for a child, such as braces for looks, cosmetic work or ear piercing.
Emotion coaching · Approach: Notice the feeling, connect, validate, label, then set limits and problem-solve
Erythromycin eye ointment · Decision: Whether your newborn receives antibiotic ointment in the eyes soon after birth, a routine step in many hospitals meant to prevent certain eye infections.

F

Fairness between siblings · Decision: Whether you treat siblings strictly equally, give each what they need, or set privileges by age and stage.
Family dietary pattern · Decision: The overall way your family eats: omnivore, mostly vegetarian with some meat, vegetarian, or vegan.
Family meals · Decision: Whether and how often the family eats together, and whether screens are allowed at the table.
Family rituals and traditions · Decision: The regular practices that make your family yours, such as holidays, meals and bedtime customs, and whether you inherit them, blend both families' or invent new ones.
Family travel · Decision: How much travel is part of family life, from waiting until children are older to easy local trips to travel as a core value.
Family-of-origin reflection · Decision: Looking back at how each of you was raised and deciding which parts you want to repeat and which you want to do differently. Most of your instincts as a parent come from here, so it helps to say them out loud.
Fears and anxiety · Decision: How you respond when your child is afraid: avoiding what scares them, comforting them while gently facing it, or pushing them through.
Feedback on each other's parenting · Decision: How you will tell each other what is working and what is not: in the moment, privately later, or on a regular check-in. Tired new parents can hear small comments as big criticism.
Feeding on demand or on a schedule · Decision: Whether you feed the baby whenever they show hunger cues, on a loose rhythm, or by the clock. Newborns are usually fed in response to cues, so this mostly matters as babies grow.
Finding out the sex · Decision: Whether to learn your baby's sex before birth, and if so when and whom you tell. It is a personal preference.
Firearms · Decision: Whether there are guns in your home and how they are stored, and whether you ask about guns in other homes before playdates.
First device and first smartphone · Decision: When your child gets their first phone and what kind, from a smartwatch or basic phone to a full smartphone.
First foods · Decision: What you offer first when starting solids, such as iron-rich foods, fruit and vegetables, or infant cereal.
First-year vaccine schedule · Decision: Which childhood vaccines your baby gets and on what timetable in the first year. US official bodies now publish somewhat different schedules.
Fluoride · Decision: Fluoride is a natural mineral that strengthens tooth enamel and helps prevent cavities. It is in most toothpaste, added to many public water supplies, painted on teeth by dentists as varnish, and also sold as drops or tablets.
Food as reward or comfort · Decision: Whether food is ever used to reward good behavior, soothe upset or motivate, such as a treat for using the potty.
Food away from home · Decision: Whether the same rules apply at restaurants, parties and relatives' homes, or whether they relax.
Free play versus organized activities · Decision: How much of your child's time is unstructured play versus scheduled activities and lessons, from mostly free play to a full calendar.
Free-range · Approach: Independence is a developmental need
Friends the parents dislike · Decision: How you respond when you do not like your teen's friends: forbid contact, limit and supervise, or voice concern and stay out of it.

G

Gendered emotional norms · Decision: Whether you treat sons and daughters the same when they show feelings, or hold different expectations such as telling boys to toughen up.
Gendered toys, clothes and expectations · Decision: Whether you follow traditional ideas about what boys and girls play with and wear, follow your child's preferences, mix deliberately, or raise children without gender expectations.
Gentle, respectful or positive parenting · Approach: Emotion regulation, affection, boundaries without punishment or shaming
Giving, service and civic life · Decision: How you teach giving and community involvement: not structured, a give jar and donation choices, regular family volunteering, or expected service in the teens.
Godparents and mentors · Decision: Whether you name other adults with a special role in your child's life, such as secular godparents or mentors, besides the legal guardian.
Good Inside · Approach: Connection, firm boundaries and repair; no time-outs, sticker charts, punishments, rewards or ignoring
Grade expectations · Decision: What you expect from your child's grades: top marks, their personal best, effort over results, or leaving it to them.
Grandparent childcare · Decision: Whether grandparents provide childcare, how often, and whether it is paid or unpaid.
Grandparents' role · Decision: How involved grandparents are in your child's life, from occasional visits to regular presence to providing childcare to living with you.
Gratitude, thank-you notes and tact · Decision: How you teach thanks and kindness about gifts: modeling it, a daily gratitude habit, required thank-you notes, or honest kindness.
Growth-mindset and grit messaging · Decision: A growth mindset is the idea that abilities grow with effort and practice; grit is sticking with long-term goals. This is about whether those ideas become part of how your family talks about school and effort.

