When faced with any sort of unstructured time, children are likely to get bored. They are also likely to let you know about it often! Summer is meant to be a time for rest and relaxation but also for exploring and education outside of the classroom. Here are some ideas for keeping your kids happily engaged this summer.

*Have a scavenger hunt in the house on a rainy day. Vary the clues depending on your children’s age. For younger children, use clues such as “Go to the room where you take a bath,” or “Go to the room with the blue walls.” For older children, use clues such as “This is the room where Dad watched the baseball game last night,” or “Find the room where Mom likes to read quietly.” The prize can be a gift certificate to a local bookstore or a new game the family can play together. Make sure everyone gets a prize or that it’s a team effort and everyone works together to find the prize. If not, you’ll be hearing “Not fair!” instead of “I’m bored!”

*Have a backyard camp out! Bring sleeping bags, tents, and build a fire. If you don’t have camping equipment, lay out an old sheet or blanket to sit on. Instead of telling ghost stories, have each family member tell a story about their favorite thing about your family. Don’t pressure your children to sleep outside, as they may be nervous or uncomfortable. Staying up late and having some special snacks is plenty fun! Just remember to use bug repellent so you don’t wake up with itchy campers in the morning!

*Use an old shoebox and create a special art box. Store all sorts of “extras” inside: buttons, scraps of paper, ribbon, washable markers and glue. Allow your children to create their own masterpiece on a piece of construction paper using all the materials inside the box. Make sure the items in the box are things your child can use independently. This way, your children can sit at the table and work while you make dinner or throw in a load of laundry. You can also use old magazines and cut out pictures to tell a story or re-create a family event.

These are just a few fun things you can do with your family this summer. Don’t be afraid to think outside the box and try something new. You can always have a family meeting afterward to discuss the pros and cons of your new, adventurous outing. The important thing to remember is relax and enjoy time together as a family, regardless of what you are doing.

It’s usually about this time when parents start to hear those dreaded words that inevitably come each summer. “I’m bored!” rings through houses across America and parents’ wells of ideas begin to run dry. The excitement of summer has started to wear off, play date pals are away on vacation, and our little swimmers are a bit water-logged. Though a loose daily schedule seems to provide endless opportunities for fun, parents everywhere are looking for quick and easy ways to break the monotony of summer. Here are a few “out of the box” ideas for keeping your children intrigued this summer.

*Call your local pet shelter and ask about volunteer opportunities. This may include a weekly trip to the shelter, handing out fliers for a pet rescue organization, or feeding the animals. Shelters likely have clear rules on who can volunteer and in what capacity, so check with them first before springing the idea on your children. If they don’t allow children to volunteer, bring your child to drop off bags of food or new toys for the animals. Seeing how much work it takes to care for a pet could also cure the constant requests for a puppy!

*Have a donation stand instead of a lemonade stand. Set up three jars for three different charities and generous neighbors can drop their donation in the jar of their choice. After your collection, have your children write a letter to accompany the donation when you send it off to the charity. They can also hang a “thank you” sign outside the house after the collections are completed.

*Have a family cook-off! Have each of your children choose a recipe to make. Invite family members or neighbors over for a taste and have them cast votes. Instead of first, second, and third place, which can surely hurt feelings, have categories such as most unique recipe, best presentation, and sweetest treat. Be sure to have a prize for each participant. Your local dollar store is a great place to pick up ribbons or small toys.

Remember, the key to keeping your children happily occupied is to provide a variety of activities. The activities don’t have to be grand trips or expensive outings. There are plenty of simple, cost-effective ways to spice up your routine summer days. Check back on Thursday for more ideas!

According to a new study, the number of children getting computed tomography, or CT scans when visiting hospital emergency rooms has skyrocketed over the past 14 years, CNN reported.

Researchers collected survey data over a 14-year period, spanning from 1995 to 2008, and found that ER visits that included a CT exam jumped from 330,000 to 1.65 million.  That’s a fivefold increase in scans.

