My son is one of the few who still goes to high school by bicycle. The neighbor who always accompanies him was recently bought an electric scooter and, as a consequence, has left the bicycle in the storage room (perhaps forever). We are lucky that we live relatively close to the high school and most of the streets are safe for cycling, even with sections of bike lanes.

Susanna Ramírez worked at a school in l'Escala based on the Montessori method. She liked it so much that, when later on she had to join another faculty, with a very different way of working, she contributed ideas and activities she had learned back then. She saw that they were well-received, to the point that a colleague encouraged her to post them on social media and share them. From this, the Instagram profile @propostes.per.infantil was born, a space that Susanna feeds with what she puts into practice in the classroom, with the simple goal of "weaving a network and helping each other out".

The afternoons are getting shorter and it is cold, but the weekends are full of plans to do as a family. As always, we have prepared a selection of plans for you to do with your children on November 6th, 7th, and 8th, such as enjoying the first screenings of My First Film Festival; being amazed by the light installations of Lluèrnia, the Fire and Light Festival of Olot, and tracking small mammals at the Ivars and Vila-sana lake, in Urgell.

This school year is abnormal for a large part of the student body in Catalonia. More than 1,000 educational centers have been left without school camps or field trips –or with significant cuts– by decision of the teaching staff. This movement is part of a pressure strategy by teachers to demand that they be paid for these trips and overnight stays (last year it was already established that they would be compensated with 50 euros per night, but the unions see it as insufficient) and, above all, to urge the Department of Education to sit down and negotiate the unions' demands. This Tuesday, families made their move: 391 Student Family Associations (AFA) have sided with the teaching staff and joined forces to demand "concrete measures" from the government to recover these activities.

Parenthood came to me at a time when I was beginning to go birding quite a lot. But when you are a parent, and of twins in an augmented way, you have to put aside, even if only temporarily, certain things. This meant that for a few years I went out into the field less to see birds, but it has also made me develop a passion for explaining birds to my children, to my friends, on social media and in the book.

November and the holiday of All Saints' Day arrive, and for a few days we talk more about those who are no longer with us by bringing flowers to the cemetery, remembering grandparents, or telling old family stories. And while we do this, we try to manage our own emotions, and if there are children nearby, the question may arise: what do we do with children's grief?

Motherhood is at odds with sleeping through the night. There is no Estivill method for mothers who have been left scrambled after so many nights of breastfeeding. We are exhausted from filling Dalsy syringes with half-closed eyes in the middle of the night and from sleeping like contortionists to try and fit in the child who has climbed into our bed looking for a safe place. I have spent almost twenty years sleeping little and poorly because with four children I have been through every stage: checking if they are breathing, viruses, nocturnal vomiting, slumber parties, shouts at dawn playing on the Play, and now the moment has arrived to go out partying.

Aiman, ten years old, trusts InfoK. He never misses a broadcast day. He does not trust social networks or other portals, he says there is a lot of fake news and that only when the children's news program reports the news, he is satisfied. He is in the best hands. After 25 years of the program, its presenter since 2020, Núria Vilanova, confesses that the trust of the young viewers is the best gift they can send her. “You have given me goosebumps, Aiman. These words give meaning to our work,” gestures the presenter as she gives him a hug. Aiman and two hundred boys and girls had the opportunity to meet the host and her youngest reporter, Alaaddine Azzouzi, at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, where the educational center and the public television celebrated a congress about the more than 4,300 programs of InfoK.

When they make the transition from school to high school, most teenagers start wanting to go out to party. A desire to discover new things, to grow up, to meet people, and to have a good time in a space far from the family's supervision. Many fathers and mothers, however, experience these first festive nights with worry and suffering. They worry that something might happen to their children late at night, they get anxious when they do not answer messages, and they are not calm until they return home safe and sound. Now then, is it possible to find a balance between the young people's eagerness for fun and the adults' anxiety? Between controlling and forbidding? Between giving freedom and crossing the line?