H

Helicopter and snowplow · Approach: Hovering and rescuing; clearing obstacles in advance
Helmets · Decision: When your child wears a helmet for biking, scooting and snow sports, and whether you wear one too.
Hepatitis B at birth · Decision: Hepatitis B is a virus that infects the liver and can pass from a mother to her baby at birth. A vaccine is routinely offered in the first day of life, and the first dose is part of the usual infant series.
Holidays · Decision: How you split holidays between families: alternating years, splitting the day, hosting at home, new traditions of your own, or traveling.
Home-based and self-directed schooling · Decision: Whether your child goes to a regular school or learns at home. Structured homeschooling follows a curriculum; unschooling is child-led with no set curriculum; democratic (Sudbury) schools let students run their own learning and the school itself.
Homemade or commercial baby food · Decision: Whether you make your baby's food yourself, buy jars and pouches, or use some of each.
Homework in the early grades · Decision: How you treat homework for young children, from opting out to doing it lightly to treating it as a firm habit.
Homework involvement · Decision: How much you help with homework: hands-off, setting the routine and space, available on request, sitting alongside, or teaching and correcting.
Honesty standard for parents · Decision: How truthful you are with your child, including myths and small lies: never lying, only kind fictions, white lies, or lying to get compliance.
Hours in care · Decision: How many hours a day and week your child spends in care, from full days to part-time or occasional.
How behavior changes · Decision: Your theory of how children learn to behave: through rewards and consequences, through a mix, or through the relationship and teaching skills. It shapes every discipline decision that follows.
How leave is split · Decision: How the time off is divided between you: all by the birth parent, an overlap, a solo block for the other parent, or roughly equal.
How limits are set, ages 6-12 · Decision: How you set screen rules for school-age children: fixed minutes, weekday and weekend rules, rules about content and context, or letting the child regulate.
How the family grows · Decision: How your family might grow: biologically only, or also through adoption, fostering or fertility treatment.
How to start solids · Decision: Whether the first foods are spoon-fed purees, finger foods the baby picks up and feeds themselves (called baby-led weaning), or a mix of both.
How to Talk So Kids Will Listen · Approach: Name feelings, invite cooperation, describe instead of evaluating
Hunt, Gather, Parent · Approach: Togetherness, encouragement, autonomy, minimal interference; children join real household work
Hygiene autonomy · Decision: When children take over washing and personal care themselves, and how much you supervise.

I

If a child comes out or questions gender · Decision: How you would respond if your child tells you they are gay or transgender, or are questioning their gender identity.
If the child is not who we expected (temperament, interests, ability, gender expression) · Decision: Talking about how you would respond if your child turns out different from what you imagined in personality, interests, abilities or gender expression.
If we separate · Decision: Agreeing in advance on the principles you would follow if you ever separated, such as putting your child first and using mediation before court, and whether to write them down.
Imported national models · Approach: Each elevates one thing: limits and adult life, play and empathy, low pressure, self-reliance
Independence milestones (playing outside, walking to school, home alone, transit) · Decision: When your child is allowed to do things alone: play outside, walk to school, stay home, take public transport. There is usually no fixed legal age.
Information symmetry · Decision: Making sure both of you have the same information: appointments, portal logins, contacts, schedules. Without it, one parent becomes the manager and the other the helper.
Intimacy after the birth · Decision: How you will approach physical closeness and sex after the baby arrives, including recovery, timing, and talking about it. Needs and readiness can differ between partners.
Investing lessons and inheritance · Decision: When you teach your child about investing and how you plan to leave money: nothing until adulthood, concepts only, a small real account, helping during life, or a limited inheritance.
Involvement at school · Decision: How involved each of you is with your child's school: one parent handles it, you split tasks, or both attend everything.

