A Sincere Apology

March 31, 2016 By Diane Constantine

Child-apologizes-resized-400x173 I read an interesting blog post in AFineParent.com, written by Jennifer Poindexter. It was 5 Simple Ways to Teach Kids How to Apologize Sincerely.

She did a good job of explaining how to teach our kids to apologize sincerely without forcing them to say the words, “I’m sorry,” as a get-out-of-jail-free card. But as I read through the steps, I wondered how many parents actually know what apologizing sincerely means. If adults have trouble saying we’re sorry and meaning it, how can we teach our children to do it right.

She tackles the problem of our own pride first. How can we possibly teach our children to humble themselves and apologize if we don’t know how to humble ourselves first?

We may have trouble saying we’re sorry if we feel like we had the right to act as we did. Maybe it was our right, but did we exercise that right in a wrong way or with a wrong attitude? I’ve had to say to my children, “What you did was wrong. I was not wrong to correct you for that. But I was angry and I corrected you in the wrong way.” Wow, that is humbling, but it is the necessary first step to getting back on a good footing with our kids.

Even while we struggle with pride, we can still teach our children. They learn how to overcome their pride as we tell them how we deal with our own pride. We can tell our children it is hard for us to say we’re sorry, but we know it is good to recognize our own mistakes and do our part to make things right.

When we genuinely apologize to our children, they get to feel the healing power of those words. When they know how it feels, they will be more willing to follow our example instead of muttering or grumbling the word, “Sorry!”

Jennifer’s second step is to help them sort out emotions involved. To sincerely apologize we need to recognize the emotions of the one we offended as well as our own. Children, and a lot of adults, have a hard time putting a name to emotions. Helping them identify the feelings can help them understand the need to apologize.

We can help them to know the emotions they feel are OK for a short while, but they need to deal with them and move forward.

If this is your problem, stop the next time your emotions are bubbling up and your words start flying out your mouth. Take a few minutes and sort through what just happened and how it made you feel. Admitting you have those emotions and deciding how to act will help you respond better in the future.

Her third point was to allow them to make the choice to apologize. Wow, how many of us hold our mate’s or our friend’s feet to the fire if they don’t apologize as quickly as we think they should. We may have been forcing apologies from our kids and yet giving our husband or wife the silent treatment until they say the words. An apology cannot be sincere if it is demanded before they are ready.

Her fourth point is that an apology is not a get-out-of-jail-free card. An apology doesn’t un-do what happened. When we’ve hurt someone with our words or actions, the apology in itself doesn’t take the hurt away. But a genuine apology lets them know we realize we’ve hurt them and we will try really hard not to do that again. So our words help to heal the hurt.

Jennifer’s final point is that we need to teach the Golden Rule. It is such a powerful relationship builder and maintainer! It is much easier to be sincere in our apologies when we truly think about the way we would want to be treated. She says, “Ultimately, that is the only way to get our children to realize the full weight of their actions and to feel remorse that will make them want to apologize.” Is the Golden Rule the foundation of your relationships?

We have done quite a bit of marriage counseling over the years. I think the most common reason for marital breakdown is unforgiveness. So many couples could forgive more easily and more quickly if the offending party knew how to apologize sincerely. I trust this will not be a problem for you and your spouse! Let’s practice genuine apologies while we teach our children how to apologize sincerely.

Ways to Encourage Honesty

March 3, 2016 By Diane Constantine

I read an article this month by Amy McCready, writing for Positive Parenting Solutions . In her article on seven steps to encourage honesty, she reported that lying is a developmental mile marker. “When your preschooler starts lying, it’s simply a new developmental milestone, according to research by Kang Lee, a University of Toronto professor and director of the Institute of Child Study. This shift signifies changes in the way your child organizes information. It’s a normal step, so you don’t need to worry about your little one becoming a pathological liar.

Though it’s a normal stage of development, we still want to know how best to deal with this misbehavior so that it doesn’t continue. Amy says, “[Children] want to avoid punishment, disappointing their parents or an unpleasant outcome. Would you be honest if you knew it would cause you humiliation, a lecture, a punishment or being yelled at?

“And naturally, when our kids blatantly lie to us, we want to punish them to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what happens – when we punish kids for lying, they’ll keep doing it in the hopes of avoiding any future punishment. So if we can’t punish them, how do we put a stop to the lies? Keeping in mind the reasons why kids lie, we can create an environment where they feel safe telling the truth. The following seven tips can help you make your home a more honest place.”

Here are her seven steps. To read the entire article go to: Seven Steps to Encourage Honesty in our Kids and Put an End to Lying.

Keep calm and parent on. If your kids worry about being yelled at or punished when they mess up, they won’t want to come to you with the truth. Focus on using a calm voice. That doesn’t mean kids are off the hook for lying. But instead of getting angry and assigning blame, discuss solutions to the problem with your child.
Don’t set up a lie. When we ask questions to which we already know the answer, we’re giving our children the opportunity to tell a lie. Instead, emphasize ways to address the situation. Ask questions like: “What are your plans for finishing your work?” and “What can we do to clean this up and make sure it doesn’t happen next time?” This can help head off a power struggle and allows your child to save face by focusing on a plan of action instead of fabricating an excuse.
Get the whole truth. Get to the root of the problem and why she couldn’t be honest. Open up a conversation gently, saying, “That sounds like a story to me. You must be worried about something and afraid to tell the truth. Let’s talk about that. What would help you be honest?”
Celebrate honest. Say something like: “I really appreciate you telling me what really happened. That must have been difficult for you, but I really appreciate you telling the truth and taking responsibility.”
Delight in do-overs. Turn the mistake into a learning opportunity. Ask, “If you could have a do-over, what would you do differently?” and brainstorm different ideas.
Show the love. Let your kids know you love them unconditionally, even when they make mistakes. Make sure they know that while you don’t like their poor behavior, you will never love them any less because of the mistakes they might make. This helps your kids feel safe opening up to you.
Walk the talk. Remember that your kids are always looking to you and learning from your actions. Those little white lies we tell, whether it’s to get out of dog sitting for the neighbors or helping with the school fundraiser, aren’t harmless – they’re showing your kids that it’s okay to lie.

