Big Kids & Teens

Board exam year is the most pressurised period in an Indian childhood. The parent's job is not to add to it — it is to hold the routine, the food, the sleep and the perspective.

The first orthodontic check belongs around age seven, and most treatment starts years later. Knowing which problems need catching early is what the early visit is for.

Children rarely say the word. They say their stomach hurts, they lose things, they stop wanting to go. Here is how to recognise it, and how to make a school act.

The Class 10 decision gets treated as irreversible and often is not. Here is what each stream actually opens, how to decide, and what to do when the decision turns out wrong.

Results day in India carries a weight it should not, and every year children are lost to it. What a parent says in the first hour matters more than anything that follows.

There is no age at which a girl needs a bra — there is a point at which she is more comfortable with one. Here is how to judge it, and how to buy without making it an ordeal.

You cannot supervise a teenager's phone the way you supervise a toddler's. What works is a small number of firm rules, an open conversation, and attention to sleep.

Indian girls still commonly reach their first period without knowing what it is. The conversation is not one talk at thirteen — it is a series of ordinary ones, starting years earlier.

Adolescence is turbulent by design, which is exactly why real distress gets dismissed as a phase. Here is how to tell the difference, and what to do.

There is no medical age for hair removal, and there is a great deal of pressure — from cousins, classmates and relatives who comment. Here is how to handle it kindly and safely.

Forbidding it does not prevent it; it prevents you from knowing. Here is how to set boundaries that a teenager will actually work within.

Feet are still growing into the late teens, and heels do measurable things to them. Here is the practical middle ground between never and every day.

There is no medical age for make-up, and the argument is rarely about make-up. Here is a way to handle it that keeps the relationship and the boundary.

Body odour arrives with puberty, often at nine or ten, and long before most parents expect it. Here is what to use, and how to raise it without making a child self-conscious.

Puberty in girls follows a predictable order across about four years. Knowing the sequence tells you roughly when the first period is coming — usually about two years after the first change.

Boys start puberty about two years after girls and finish later, which is why a Class 7 classroom looks the way it does. Here is the order, and what to tell him before it starts.

At ten, friends begin to matter more than parents. That is developmentally correct, and it is the moment to make sure the channel home stays open.

Eleven is early adolescence: the body is changing, the mood is unreliable, and the child is negotiating for a version of independence they are not quite ready for.

Twelve is the last quiet year before the board-exam machinery starts. It is worth using to build the habits and the relationship that will carry the next five.

Seven is when a child starts having views you did not give them — about fairness, about friends, and about you.

Eight-year-olds can do a great deal and have just started noticing what they cannot. How the family handles that decides a lot.

Nine is the last year of clear childhood for many children. Bodies begin changing for some, and the door starts closing — literally.