K

Kindergarten entry timing · Decision: Whether your child starts kindergarten as soon as they are old enough or a year later, which matters most for children with summer birthdays.

L

Language of instruction · Decision: Which language your child is taught in, such as English with some French, French immersion, or a bilingual program.
Languages at home · Decision: Which languages your child hears and speaks at home and how you pass on a second language: one parent one language, a minority language at home, or classes and immersion.
Learning or developmental concerns · Decision: How you would respond if you suspect a learning difficulty or developmental difference: watching, informal support, school assessment or a private one.
Life and disability insurance, beneficiaries, emergency fund · Decision: Protecting your family's finances if a parent dies or cannot work: life and disability insurance, who is named to receive the money, and an emergency savings fund.
Lighthouse · Approach: A stable beacon between hovering and letting go
Lying · Decision: How you respond when a child lies: punishing the lie, giving credit for honesty, making truth-telling safe, or treating it as normal development.

M

Major life disruptions (job loss, serious illness, death of a parent, ageing grandparents, moving) · Decision: How you would handle big setbacks and changes while raising a child: broad principles or specific plans.
Major versus day-to-day decision rights · Decision: Which parenting decisions need both of you to agree (big ones like medical care or schools) and which can be made by whichever parent is on duty (what to wear, snack, nap).
Manners · Decision: How much politeness you expect and teach: modeling it, prompting ("what do you say?"), requiring it, or formal etiquette.
Meaning without religion · Decision: How you give your child a sense of meaning, awe and ethics outside religion: ethics conversations, nature and gratitude rituals, or a secular community.
Medication philosophy for common illness · Decision: How readily you give medicine for everyday illness such as fevers, colds and aches: treating promptly, waiting and focusing on comfort, or keeping medicine to a minimum in favor of natural remedies.
Melatonin and sleep aids · Decision: Melatonin is a hormone the body makes to signal bedtime; it is also sold as a supplement. The decision is whether you would ever give a child melatonin or another sleep aid, or rely only on routines and behavior changes.
Mental load and task ownership · Decision: Who notices, plans and remembers everything a child needs (appointments, clothes, forms, supplies), not just who does the tasks. Owning a whole area is different from helping with it.
Midwife or doctor · Decision: Who will be in charge of your care in pregnancy and birth: an obstetrician (a surgeon who handles complications), a midwife (a specialist in normal birth, in a hospital, birth center or at home), a family doctor who delivers babies, or a team that shares the care.
Milk source · Decision: What your baby drinks in the first months: breast milk (from the breast or a bottle), formula, or a mix. It affects who can feed the baby and how nights are shared.
Money transparency · Decision: How much your child learns about family money: nothing, general values and trade-offs, the budget, or income and net worth.
Monitoring messages and location · Decision: Whether and how you check your child's messages or track their location, with their knowledge or not.
Monitors · Decision: Whether you use a baby monitor and what kind: none, audio, video, or a wearable device that tracks vital signs.
Montessori at home · Approach: Freedom within limits, real work, no rewards or punishments
Moving house for schools · Decision: Whether you would move, use out-of-area options, or pay for private school to get a school you prefer.
Music lessons · Decision: Whether and when your child learns an instrument: only if they ask, a trial period, required for some years, or required with enforced practice.

