There were a couple of questions on the site this week about disciplining young children: When can you start “disciplining”? was one, and How do you discipline your child without feeling horrible afterward? was another. It’s one of those things that my husband and I worried a lot about initially, and still sneaks up on us from time to time.
Addressing part of these questions, another wonderful essay from the “Grandma Says” feature of Growing Child.
Remember, we’ve talked about this
I met a neighbor’s visiting granddaughter out walking her dog. The puppy jumped up on me, and Katie said to her, with elaborate patience, “Now, remember, we’ve talked about this!” It was hard not to smile at the exact intonation she duplicated from hearing those same words from a parent.
And isn’t that just our problem! We talk about something and explain to our youngsters just why they should not engage in a particular activity. Then later we talk some more. And we keep on talking, eventually becoming exasperated with the children’s failure to heed our perfectly logical and beautifully expressed guidelines. What’s wrong with this picture? Well, it depends on the children’s age, of course. There are certain times in the first two or three years that we should depend far less on talk and more on action.
That’s the time to redirect children’s actions and behaviors to more suitable activities, and realize that their self-control is so weak or non-existent that they need us to help them change behaviors. And this can be done best without much in the way of lecture or commentary.
Learning to be exquisitely brief is a parental art. So the parent of the toddler who is involved in a fracas with another child over a beach shovel simply moves the toddler, hands her another implement, and says, “Gently, Becky. Let’s dig here. Sophie wants to dig there.” Even later, when children are coming to understand a bit more about limits and expectations, most parents undoubtedly talk too much. I hear parents reason, justify, explain, repeat, nag, and just keep on going long past the point of reasonable expectation that they still have the child’s attention.
Every child is born with invisible earflaps, that are lowered when an individual’s self-esteem is under attack. And after all, that is what is happening when parents keep talking too much, since the implication is that children are just too plain dumb to get it, and therefore parents have to keep talking. When I used to teach student teachers of preschoolers, a tool that we used was to set up a tape recorder and just let it run. When the students later played back their words, they were usually astonished to hear themselves speak. Often both their tones and words seemed like an affront to respect of the children, rather than the well-meaning guidance they had intended.
I remember one student teacher’s comments: “It sounds like I don’t think they understand anything at all. I’m talking way too much.”
While it may not be practical to tape yourself on a regular basis, it can be useful to consider how much you are talking, and how your child is receiving your words. It is useful to consider what is the minimum amount of information that would be helpful, both for your child’s learning and for your own sanity. Giving instruction and setting limits are areas where truly less is often more.
So remember, parents, we’ve talked about this.
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["Grandma Says" is a feature of Growing Child and your encouraged to send your comments to: GrandmaSays@GrowingChild.com. This article used by permission of the copyright owner Growing Child, Inc. For a free sample of Growing Child timed to the monthly age of your child go to GrowingChild.com.]
