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One evening before dinner, I noticed my four-and-a-half-year-old son, who is in full-day junior kindergarten, sitting glumly on the kitchen floor. I sat down next to him and asked, ?Was today a good day or a bad day"? In a sudden burst of candour, he told me it had been a good day, but it turned bad when the girl who had professed her love to him the week before told him she now wanted to marry somebody else. While I hadn?t expected to have the marriage talk so soon, I was secretly high-fiving myself for getting him to open up. Most days, when I ask how school was, he just grunts ?fine.? If I can?t get him to say much now, how can I make sure he talks to me about girl troubles?or whatever else is on his mind?when he?s a teenager" It turns out the connection a kid needs to feel with his parents in order to open up and talk to them is cemented long before the teen years. Julie Romanowski, a parenting coach in Vancouver, says communication skills are built even in infancy and toddlerhood. When your baby cries and you pick her up, you are showing her you?re someone she can count on. Being that trusted confidante isn?t as straightforward, though, when your kid?s daily life experiences grow to include things like academic pressure, friendships, bullying and other social issues. But it?s vitally important we maintain that bond, says Jennifer Kolari, a Toronto therapist and author of Connected Parenting: How to Raise a Great Kid. It?s our job as parent...