Eight-nine percent of the visits were to non-pediatric hospitals, and the radiologists who oversaw and interpreted the scans were likely not trained in pediatric radiology, according to the study’s lead author Dr. David Larson, director of quality improvement, Department of Radiology at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center.

“We need to think creatively about how to partner with each other, with ordering clinicians and with CT manufacturers to ensure that all children are scanned only when it is appropriate and with appropriate techniques,” Larson said.

The injuries that most often result in a CT exam include head injuries, abdominal pain and headaches.  Scans for abdominal pain showed the biggest increase, thanks to technology improvements – but researchers say this may not an entirely positive finding.

Though abdominal CT imaging is widely available, thorough and fast, the radiation dosage is up to seven times that of a head CT.

Experts say the increase in CT scans for children overall is likely being driven by parents who are pushing for them more, and doctors who are willing to perform them.

“Doctors are afraid of missing things, afraid of missing a diagnosis,” said Dr. James Chamberlain, division chief, Emergency Medicine & Trauma Services at Children’s National Medical Center in Washington, D.C.  “They are afraid of malpractice and parents are more likely to advocate for their children than they were 10-15 years ago.”

Chamberlain emphasized, however, that because of the risks associated with excess radiation exposure, parents should make a point to ask doctors if their child really needs a CT scan.

“This study is alarming and should make all of us very concerned about radiation and children’s brains and abdomens,” he said. “Hospitals should be examining their practices, they should be benchmarking individual doctors against each other and against national standards and they should be assuring that appropriate doses of radiation are used for children.”

According to Chamberlain, criteria have already been developed on who actually needs a CT scan for a head injury. Those patients include people who have been unconscious, have a deformed head, are vomiting, suffered a severe injury such as being in a car that has rolled over. The setting of criteria for abdominal scans is under way.

Meanwhile, the Alliance for Radiation Safety in Pediatric Imaging is heading a national campaign called “Image Gently,” the  goal of which is to increase awareness about lowering radiation doses in children, and harness the expertise of pediatric hospitals to teach non-pediatric hospitals how to use the appropriate dosages of radiation.

Click here to read more from CNN.

Forty percent of American children have seasonal allergies. When a parent has allergies, his or her child will probably have them too.

Most allergies tend to appear in childhood. So, if you have seasonal allergies as an adult, you probably started getting them as a kid.

As children, boys get more allergies than girls, but as they get older, women usually catch up to men.

Even though we say allergies are seasonal, they can occur year-round. In the spring, you can get allergies to grass and pollen, and in the fall you can get allergies to ragweed, molds and spores of different kinds.

Allergies occur when pollen, mold or dust kick your immune system into high gear, triggering a release of histamines, those chemicals that are mostly responsible for the sneezing, the runny nose, the itchy throat, and the watery eyes.

If teenagers weren’t properly exposed to their environment as children, their immune system won’t be able to recognize as harmless the pollen, dust and mold spores around them every day.

Loading the Virus Protection Program

Your immune system is essentially a system of specialized cells and organs that protects you from outside threats such as viruses, bacteria and other biological outsiders.

It is during the first decade of life that it learns which biological intrusions it needs to protect you against. What this means is, if you don’t get exposed to many of the harmless biological threats in your environment during your first decade of life, if you do not challenge the immune system early, you may pay the price with seasonal allergies and asthma throughout the rest of your life.

I’m talking about the dangers of over protecting our children. Some of this overprotection has been institutionalized in the form of widespread use of antibiotics, vaccinations against various diseases, cleaner food and water, and better living conditions.

But some parents may make this “problem” worse by keeping their kids at home in a “sterilized” environment – never taking them to the park, never letting them play in a sandbox, never letting them roll around in the grass, never letting them have a pet at home, and keeping them away from other kids who may be sick.

By underexposing our children to bacteria, certain viruses, and other minor threats in the environment, their immune systems will not develop the appropriate responses, and they may end up with seasonal allergies and other problems of an inexperienced immune system.

