This competency-based secondary learning guide on strengthening parenting skills is part of a series that are adaptations of guides developed for adult consumer and homemaking education programs. The guides provide students with experiences that help them learn to do the following: make decisions; use creative approaches to solve problems; establish personal goals; communicate effectively; and apply management skills to situations faced as an individual, family member, student, and worker. Each learning guide includes the following sections: a general introduction and guidelines for using the material; a checklist for users for advance planning; introduction to the guide; specified competencies, with student outcomes/evaluations, definitions, key ideas, teacher strategies/methods, suggested student activities, sample assessments, and supplementary resources. Four competencies are addressed: explain the nurturing roles and responsibilities of parents; determine expectations in the physical, mental/intellectual, emotional, and social development of school-age children; describe ways to foster a school-age child's social, emotional, motor/physical, mental/intellectual, and language development; and demonstrate positive techniques of relating to school-age children and guiding their behavior. Eighteen supplements contain information and activity sheets on the following: self-esteem, parenting roles, self-confidence, developmental expectations, television shows for children, verbal messages, discipline or punishment, building confidence, and setting limits. A bibliography contains 38 items. (YLB)