My Monthly Rant

Long-winded explanations or questions: Which Works? I think this will really help.

Have you ever given a long-winded explanation after your child was finished sitting in timeout?

Have you ever sat her down, looked in her eyes and began your long-winded conversation by saying things like, “I need to explain the rules again, I’m so disappointed in you, do you know how badly you hurt sister’s feelings?”

We’ve all done it.

When my kids were little I was always afraid that if I didn’t have a long-winded conversation to make my point my children would never figure it out for themselves. That’s just not true.

Did you know that to a child a long-winded explanation of the rules feels just like another timeout?

During that type of conversation a child will agree to almost anything. He may say “I never do it again daddy” or automatically say “I sorry” just so he can get it over with.

Children aren’t stupid and don’t want to get in any more trouble so they try to listen and absorb what you’re saying, but they can’t get it all, it’s too much information at once. What they tend to do while you’re pointing out their misbehavior is to slightly withdraw into themselves. You may even remember acting the same way when you were a child.

Watch your child’s body language next time you’re involved in a long-winded explanation.

His body stiffens a bit; he may rub his hands, his eyes or his legs.
At some point he may even try to force a hug on you—he needs this overwhelming amount of talking to end.
He’s emotionally done and can’t process any more information.
He can’t absorb your feelings about what he did and his feelings about what happened all at once. 
It’s just too much for him.

But it’s a parents job to explain behavior, so what can be done?

As a reformed long-winded talker I can say it took me a while to figure all of this out.
The first thing I had to realize/accept was that my long-winded talks were a disguise for my anger.
I began to see that I was still angry even after my child was finished with his timeout.
I realized I was hiding my anger by using a “sort of calm tone of voice”.
I began to listen to myself and realized that my “sort of calm tone of voice” would get even calmer the more I kept talking, or should I say I would keep talking until I could no longer feel my anger.
I assumed my child was listening to my every word but he wasn’t, he’d already sat in timeout and he wanted out of there and would agree to anything to make this all stop.

How can you eliminate long-winded explanations and still enforce your rules?

Any parent can stand in front of their child and scream their rules and values all day long but that doesn’t mean she will remember them, understand them or adopt them. It just means the parent is standing there screaming their rules and values.

How she’ll really learn what you want her to learn is to ask her what her idea of what happened is. Doing this tells your child you care about her and are interested in how she sees things. It also allows you to calmly correct those areas where she’s really off base.

What words can be used to replace the long-winded explanations?

The words Safe, Kind and Honest are three words that have been used in preschools since my kids were little and have become very popular again.
Some people use respectful instead of honest, but I think the word kind is same thing as respectful to a preschooler, so I use honest.

Using those three words as reminders of your rules is easy enough for a preschooler, allows her to understand your expectations for behavior, and can also be used instead of timeout.

After a child has misbehaved you ask them, “Is what you did safe?” Or ask, “Was it kind?” Or ask,  “Is what you’re telling me really what happened?” Or ask all three. The last question is a great way to introduce honesty without needing to call her a liar. Don’t forget to ask her what she needs to do to make things right.

Parents will need to introduce the concept of these three words slowly.

Don’t assume your child understands these words or that they’re now the new family guidelines. You need to teach her by asking questions after misbehavior and then go silent as you wait for her to answer. You need to talk about things and give her time to get it.

Silence is golden for a reason, and there’s a warning.

Silence allows you to breathe to release your anger and says, “I’m serious and you need to listen. It causes a child to dig deep and think about what they did and what they need to do differently.
Warning: Don’t go silent for too long, just a few seconds, if she has no answer help her out.
Children don’t like this. They get uncomfortable being put on the spot because it forces them to think about what they did. This only works if you’re empathetic and slowly ask questions that guide your child through their discovery of what they did wrong versus feeding them all the answers thru your long-winded explanations.

Because parents may need help with how to apply the family’s rules at the preschool level I’ve written an entire seminar on this topic. It’s seminar #9, Yelling: Is yelling the only way to get you to listen? In the seminar you’ll learn how to create your family’s rules so a preschooler can always understand. And if you like what you learned here you can add the three words Safe, Kind, and Honest into the mix as well. The seminar also has sample conversations.

So next time you begin your long-winded talk after a timeout, or any time you want to pass information to your child think about asking questions that include the words Safe, Kind, and Honest instead.

Here are 4 things I think are cool finds from others websites

I’ve been on the web doing research and while wandering around I’ve found some interesting things.

1.  Do you like doing crafts with your kids but hate the mess. Well some smart person came out with mess free stamps for
     kids and eco friendly ink! Go to www.littlestamp.com.

2.  Does the thought of all you have to do each day defeat you before you get started? Are you looking for organizing tips
     and ways to help make through the day? Go to www.habitudes.info.  You must insert dot info or it won’t work.

3.  There is a brand of flip-flops with many different names that have been recalled because they have too much lead in
     them. Take a look at your child’s flip-flops to see if the ones you have are any one of these brands.
     Baby Estampas, Baby Pets, Baby Letrinhas, Kids Lucky Bug, Kids Fun, Kids Surf, Kids Pets, Kids Sports,
     Kids Monsters, Kids Apple, Kids Fairy, Kids Flores, Kids Lighthouse, Kids Candies, Kids Love, and Kids Rock.

4.  The iPhone has a new application to help babies sleep, appropriately called Sleepy Baby. The application is less than a
     dollar and will help your child to sleep no matter where you are, great for traveling! It plays a heartbeat, a fan, a vacuum,
     white noise and shhhh. I would even use it for older children when traveling to block out hotel noise. Where was this 30
     years ago???

     You can find it at:
      www.apptism.com/apps/sleepy-baby
       www.sleepybaby.net/

That’s all I have time for this month-talk to you in April.