Two things to avoid when talking to Children

Often it’s seen that we tend to be excessively casual when we are with children, like how we talk, teach, play or do any activity with them. When we talk to a child, it’s very important that we convey our message appropriately and don’t end up giving wrong lessons to them.

Reiterating my thoughts from my earlier blogs about children, they watch us every moment and learn from us. Children are sensitive and innocent souls, and they take everything quite seriously contrary to what the usual belief is, that they don’t pay attention to us. Their mind is like clay; it takes the shape, you want to give.

They keep noting down points on each scenario or event about the things we taught them intentionally or unintentionally! Things which we feel simple and OK may not be same for them.

There are two things which people bring in common practice when talking to Children but the outcome is not mostly positive.
Let me share with you here…

1) When we are in a situation where we see the child is not ready to leave us, be it you are dropping them to a childcare, school or any place. We feel it’s OK to trick them and disappear the next moment. Or we wait for them to get distracted somewhere so we can drop out of sight.

Here our intention is not to give them pain and leave, so we try to trick them or wait for the right moment to be out of sight. But the result is indirectly you are teaching your child to lie and to be dishonest in future. 

You must have used an excuse to trick them like you will back in 2 minutes or you are going to get something and come back to them. So you leave your child in a wait state. The child will wait endlessly for your arrival hoping now you will be with him in few minutes. But when you don’t come, Child learns that this is a way to deal with a situation and it’s ok to lie or to be dishonest. 

The fix is to be honest with your child and tell your child that you need to go to office or whatever is the reason and you will come back and pick him up at so and so time. Chances are high that your child might cry or throw some tantrum, but it’s ok to take a moment to calm them down and leave. Good things take time and remember you are not wasting your time, you are investing your time for their future habits.

2) Don’t play the ultimatum game with them. It will definitely backfire. If we keep talking to them in tone like… if you do this, I will do this. Like if you sit and study now, I will get you a small gift or you will get a chocolate treat if you are going to eat your dinner without any bad behavior. 

They are learning that this is a way to get things done. They take it as work gets done only when you give a warning or use the terms and conditions. And then no sooner or later, they will start talking to you in same language. I will do this only if you get me this.

Solution is not to encourage such kind of behavior. If you want them to do something, make them understand why it’s important to do it. If they start talking in ultimatum language, stop them then and there. 

If they say things like I will eat veggies in my plate only if you give me a sweet after my meal, you can clearly explain that as they have used an ultimatum, they need to eat the veggies and get up from the meal. If they would have requested for having sweet in a normal tone, we would have given a thought about it and may have offered them. But since a warning tone was used, request cannot be accepted.

When we deal with a problem, it’s important to ensure we find a solution not only for the very moment but also for future. Fixing things today should not break something tomorrow. These are few subtle things which may not look alarming from a broader perspective, but these will leave an impact on the younger minds and may become a part of their habits or the way they handle a situation.