Parenting

** Parenting **

Parenting is a course that begins at conception and ends at toddlers. The students learn how to conceive and how to prevent conception. Once pregnant, student discuss options available to the women. Pregnancy care, nutrition, fetal development, genetic disorders, and the birth process are discussed. The students also experience pregnancy through the empathy belly which simulates many of the effects that pregnancy has on a women. The students then learn about the types of post-partum depression, and baby care including feeding and diapering options, reflexes, growth and social, physical and emotional development of an infant. The course also includes a 3-day experience of parenting with a computerized reality baby which simulates a newborn's life and demands. This reality experiment is very educational for the students. The course ends with a study on toddlers and their physical, emotional, social, and motor skills. Students get to visit a daycare center and create dramatic play boxes for developing toddlers. The final project students invite toddlers into the classroom to play with their creations.