One of the most awaited dates of the year is here: the Castanyada and now also Halloween. That is why the activities for these days revolve around the theme of chestnuts, scary stories, and pumpkins. As always, we have prepared a selection of plans for you to do with your children on October 30th, 31st, and November 1st, such as getting scared at the Espantanens parade in Puigcerdà, eating chestnuts and panellets at the Operació Castaween at Món Sant Benet, and seeing giant pumpkins at the Calaf Pumpkin Fair.

Excessive screen use and few hours of sleep and outdoor time, along with other factors such as hereditary ones, are turning myopia into one of the refractive defects that most frequently affect adolescents and young people. In fact, a study by the Faculty of Optics and Optometry of Terrassa at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC) points out that childhood myopia almost triples between the ages of 8 and 12. The Childhood Visual Health Cohort of Terrassa (CISViT) research project, developed by the Vision, Optometry and Health (VOS) research group of the Polytechnic University of Catalonia - BarcelonaTech (UPC), linked to the Faculty of Optics and Optometry of Terrassa (FOOT), reveals unprecedented longitudinal data on the child population of southern Europe. Initiated in 2021, the project currently has more than 2,500 participants.

Our home is a beautiful chaos. There is always something going on: a little game in the hallway...

There are moments when living with a teenager feels like a constant negotiation: reminding them to pick up their things, to keep a commitment, or not to always leave for tomorrow what they need to do today. Adults insist, young people resist, and a daily matter ends in an argument. It is easy to interpret this as a lack of will. But learning to take on responsibilities is more complex than following instructions.

The name Narcís intoxicates like the namesake family of bulbous plants with beautiful and fragrant flowers (Narcissus); even so, it is one of those names in danger of extinction in our country. Among male names, Narcís currently occupies the 239th position in Catalonia, very far from the 125th position it holds among those born before 1940.

We are at the threshold of the first of the dates with which the school calendar is dotted with holidays that we call “traditional”. This festive calendar begins with the Castanyada, and in this first stage we are already faced with a first contradiction that we must resolve.

Racism, prejudice, anger, or fascism are elements that have been present intermittently throughout history. But it is true that today, through social media and influencers, young people have greater access to content from all over the world, content—sometimes more biased than others—that sometimes takes hold significantly in their thoughts and beliefs. In the words of illustrator and photojournalist Jordi Borràs, these discourses “do not take hold in them simply because they are young, but because they have less experience, less training, and less cultural and ideological foundation, and they lack the vital and historical perspective that we adults have”.

We have a new weekend ahead full of activities and all of them are already starting to take on the colors of autumn. As always, we have prepared a selection of plans for you to do with your children on October 23rd, 24th, and 25th, such as enjoying Canalla!, the new children's and youth book festival in Vic; participating in the Early Childhood Days in Cambrils, or taking an excursion to Montseny to visit the Autumn Fair and the Arbúcies Flabiol Festival.

Like penguins is an autofiction show, in which I tell the story of Helena, who is me. In it, I explain why I became a clown.

Sandra Bruna (Barcelona, 1973) is a literary agent. Twenty-five years ago she created the Sandra Bruna Literary Agency and represents more than a hundred authors.

She grew up on Nàpols street, in the Dreta de l'Eixample, which she claims has changed a lot over the years. “It was a neighborhood that was a real neighborhood. I remember Miquel, the man from the kiosk, the plumber who would come to the house to fix things for you... That which now seems like it can only happen in small towns, before it also happened in the neighborhoods of Barcelona,” she explains. Bruna went to the Sagrat Cor school, in Tetuan square. “I was a very studious girl, but the sciences were very hard for me. I had to put a lot of effort into math, chemistry, physics, and that was a tough process. On the other hand, everything that was literature went very well for me. Many times they would reward me for the effort rather than for the results, especially in the science line, because they saw that I really worked very hard at it,” she recalls.

Gabriel Ginebra is part of the Regional Expert Council of the TUI (Time Use Initiative) and will be one of the speakers at the Time Use Week that is being held from October 19th to 21st in Barcelona. He is part of a family of twelve siblings, he has raised seven children with his wife, and now he has two grandchildren.