N

Naming and surname · Decision: How you will choose your baby's name and last name: one parent's surname, hyphenated, both, or a new one, and whether the given name honors someone.
Newborn screening (heel prick, hearing, heart) · Decision: Newborn screening is a set of quick tests done in the first days of life to catch rare but treatable conditions: a drop of blood from the baby's heel, a hearing test, and a pulse-oxygen check for heart defects. The decision is whether to accept all of them or opt out of any.
Night dryness and bedwetting · Decision: Staying dry overnight is a separate step from daytime potty training and usually comes later. This is about how you handle nights: pull-ups until it happens by itself, training day and night together, lifting the child to pee, alarms, or medication.
Night duty · Decision: Who gets up with the baby overnight, to feed, change and settle, and whether you split it, alternate nights or share it. Newborns wake often at night, so this decides how rested each of you is.
Nudity and privacy at home · Decision: How relaxed the household is about being undressed in front of children, and how body privacy changes as they grow.
Number of children, and when we are done · Decision: How many children you each want and how you decide when your family is complete.

O

Online safety, sexting and pornography · Decision: How you talk to and protect your child about risks online, including sexting and pornography: blocking, conversation, or both.
Organic · Decision: Whether you buy organic food for your family, all of it, selectively, or not at all.
Overall risk philosophy · Decision: How much risk you will accept in everyday childhood, from keeping children as safe as possible to letting them take supervised or free-ranging risks.
Overall stance: warmth and structure · Decision: Researchers describe parenting styles by two things: warmth and demands. Authoritarian is strict with little warmth, authoritative is warm with firm limits, permissive is warm with few limits.
Overnights away from the baby · Decision: When your baby first spends a night away from you, for example with grandparents.

