… And I’d love your input. Any thoughts? What would you like to see added, removed or improved?
While I’m in the early design stages, please think about what currently works, what doesn’t, and especially what I can do to improve your experience on the site.
Questions to consider:
- When you visit the site, do you find what you’re looking for?
- Do you have any suggestions about how you’d like to see posts organized?
Other specifics I’d love you to weigh in on:
Community forum
Do you (or would you) use this forum? In recent years, it has been used only minimally and, to be honest, it is an administration nightmare because of the spam “users” constantly applying.
However, I love being able to offer a place where parents and professionals can find like-minded respectful care enthusiasts in their cities across the globe. One idea I’m considering is removing the discussion topic threads entirely and leaving just the “RIE-Inspired Parents, Caregivers and Preschools Connect” and “Parents Connect Locally” (which is currently only visible to registered users). It would still require maintenance work on my end, and I’m always crushed for time, so I’d love to know if you would actually use this service.
Products
Along with the new articles and podcasts I will continue to offer free of charge, I also have two Amazon bestsellers: Elevating Child Care: A Guide to Respectful Parenting and No Bad Kids: Toddler Discipline Without Shame and a busy telephone consulting service. I’m also developing an exciting new audio product (more on that soon). Are there any other services or products that would interest you? I welcome your ideas!
If you have any thoughts or opinions, please leave feedback as a comment on this post. I can’t promise to respond to every comment, but everything will absolutely be read and carefully considered.
I look forward to your insights and thank you for taking the time to share them with me!
With appreciation,
Janet
Hi Janet!
Main points from me:
Please please please don’t go down the commercial route. Play at home mom went very commercial and it is a huge turn off to see lots of adds on a page. It just looks bad. As it is, with recommended reading it’s fine.
I would agree that the forum is defunct now Facebook is around. Parents connect would be great. Keep pointing users from Facebook there to ensure it is continually updated.
Training. Online seminars. Would love some thing there. For educators too 😉
Links to places to purchase great materials. But done tastefully (without blaring advertisement on the homepage etc) like climbing structures, play objects.
Finally, a personality test to see what kind of peaceful parent i am. Kidding.
Can’t wait to see the final website!
Hi Sarah! I have the results of the test already… you are a CHAMPION as a peaceful parent. 🙂 So, that was easy.
I really appreciate your feedback! No way am I doing blatant advertising, so no worries about that. A recommendation page is in the works… thanks for the encouragement!
Love, love the idea of doing online trainings. I’ve been in discussion with a couple of people about the possibilities… that probably won’t be coming up right away with the redesign, but it’s in the near future, for sure.
Thank you again!
Janet,
First, you are a LIFESAVER.
Also, I second the above of online trainings. Honestly, I want trainings as a professional. I would really like to start groups and maybe even a day care or preschool someday using this philosophy, but coming out to California or any of the big cities for 2 weeks is not feasible for me right now, with little ones and working full time. So, any kind of training to spread the love would be amazing.
Also, I would love it if the articles could be searched by category because when I am desperate, I am DESPERATE.
Thank you!!!!
Jenny
Hi Janet,
Thank you for the great content and inspiration! I’ve gotten so much out of reading your articles while raising my 3-year-old and thinking ahead to how I’ll handle my new arrival this spring.
A couple thoughts on a new site:
– More responsive or mobile-friendly – fonts seem quite small on my iPad and iPhone where I do most of my reading – especially your blue font intros that are somethings illegible on mobile.
– consider categorizing content with tags on posts rather than sorted into menu categories
– if possible, more podcasts and ideas for extending concepts into preschool age and beyond
Thanks again!
Amy
Hi Amy! Thanks for your kind words!
YES to the mobile friendly! Something has gone wrong with the plugin we have for that. It was working, but isn’t at the moment for some reason… and my developer has been ill…so I’m sorry, but that will be back in good shape soon.