Studies show that if you have a pet when you’re a kid, you are less likely to get asthma. The same applies to running and rolling around in the grass at the park when you are three years old; those who do tend to have fewer seasonal allergies later on. A little exposure is a good thing.

Allergy Prevention

Prevention is the best treatment for seasonal allergies. Have you heard of spring cleaning? They don’t call it that for nothing.

If people in your household have allergies, it is important to do a thorough cleaning of the house, especially in the spring, by removing all the dust that has collected in your house over the winter.

It’s a good time to shampoo your rugs, vacuum all the nooks and crannies, and remove the mold from all kitchen, bathroom and garage surfaces.

If you have allergies in the spring and summer, take a few precautionary steps to avoid bringing allergens back into the house.

When you come in from the outdoors, don’t bring the clothes you’ve worn outdoors into the bedroom; change in another part of the house and take a shower, if you can.

Avoid being outdoors from the late morning to early afternoon, as those are the peak hours for pollen production. Keep your windows closed if you’re really allergic.

Teenagers bully others in an attempt to increase their own popularity, research suggests.

HealthDay News reported the results of a new study, which claims that the teens who are most likely to bully others are those that are already popular, but want to be even more so.

The teens, researchers say, believe that antagonizing their peers will increase their social status.  Thus, those teens with high social status, but not the highest, are the most likely to engage in intimidation through bullying.

“Status increases aggression,” said lead study author Robert Faris, an assistant professor of sociology at University of California, Davis. “For a long time, people perceived aggression as a maladjusted reaction to problems at home or mental health issues, but our research is consistent with the idea it’s a nasty underbelly to social hierarchies. Aggression is perceived to be a way of getting ahead.”

Bullying levels peaked among teens who fit into 98th percentile of popularity.  However, once teens reached the top 2 percentiles of popularity, bullying levels fell drastically.

Researchers theorize that the most popular kids in school generally do not bully others because they no longer have any need to get ahead.  In fact, once at the top of the social pecking order, continuing to bully others may be seen as insecurity in one’s social position, which could actually lead to a decrease in popularity.

Bullying is also rare among the least popular students, presumably because they have no power to do so.

Researchers also observed a large “silent majority” – 67 percent of teens were not aggressive or mean toward anyone, but generally acted as tacit observers to the 33 percent who were.

Those 33 percent picked on an average of 2 other kids.  The maximum number of people any one bully picked on was nine.

However, multiple bullies might target the same person.  Researchers saw that one person could have as many as 17 different aggressors.

The dangers of bullying has come to light in recent years with news stories about bullied students committing suicide or being killed in aggressive acts that were taken too far.  Every day, an average of 160,000 U.S. students skip school because of bullying.

The study was published in the February issue of the American Sociological Review.

Click here to read more from HealthDay News.

A new study is creating controversy with its claim that children with working mothers are more likely to be overweight, CTV.ca reported.

The results of the study indicated that for every five months a child’s mother worked away from home, there was an 10 percent higher increase in the child’s BMI compared to other children the same age.

According to researchers, this is the equivalent of gaining nearly one pound more than what a child typically would every five months.  Over time, these pounds can add up and eventually lead to obesity.

“We want to emphasize that this is not a maternal employment issue; this is a family balance issue,” said lead researcher Taryn Morrissey.

Morrissey and other researchers from American University, Cornell University and the University of Chicago compiled data from more than 900 children in 10 U.S. cities, with emphasis on children in grades 3, 5 and 6.

They speculated that the reason that these children gain more weight is because families in which both parents work tend to eat out more often, eat more fast food, and are more likely to skip breakfast.

The effect was seen most strongly in fifth and sixth grade children, who were more likely to gain weight than any other age group.  This may be because children at this age tend to have more independence in their food choices than younger children, the researchers said.

The study was published in Child Development.

Click here to read more from CTV.ca.