P

Pacifier · Decision: Whether your baby uses a pacifier (dummy) and when to introduce it, for example from birth, after feeding is established, or only for sleep.
Pain management and preparation method · Decision: How you plan to handle labor pain, from a planned epidural to preparing for an unmedicated birth with a method such as Lamaze, Bradley or hypnobirthing.
Parental controls and a family media plan · Decision: Whether you use control software and a written plan, light controls with conversation, or rely on trust and talking.
Parental leave length · Decision: How much time off you will each take around the birth or adoption, from a few weeks up to leaving work. Rules and pay differ a lot by country, state and employer.
Parents' own conduct while in charge · Decision: What you each agree to do or avoid while responsible for your child, such as drinking alcohol or using drugs.
Parents' own phone use · Decision: How you use your own phones around your child: phone-free time with them, set zones and times, or no particular rules.
Parties and curfews · Decision: How you handle going out: unsupervised parties, curfews, check-in rules, and what happens if they need a ride home.
Partnership model · Decision: How you divide work and care overall: one parent earning and one caring, a lead and a supporting parent, both working with outside help, or sharing equally.
Pedagogical tradition · Decision: The teaching approach: a mainstream curriculum, project-based learning, Montessori (child-led, hands-on) or Waldorf (arts and imagination), classical education (a structured, language- and logic-based approach), or the International Baccalaureate, an international program.
Personal tablet, YouTube and short video · Decision: Whether your child has their own tablet and what they watch, from none to a shared locked-down tablet to their own device.
Personal-safety teaching · Decision: How you teach children to stay safe from harm by others: warnings about strangers, a trusted-adult plan, body-safety rules, or little explicit teaching.
Pets · Decision: Whether your family has pets and who is responsible for them, from no pet to a family pet the adults care for to the child's own pet.
Phones in bedrooms and at school · Decision: Whether phones stay out of bedrooms overnight and how phones are handled during the school day.
Physical punishment · Decision: Whether you would ever spank or hit a child as discipline, from never to occasionally to routinely. It is one of the clearest areas where medical bodies give a firm recommendation.
Picky eating · Decision: How you respond when a child refuses most foods: cooking a separate meal, serving one family meal with a safe food on the table, one meal take-it-or-leave-it, hiding vegetables, or repeated exposure without comment.
Placenta · Decision: What happens to the placenta after birth: disposed of by the hospital, kept (for burial or as a keepsake), or prepared for consumption.
Planning a home birth · Decision: Whether you would plan to give birth at home with a trained attendant. It involves who qualifies, who attends, how far the hospital is, and a plan for transferring if something changes.
Politics and worldview · Decision: Whether your child hears your political and moral views, several views, or none, and how you handle disagreement within the family.
Positive Discipline · Approach: Kind and firm together; rejects both punishment and rewards
Post-secondary expectations · Decision: What you expect your child to do after high school: university, any further training, trades, a gap year, or their own choice.
Posting the child's photos · Decision: Whether you share photos or videos of your child online and with whom, from nothing identifiable to a private album to open posting.
Postpartum mental-health plan for both parents · Decision: Knowing the signs of postpartum depression and anxiety (in either of you) and agreeing in advance who will speak up and what support you will arrange.
Postpartum support model · Decision: What help you will have after the birth: just the two of you, family, or paid help during the day or overnight.
Practice and quitting · Decision: What happens when your child wants to stop an activity: stop any time, finish the season, replace it with something else, or never quit core commitments.
Praise · Decision: How you tell a child they have done well: lots of enthusiastic praise, specific praise, praise for effort, or low-key acknowledgment.
Pregnancy loss · Decision: Talking before it happens about how you would each want to grieve and whom you would tell if a pregnancy ended in miscarriage or stillbirth.
Prematurity, NICU and birth complications · Decision: Preparing for a baby who arrives early or needs intensive care. The NICU is the hospital's neonatal intensive care unit.
Prenatal genetic and carrier screening · Decision: Prenatal screening uses blood tests and ultrasound to estimate the chance of conditions such as Down syndrome; carrier screening checks whether you carry genes for inherited conditions; diagnostic tests (CVS and amniocentesis) take a sample for a definite answer. The decision is how much of this you want to know.
Preparing together · Decision: Whether you will get ready for parenthood as a couple, from nothing formal to books, a class, or counseling, and what that preparation looks like.
Preschool philosophy · Decision: Preschools follow different teaching philosophies. Montessori is child-led with hands-on materials; Waldorf stresses imagination, arts and play; Reggio Emilia builds on children's own projects; play-based programs learn through play; forest schools are mostly outdoors.
Protecting the couple relationship · Decision: How you will make time for each other as a couple once a baby arrives, from date nights to small daily rituals, rather than waiting until there is time.
Protection versus independence · Decision: How much you protect your child from difficulty and risk versus how much you let them try, struggle and sometimes fail on their own.
Puberty talks · Decision: When and how you talk about puberty and bodily changes: gradually from early childhood, in one planned talk, or leaving it to school.
Pumping, bottles and donor milk · Decision: Whether you will express breast milk, when you will introduce a bottle, and whether you would ever use donor milk from a milk bank or another person.

R

Race, class and privilege · Decision: Whether and how you talk with your child about race, money and unequal opportunity: not raising it, answering when asked, or proactive age-appropriate conversations.
Reading culture · Decision: How reading fits into family life: reading aloud daily from birth, a bedtime story, books available for the child to pick up, or reading targets and rewards.
Responding to big feelings · Decision: What you do when your child is upset, angry or sad: validating every feeling and limiting only behavior, acknowledging briefly, distracting, minimizing or disapproving.
Responding to crying · Decision: How quickly and how you respond when your baby cries: immediately every time, after a pause to observe, or letting them fuss for set periods.
Revisiting agreements · Decision: How you will keep your decisions current as your child grows, whether that means a set check-in, a review at each age, or only when something goes wrong.
Rewards and consequences for grades · Decision: Whether you pay or reward for grades, reward effort, only praise, or give consequences for poor grades.
Rewards and sticker charts · Decision: Whether you use rewards, like stickers or treats, to encourage behavior, or avoid them.
RIE / Educaring · Approach: The baby is a capable whole person: observe, narrate, trust, intervene little
Room sharing · Decision: Whether siblings have their own rooms or share, and by what rule: age, gender, or choice.
Room-sharing duration · Decision: How long your baby sleeps in the same room as you (in a separate bed) before moving to their own room.
Rules at the grandparents' house, and when they are ignored · Decision: What happens when grandparents follow different rules from yours about treats, screens, bedtimes or safety, and how you set boundaries.