Hmm… interesting idea about not having menu cagtegories. Wondering if we could both… both tag and also have listed categories.
Great feedback about resources for children older than preschoolers… My focus will continue to be the early years, but since I now have a 14,19, and 23 year old and have never needed another “method” all these years, I could certainly share more about respectful parenting in the later years.
Thanks again, Amy!
Couple comments – my biggest one is that I cannot increase the mobile font size right now. It is so so tiny, especially your top bolded fonts where parents ask a question etc.
Second one is – I love that you haven’t had a million ads and detection stuff on your pages. I have a big issue with them – slowing the load time, taking over and polluting the page space. I think you should always promote your books and any other sale able offerings though. I have learned a great deal from your blog and would like to see you continue successfully!
Thanks, Sylva, the mobile issue was a kink that should be sorted out… and I AM going to continue to avoid ads and pop-ups and all that garbage. Thanks for your support!
Hi! Love your stuff so much! I would appreciate the ability to search specifically for topics like, “interrupting,” “constantly saying Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy”
Things that may not have entire sections dedicated to them but more specific “I need help now” topics.
Ha! Yes, I’m not sure how we can do that, but will certainly look into it. Sometimes a Google search is helpful for pulling up entire sentences… For example, Googling: “Constantly saying Mommy, mommy, mommy, mommy Janet Lansbury”. I know, because I sometimes need to find my own stuff that way ;).
Regarding “mommy, mommy, mommy”, here’s a podcast about that: https://soundcloud.com/janet-lansbury/your-child-asks-again-and-again-and-again
I find it difficult to find articles that I have read previously. Can you please have categories for different topics you have covered?
Also if you can share different success stories from parents, I love those!
Yes, I plan to have subject categories that will be easier to navigate.
Brilliant idea about having a place for the success stories!!! I’ve been needing a place to store them all! Thanks!
Hi Janet,
I love your Facebook posts and podcasts and have been to the site a few times because I wanted to use the forum but for some reason I couldn’t get it working. I would love for the community bit to work. I really wanted to connect with other parents and share info and even meet up (as an expat trying respectful parenting in another country) but the registration process was confusing – I got an email but then was never added properly – anyway, for me that’s the most important thing.
I personally wouldn’t engage in a discussion on Facebook because it’s too public – anyone I know who follows you will see me discussing private issues and that’s not for me.
I haven’t read most of the above comments but someone mentioned not going commercial. I 100% agree. I guess it’s a difficult one for you as the idea is to make a living, but I find that so many of the parenting blogs post too often so it starts to feel like the posts are a waste of time, just the same old stuff getting pushed out to increase the number of clicks. Also being too pushy about products is a turn off – looking too slick and branded is suspicious.
One of the reasons I would come to the site is to find an article for a friend, so for me a strong search function is really important. I’m not sure if you already have this but adding the podasts into the search would be useful.The podcasts are great though I do find it difficult to go back through them and find one I want to share with my husband.
An audio product that demonstrates the fundamentals of RIE in terms of tone and useful phrases to use in different situations would be fabulous!
I still want to find the podcast where you mentioned that in some situations you don’t have to empathise with a preschooler who has done something you’re unhappy with… can you remember that point? It’s such a big issue in our home! Was it the parents of multiples podcast?? Maybe I should send you an email about this question separately!
Many thanks for all your help and advice via this site!
Hi Janet,
How exciting! I love your site and your books, and as a paediatric Speech Pathologist, often direct parents to the resources you supply. I second (?third) the call for no commercialisation if possible – or maybe what I’m really worried about is a paywall. This blog is such a great service, I love it being available to my strapped-for-cash clients free of charge. And many of them do then go on to purchase the books!
A few other comments from me:
– I would find an index or contents page, and/or FAQ really helpful for tracking down past posts. I often return to posts, and the tags and search function are clunkier than they need to be.
– It might be useful to have separate posts, each reviewing a specific recommended (or non-recommended) book or resource. I love your book list at the side of the blog, but it would be even better to hear your thoughts about their specific content.
