How To Talk So Little Kids Will Listen: A Survival Guide to Life with Children Ages 2-7

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When we demonstrate generosity of spirit by accepting feelings, we help our children become more resilient” Toddlers need to be told a thousand times. Children under two have difficulty internalizing your directives. Most three-year-olds begin to internalize directives so that what you ask begins to sink in. Do less and less repeating as your child gets older. Preteens regard repetition as nagging. 19. Let Your Child Complete the Thought Describe your child’s progress – Explain the process he/she completed when he/she accomplished a goal like sounding out each letter and putting them together to complete an entire sentence!

All kids want to connect, all kids want to be understood, all kids want a say in what they do and how they do it.”

Express your feelings . . . Strongly! ‘HEY, I don’t like to see people being pushed” (92)! Common sense thought from a kid: “I don’t care what you like.” Book’s comic book example (129): Instead of Mom saying, “You’re going to your room! And no dessert for you tonight” & Kid saying “I don’t care!”, Mom should say, “I’m upset! I don’t like what I see!” And the authors really think the kid will care more about how mom feels than about missing out on dessert? HA! Imagine being at work and your boss doesn’t like your work. What will you care more about: The boss saying, “I don’t like what I see” or the boss not paying you for the day’s work? The truth is that people are selfish; most will care more about themselves over other people’s feelings. I tried the book’s suggestion anyway: “I don’t like the toys being on the kitchen floor.” Kid ignored me and didn’t clean them up. FAIL.

Praise descriptively; hold a mirror up to themselves. Children and coworkers are self-centred because they can only experience reality through their own perceptions.

Painting visual pictures in the minds of your audience will get them far more into your mindset and ideas then otherwise. Visual hooks are a powerful persuasion technique. Pretending to fly in public might be embarrassing but it beats yelling at your kid! Kids need affirmation to build a healthy degree of self-esteem but don’t overdo it or they could wind up feeling like the world owes them everything they want. There’s a spectrum that starts at “confident” and ends at “entitled” — aim for the former. You can’t go by yourself to the park, but you can play in the neighbor’s yard.” 22. Give Advance Notice Like most other discipline books, this one says no to time outs. Parents can put themselves in time out (122), or sit in time out with their child with the parent’s arm around the child comfortingly (123). The latter rewards the child’s bad behavior with love and attention from the parent.