S

Safe-sleep basics · Decision: The baseline rules for putting a baby to sleep: on their back, on a firm flat surface, with nothing else in the sleep space. Unlike most topics here, these are safety rules to know, not preferences to weigh.
Sampling or specializing · Decision: Whether your child tries many sports through adolescence or settles on one early and plays it year-round.
Santa, the Tooth Fairy and other magical beings · Decision: Whether you tell your child that Santa and the Tooth Fairy are real, play along, call it a game, or skip the myths.
Schedules or baby-led routines · Decision: Whether you follow the baby's cues for feeding and sleep, build a flexible routine, or set a firm schedule.
School sector · Decision: What kind of school you choose: neighborhood public, public school of choice, charter, or private. Religious schools exist but are outside the scope here.
School-choice criteria · Decision: What you weigh most when choosing a school: nearby and community, results and rankings, teaching approach, the mix of students, or your child's happiness.
Screens as a tool (meals, cars, restaurants, meltdowns) · Decision: Whether you use screens to get through hard moments, such as meals out, car trips or meltdowns. The AAP's "Calm" question asks whether a screen is becoming the main way a child settles.
Screens before age 2 · Decision: Whether babies and toddlers under two see screens at all, such as video calls only, occasional shared viewing, or screens as part of the day.
Seeking mental-health help for the child · Decision: When you would involve a professional about your child's emotions or behavior: at early signs, after the pediatrician, or only if serious.
Self-care skills timeline · Decision: When you expect your child to do things for themselves, like dressing, feeding and washing, and whether you push early independence or follow readiness.
Sex education at home: timing · Decision: When you talk with your child about sex: one big talk near puberty, answering when asked, many small talks from early childhood, or leaving it to school.
Sex education: message · Decision: What you tell your teen about sex: abstinence, delaying while knowing about contraception, comprehensive and consent-focused, or a readiness-based approach.
Shared developmental expectations · Decision: Having the same picture of what a baby, toddler or child can realistically do at each age, so one of you is not expecting a two-year-old to behave like a five-year-old.
Sharing and toy-taking · Decision: How you handle disputes over toys: requiring sharing on request, setting timed turns, letting a child keep a toy until done, or staying out of it.
Sibling conflict · Decision: How you respond when siblings fight: staying out, coaching and mediating, judging and imposing a solution, or separating them.
Single-sex or co-ed · Decision: Whether your child attends a school with both boys and girls or a single-sex school.
Sleep training · Decision: Whether and how to teach your baby to fall asleep and stay asleep on their own. Methods range from letting them cry for set periods to gradual, parent-present approaches to none at all.
Sleepovers · Decision: Whether your child sleeps at other people's homes, and under what conditions.
Slow and "good enough" parenting · Approach: Fewer scheduled activities; perfection is unnecessary and manageable frustration helps
Snacking structure · Decision: Whether eating happens at set meal and snack times, on demand all day, or with no snacks at all.
Social media start age · Decision: The age at which your child may have social media accounts, from the platform minimum of 13 to later at 15, 16 or 18.
Spacing · Decision: How far apart you would like your children to be: close together, moderately spaced or wide apart.
Special needs, disability and neurodivergence · Decision: Talking about how you would handle having a child with a disability or a developmental difference such as autism or ADHD, including work, care and schooling.
Spending on the child and materialism · Decision: How much you spend on your child and what that teaches, from a minimalist approach and experiences over things to matching what their peers have.
Sports intensity · Decision: How serious sport becomes: not at all, just for fun, school teams, competitive clubs, or travel and elite programs.
Standards and gatekeeping · Decision: Whose way of doing things counts as "right" for everyday care, such as how to swaddle or what bedtime looks like, and whether the other parent is free to do it differently without being corrected.
Structure versus child-led · Decision: How much of the day runs on adult-set schedules and rules versus following the child's own rhythms and interests.
Struggle, frustration and failure · Decision: How much you let your child struggle and fail before helping, from clearing every obstacle to deliberately toughening them up.
Sugar and juice before age 2 · Decision: Whether your child has juice or foods with added sugar in the first two years, and how strictly you hold that line.
Summers and camp · Decision: How summers are spent: unstructured at home, day camps, specialty camps, sleepaway camp, or academics and work for teens.
Sun exposure · Decision: How you handle sun: strict covering and avoidance, sunscreen with outdoor time, or a relaxed approach.
Swaddling · Decision: Whether to wrap your baby snugly in a blanket for sleep, and when to stop, which is usually when they begin to roll.
Swearing · Decision: Your family's rule on swear words, from none for anyone to adults only to rules by context.