– I don’t and I wouldn’t use the community forum. I prefer using the Facebook based RIE group.
Hope this is helpful.
Hi Janet,
I love your articles. I find that my search keywords never pull up the article topics I am looking for, even though I know the articles exist on your site. Also the summary text at the beginning if your articles is a bit too small. Not a huge deal! Thanks!!
I read you website only on the iphone and in this version I miss the date of the blog posts.
When you link one of your articles on facebook or twitter i always wonder whether it is a new one, which I will find in my feedreader later anyway.
I’d love to see a section for older kids too. As my older one gets to be school age, and the younger one preschool age, I feel like we could use the guidance and specific examples and developmental info for older kids.
I would also love if there were some training programs available in Canada or a listing to connect some of us!
I love your work, its so meaningful and I’m so happy to have found direction gor the ways I’ve always thought children should be treated! Thank you for all you do!
Hi Janet – thank you for everything you do. I love your books, website and podcast. It would be great to be able to search your archive by age (of child) as well as general activity (sleeping, breastfeeding, classes, school, etc) as well as behaviour…? (tantrums etc?) I am not sure if that would even be possible but searching by age/phase would be brilliant.
Hi Janet,
I love reading your posts and i read every single one! You have been a great inspiration for us, thanks again.
– I would like to receive a notification when i comment on one of your posts here on the website and someone answers my comment.
– I would not use the forum, i’d use the FB page.
– I find the experiences you share on FB of “real parents with real kids” very very useful. I’d love to have more of these, they help go from intelect to reality.
Looking forward to discovering your new website!
I’m guessing you’re already feeling overwhelmed nuby all the suggestions and I know you’re strapped for time, but I’d love for you to write another book (compiling blog posts) and most importantly recording it into an audiobook. The podcasts and audiobooks have been most useful for me but I’ve literally listened to each and every one of them several times and would looooove more! Thanks for everything you do.
Thank you so much for all of the wonderful information you provide. I have used it many times and often refer other early childhood professionals to your website. With that in mind, I would love to see a monthly training webinar/video that people in the ECE field could view to introduce them to the concepts of respectful caregiving and also to expand their knowledge/understanding of this. The ECE field needs more advocates to help promote RIE methods and how they can be implemented in an early childhood center setting. It would be wonderful to have online videos that model respectful interactions between caregivers in a child care setting and infants/toddlers. Even something as basic as a respectful diaper change, feeding, or allowing infants to find their own way of moving their bodies instead of manipulating them or plunking them in containers. Keep up the great work…we need it!
Graphic Designer weighing in here. 🙂
I would suggest increasing the font contrast with the sidebar areas (currently the green on greeny beige is not high contrast enough for anyone who has vision difficulties.
Your buttons like “Submit comment” should be larger & coloured both for visibility purposes as well as making submitting comments easier for those with larger fingers.
I’d also suggest having your widget headers “archives, sites of interest etc” look less buttony and more “this is a header and not something you need to click on”.
Also suggest removing your archives list from the widget area– or at least shrinking it down or making it a link instead, it’s a bit too long and gets rather overwhelming to look through.
Otherwise, as a parent, I totally agree with the rest of the feedback. Having articles about older kids, categories, FAQ, etc, would all be very helpful.
Thanks for doing everything you do!
Hello Janet
I can not say enough praises for your informative and helpful articles and I look forward to exploring your new website! I have learned so much already and am always seeking new ways to make day to day life more manageable and enjoyable for families. I currently use your blog/articles as a teaching tool that I share with my colleagues and the families I work with as an early intervention teacher for infants and toddlers with special needs. We work with them in their homes and in our center so the information you provide helps us help families make life less stressful for them and gives them the tools they need to help their babies develop and grow into loving, contributing members of a family and community.
For the future site, it would be nice to have the articles listed by topic for easy access. I would also like to be able to print them to share with colleagues and families.
