It is said that patience is a virtue and when it comes to children it is very true. Children require an enormous amount of patience. When a child is hanging on your arm yelling mommy, mommy for the 10th time, how do you dig up the patience needed to respond appropriately? What do you tell yourself inside to stop you from yelling or losing your temper? Here are a few things we can remember in order to help us have the patience needed deal effectively with our child:
- I was told once that children learn something effectively only after it has been presented to them at least 10 times. So we must have a lot of patience until we get to that tenth time. Remember that children are a blank slate; even though they may have seen it many times or you may have told them many times, they may not have put it all together yet. Sometimes another explanation or a “showing” is needed.
- Remember that children have difficulty processing negative input. If you do lose your temper with the child, the child does not have the ability to reason and conclude that you had a busy day and so are a little charged or they did not act appropriately in this one instance but you love them immensely. Any negativity you portray may be interpreted by them as “I am bad and mommy doesn’t love me.” This may lead to more misbehavior. Think about the potential long term damage that may be caused by the child’s inability to understand or handle negative emotions effectively. Always tone down your anger and give a calm reprimand, and always with an explanation of what the child should do instead. Telling the child what he should not do is not very helpful for him; if he knew how to act appropriately he would have. So always model the behavior you want for the child. If the child is old enough, replay the situation and ask him to do it properly this time.
- Every child is created with both good and bad in them. As a parent, part of your job is to seek out and expand the good. Don’t let the bad trick you into believing that your child is a “bad” child. Remember, that it is your responsibility as a parent to encourage the good. Remind the child and yourself of his past good behavior and show him that you believe in him and trust him to do better next time. Teach the child to believe in himself and give him a model of who he could be.
At The Brook Academy, we make the effort to teach our children good practices, like waiting, not interrupting and considering parent’s feelings. We act out different scenarios and model good and bad behavior. By allowing them to see the entire scenario from the outside we can point their attention outside of themselves to what the parent is doing and they can see how their behavior can be cooperative or disruptive.
We would love to hear your thoughts. Contact us at info@thebrookacademy.com with any comments.