T

Tantrums · Decision: How you respond when a toddler has a meltdown: ignoring it, staying nearby, helping them name the feeling, distracting them, or giving in.
Teen jobs · Decision: Whether your teen works during school years, from no job to summer only to part-time during the school year.
Teen privacy and confidential care · Decision: How much privacy your teen has in their room, phone and health care, including time alone with a doctor.
The child's money: structure and tools · Decision: How your child learns to handle money: free spending, save-spend-give jars, a parent-matched savings plan, or a real bank account.
The non-nursing parent's role · Decision: What the parent who is not feeding the baby from the breast does at feeds and around them: diapers, burping, settling, bottles or night feeds. It decides how the load is shared in the early weeks.
The parent's own regulation and repair · Decision: How you handle your own anger and stress, and whether you apologize and make things right with your child after losing your temper.
Tie-breaking when we disagree · Decision: What you will do when you each want something different and neither will budge. Agreeing on a way to break the tie beforehand keeps a disagreement from becoming a standoff.
Tiger · Approach: Strict, achievement-first, enforced practice
Time-out or time-in · Decision: How you respond when a child is out of control: a time-out (the child is separated for a short time), a time-in (you stay with them and talk), or something else.
Toddler hitting and biting · Decision: How you respond when a toddler hits or bites, which is common at this age: stopping and removing them, a time-out or a time-in.
Toilet-training approach · Decision: Potty training, also called toilet training or toilet learning, is teaching a child to pee and poo in a potty or toilet instead of a diaper. Approaches range from watching a baby's cues from the first months (elimination communication), to an intensive few-day method, to waiting until the child shows they are ready.
Toilet-training motivation and setbacks · Decision: How you encourage potty training and respond when it goes wrong: whether you use praise, stickers or treats, and what you do about accidents, refusal and steps backward. Setbacks are a normal part of the process.
Tongue-tie release · Decision: Whether to have a quick procedure to release the tissue under the tongue if a baby is thought to have a tongue-tie that affects feeding.
Top-priority value · Decision: The one value you would put first if you had to choose: kindness, achievement, happiness, independence, or obedience and respect. It quietly steers many everyday decisions.
Toy philosophy · Decision: What kind of toys you buy and how many: few, open-ended, rotated, a mix with electronic toys, or plenty.
Tracking feeds, sleep and diapers · Decision: Whether you keep a record of feeds, naps and diapers, and how: not at all, on paper, in an app, or with wearable devices.
Trampolines · Decision: Whether you allow home trampolines and under what rules, such as nets, one jumper at a time, and supervision.
Travel consent, passports and relocation · Decision: How you handle taking your child abroad, getting passports and moving away: either parent freely, notice and itineraries, or joint consent.
Tummy time and "containers" · Decision: Tummy time is placing a baby on their stomach while awake and watched, to strengthen the neck and shoulders. "Containers" are things like bouncers, swings and car seats that hold a baby.
Tutoring and test preparation · Decision: Whether your child gets extra academic help: none, only when struggling, enrichment to get ahead, or ongoing programs.
Type of non-parental care · Decision: What kind of care you would use: a daycare center, a home daycare, a nanny, a shared nanny or an au pair.