A list of your favorite resources for purchasing that could be easily printed would also be wonderful. Families are always looking for new ideas that help with a variety of child rearing topics.
Thank you so much for the work you do. It is making a huge difference in the lives of so many children and families. Please know that your work is appreciated.
Sincerely,
Dawn
I read your posts mainly on my phone so as someone previously mentioned mobile font size – it’s currently a little small. Also as I read through a blog reader (feedly) i really hope the new site will be compatible. Thanks so much!
I also hope you don’t have to switch to heavy advertising because I find I end up giving up on those types of sites. I’d still read because your content is so well thought out and wonderful but would probably get frustrated or annoyed with the distractions and longer load times.
I wish more people used the parents connect locally feature here. I’ve tried putting feelers out there on FB but they seem to get lost in the fray, plus FB feels “too” public to me sometimes
Hi Janet,
I’m constantly linking to your website when my fellow moms of multiples have questions. It’s a terrific resource—but I usually google searh “Janet Lansbury ” to find what I need! So maybe more robust/obvious searching/indexing? Also, I love the parents connect with parents feature of the forum—it’s how I made my first friend ever when we moved across the country!! Resources for older kids would be great, but I know your focus is really the younger set 🙂
Facebook is too public for me too. Though if most people prefer it, it might be hard to keep both a facebook group and a forum going. The forum needs fewer subforums to start to feel active- it’s good to keep the geographic stuff separate but the general parenting stuff would be better altogether while it is low traffic. I had problems registering too – seem to remember that I had to try several different e-mail addresses until one worked.
It’d be nice if there were a blog post corresponding to each podcast to announce that it has been published – partly as a place to ask questions in the comments etc. and also because I forget to check if there are any new podcasts!
Hi Janet,
I have three comments:
1. I am such a fan of your wise articles and advice that I always want to spread the word around me. To that end, I always wish there was an introduction on the home page which explained your philosophy and RIE (something along the lines of your wonderful “what your baby can’t tell you” post).
2. I agree with Larissa that I am always searching for your articles from a google search and not directly from the search tool of the site itself as it seems to work better.
3. I am based in Europe and dream to travel to California to attend one of your classes. In the meantime, it would be wonderful to have more videos of your classes (that is if the parents agree of course 🙂
Hope this help,
Cecilia
I LOVE your work….. I tried to post a comment a few days ago and it didn’t work, just lost what I wrote (my iPad is really slow….)
I don’t have Facebook, so I would love a link of the podcast on the website. Just like a new blog entry: here’s the new podcast of this week, titled…. So if the title sounds interesting I can have a look. It’s not always easy to read a Facebook public page….
I love your web site and think it’s perfect just the way it is! I think someone found me here in Jerusalem thru the Forum, so I guess I would like you to keep it in some format.
Dear Janet,
I have just a few comments. I love your page and have read most of articles and quite a few of them several times. Search option is not very helpful at the moment I’ve found. Somehow not all the articles where a particular topic is discussed come up. There is one low tech version alternative, that I’ve seen on some other blogs and found helpful – a list of topics with all the articles below that discuss the matter or even just touches on the topic. I found it easy to use as it allowed to scroll down, find the topic I was looking for and read all the articles about it. Not sure if it would work in you blog, but might consider.
As for the forum, I have looked in it once. I follow facebook page much more.
It would be good to have also your podcasts and youtube videos available on your page (not just pinned within articles). When I went crazy with RIE at first, I spent hours watching all your videos on youtube and when I watched all yours I then searched and watched all other RIE videos available on youtube. It helps so much to have a visual reference of everything you write about.
That’s all. I hope it helps.
Karina
Oh sorry, just realised that podcasts are available already.
Dear Janet,
I LOVE your website and blog and have recommended it too many times to count. I agree that the color contrast could be more pronounced. I do not want to share my opinions publicly on Facebook, as some people do. I very much prefer a forum kind of share. Have you considered making a LinkedIn group which is less public than FB?