U

Ultra-processed and convenience food · Decision: Ultra-processed foods are industrially made products with ingredients you would not use in a home kitchen, such as packaged snacks, sugary cereals and ready meals. The decision is how much of this your family eats, from avoiding it to no rules.
United front · Decision: Whether you back each other up in front of your child even when you disagree, and where the exceptions are. It is about what your child sees and hears when the two of you are not aligned.
Unsolicited advice and who manages whose family · Decision: How you respond when relatives give advice you did not ask for, and who speaks to whose family when something needs to be said.

V

Vaccines in pregnancy and the RSV route · Decision: Vaccines in pregnancy (flu, COVID-19, whooping cough) pass protection to the baby. RSV is a common virus that can cause serious breathing illness in young babies; you can protect the baby either with an RSV vaccine in late pregnancy or with an antibody injection given to the baby after birth.
Video games: time, violence, online chat · Decision: Which games, how long, and whether your child can play and chat online with others.
Visitors and the first weeks · Decision: Who comes to see the baby in the first weeks and on what terms, from an open door to no visitors for a set period, and any ground rules such as hand-washing.
Vitamin K at birth · Decision: Whether your newborn gets vitamin K, which helps blood clot, and in what form. It is usually offered as a single shot in the first hours of life.

W

Water birth · Decision: Whether you would use a tub or pool in labor, and whether you would plan to actually deliver the baby underwater. Using water for pain relief in labor is different from giving birth in it.
Water safety · Decision: How you teach water safety and swimming: lessons from a young age, infant survival-swim programs, or lessons later with fencing and supervision.
When one parent travels or works long hours · Decision: How you will handle the stretches when one of you is away or working late: whether the home parent keeps their own rules, routines stay the same, backup is arranged, or the other parent makes up time later.
When relatives hold different views · Decision: How you handle relatives whose beliefs or values differ from yours around your child: keeping topics off the table, letting the child hear both, explaining at home, or limiting exposure.
When to start solids · Decision: The age at which you begin offering foods other than milk. Official bodies give slightly different windows, centered on about six months.
Where children sleep after infancy · Decision: Where your child sleeps once they are past infancy: their own room, a room shared with a sibling, or your bed, and whether they may come into yours at night.
Where self-esteem comes from · Decision: What you think builds a child's sense of worth: frequent affirmation, warmth with honest feedback, real responsibility, or achievement.
Where to live · Decision: Where you choose to live in relation to family and work, including living near one set of grandparents or having relatives move closer.
Whether and when to do preschool · Decision: Whether your child attends preschool before kindergarten, and how many days and what kind.
Who controls what and how much · Decision: Who decides what a child eats and how much. One well-known approach, the Division of Responsibility, has parents choose what, when and where food is served, and the child decide whether to eat and how much.
Who disciplines · Decision: Whether one parent is the disciplinarian, whoever is present handles it, or each parent does it in their own way.
Who is in the room · Decision: Who will be with you during labor and birth: just the two of you, a doula, a family member, or more people.
Who pays for big items (phone, car, university) · Decision: Who pays for large costs as your child grows: parents pay, a set contribution, matching, or the child pays.
Who provides care in the first years · Decision: Who looks after your child during the day in the early years: a parent at home, both parents working with paid care, or family helping.
Who scales back at work · Decision: Which of you will reduce hours, step back or change jobs to make family life work, and by what rule: lower earner, more flexible job, both a little, or neither.
Will and guardian nomination · Decision: A will states who gets your property, and where you name a guardian, the person who would legally raise your child if both of you died. Without one, a court decides.

Y

Yelling and harsh words · Decision: Whether you raise your voice or use harsh words when frustrated, and what you do afterward.

Last updated 2026-10-05. General information, not medical advice.