I also agree with those who would keep the ads off to the side as they are. Non-obtrusive, yet there if one wants to see them.
And I agree with the recommendation page.
Now, a big THANK YOU for your wonderful work!!! Wishing you major success with the new website and in your important help to so many parents!!!
I’d love to be able to search for posts applicable to my child’s age! often when I search by topic I wind up reading posta that are informative but perhaps not applicable to my child’s current age or stage of development.
Hi Janet – I’m sure most people, more skilled than me, have expressed great ideas already – I’ve read a few of their ideas. So many highly skilled peeps in your readership!
My suggestion: now that you are traveling and doing more speaking engagements it might be worth posting where you will be next.
As others have said, I frequently use your articles to assist parents who are struggling and for that I am extremely grateful.
As always – hugs.
Hi
I love your site and the podcasts are so useful but I don’t use facebook so I agree a link to the podcast on the site would be great. Maybe with a comments section for people to discuss what you’ve said for a time after it’s published (but that might increase your workload even more) I’m so appreciative of the amount of excellent content you put out for free – it prompted us to buy your books and I recommend the site to everyone.
I have always use your site on my mobile so I don’t know if how your site looks changes a lot. But before this new design it was a lot easier to see your older articles and filter them.
Since this new design it’s more difficult. So I would say filtering could be improved specifically for mobile users.
Hello Janet,
I love reading your posts and find even the tone of your articles gentle and reassuring; making it easier for us to flow it down to our kids.
My suggestions:
Please increase the body font size. For all the great content, the readability could be better.
Maybe you can do a guest feature/podcast, where you bring in parenting perspectives from all over the world. What works/what doesn’t work in different parts of the world.
The other suggestions have already been voiced above.
Thanks,
Shobha
Hi Janet,
I’m from Brasil and just found out about RIE and you. It is new world for me but your books and Magdas are part of my life already.
I feel I’m much behind yet because my oldest is going to be for this Tuesday and the other two are 2,4 and 1,2.
I am probably going to the US to take the Foundation course, but would also love to have some kind of online course with you.
Love your work, love to have found this new way of parenting with respect
I do love the forums on your website. I recently joined your Facebook page, but I don’t like to publicly post about my child. The forums offer some anonymity. I also like to read all the posts and your responses. It sort of ‘fleshes out’ the techniques presented in the blog. I hope you find a way to keep them that is much easier for you to maintain. Oh, and I know someone else mentioned it, but an email sent to alert you that someone has replied to your post would be helpful. Thank you for all you do!
Your site has been such a life saver! I have bought one of your books, and plan on buying more. But, I know I use the site more than the books, and I want to pay for all this help. I think it is wonderful when we can ‘vote’ our dollars for what we want more of and to be able to compensate you for all your work–and for there to be practicality for keeping it up. I’ve seen sites that have ‘donate’ buttons and I love it. We don’t have a ton of money, but, hope, if we, and others like us were giving the opportunity to support this site, we would! Anyway, thank you for this site!
Janet,
You are amazing! Thank you thank you for helping me a better person (not just parent)!!! I would absolutely love a secret Facebook group. KelleyMom has one and it was indispensable during my breastfeeding days. It’s an awesome resource if you feel up for moderating. Thank you!
Hi Janet,
One little thing for me is that I listen to your podcasts on the iPhone podcast app but I don’t think I can get directly there from your website. Is there a way to make this an option? At the moment I search for the topic I’m interested in on your website and then when I’ve found a title I want to listen to I need to search for that on iphone podcasts. Thank you so much for continuously sharing your wealth of knowledge.
Best wishes,
Alice
Thank you for your interest, Alice. My podcasts are embedded here from Soundcloud rather than iTunes. So they can be listened to directly here (free) via Soundcloud. For other channels, you’ll need to go those channels and find the podcast. Sorry for the inconvenience!