Some of these principles we have highlighted many times before. But it is always good to review them in light of specific parenting situations we face.

Many of your children are not yet to the stage where they lie, for you, being forewarned may keep you from increasing the likelihood of more lying when it begins. For those of you who have already detected your children in lies, hopefully this and other articles will help you to discover the root cause of the lies your children tell.

A Better Way to Stop Lying is a previously published article on Your Child’s Journey that you may find helpful too.

Goals and Challenges for the New Year

January 7, 2016 By Diane Constantine

It’s the beginning of a fresh new year. Your challenges this year are sure to be different from last year. A year makes a huge difference in a baby or young child’s life. And you may have a new addition since last year.

This is a great time to reflect on your parenting goals and challenges. Why not take a few minutes and consider what you would like for your child this year?

1. What are the one or two most important things you want your child to learn this year?

What would you have to change in order for him/her to learn these things?

2. What are the one or two most important things you want your child to experience this year?

How could you make these happen?

3. What is the biggest problem you and your husband or wife have regarding your children?

What needs to happen for that problem to be resolved?

4. What is your greatest joy with your child or children?

How can you build memories around this activity or experience?

5. How can you keep these ideas alive and active throughout the year?

My greatest desire for you this year is that you would be able to enjoy your children more. It is easy to get into a rut, just doing what needs to be done at the moment and rushing from one event to another. Too many activities and too little time together can sap the joy out of our relationships.

How you treat your child today can be a foundation block or a stumbling stone in his future. Use the moments you have to imprint your values in your child’s life. Try to increase your use of teachable moments and reduce your expressions of frustration.

Make the effort to find at least one thing to treasure every day with each child. Tell your child when they do something right or good or generous. When you pray with your child, remember to thank God for the good things you see in that child. Don’t get fixated on what it is that needs to change.

May God abundantly bless you and your family this year!

How to Deal with Failure

December 4, 2015 By Diane Constantine

I read an article by Jill M. Richardson, How to Deal with Failure, part of her Strong Kids series at A Fine Parent.com. Her article was aimed at parents of older children and even teens. But there were a few things she pointed out that I think we should start practicing even with our young children.

We live in a day and a culture that pressures us to make sure our children feel good. We want our children to feel good, but there is a danger in micromanaging their lives so they don’t experience failure at all. There are things we can do to help them deal with failures when they come, so that they are not crushed by them.

These are the ones I felt were most important for parents with young children. You may read her entire article at: A Fine Parent

Rescue dogs, not kids

If a potential failure will not result in serious bodily harm or devastating embarrassment, let the child fail without Superparent to the rescue. Allowing for small failures now, teaches a child the skills to deal with, and perhaps even avoid, bigger ones later.

Value Unstructured Play Time

Free time is when kids imagine, explore, and create. These are the formative hours for developing skills to problem solve. Scheduling kids so tightly that they lose this time cripples their creativity, a significant key to dealing with failure.

Unstructured play also allows kids to work out potential relationship issues. It’s in learning how to take turns with the swings, create an alternate world in the oak copse, or cope with a rule-flouting bully that kids figure out rule making, negotiation skills, and the heeding of others’ (sometimes unspoken) language.

Cause and effect teaches better than a parent playing labor dispute manager. Because we all know how well that works anyway.

Teach Grit

Basically, it is the ability to persevere, maintaining effort despite setbacks and discouragements, with a marathon-type approach.

We can help our children find their passion and pursue it, not with a competitive mindset, but with a determination to keep at it no matter what. This “grit” is key to returning stronger from failure.

Normalize Failure

Parents who shield their kids from failure leave another unintentional result. Their children come to regard failure as abnormal and unredeemable. A person for whom failure is seen as catastrophic and unacceptable internalizes the message that failure cannot be recovered from. It is terrifying.

Send them the message: Failure is normal. It happens to everyone. It is a part of life and learning. It is not shameful.

Talk Through the Scenarios

What not to say: “You won’t fail.” “You”ll be great.” “They’d be crazy not to take you.”

Problem is, I can’t make that guarantee. I can’t promise she won’t be terrible. Plus, I don’t know all the factors going into whatever judgment she’s up against. Will she trust me again after she does fall on her face in that audition?

Instead, ask this question: “What’s the worst that can happen?” Whatever the answer, pursue it to the end. Helping her work through what could happen if she fails helps her face the fear of it.

Or say something like, ‘I can see you’re upset. What do you think is a good first step here?’

Have Fun

With sensitivity, learn to laugh at your own failures and teach your child to do so as well. Obviously, this doesn’t mean howling when your kid falls on her face in the gymnastics meet. It does mean that learning to have a sense of humor about our own faults and missteps helps us to cope with the bigger ones.

_____________________________________________________________

Jill M. Richardson is a writer, speaker, former teacher, and pastor in the Chicago area. Besides her own three daughters, she has worked with kids through teaching, community theater, coaching reading teams, and youth groups.

See Jill’s Blog

The Importance of Grandparents

November 2, 2015 By Diane Constantine

This month I’ve been considering the importance of the grandparent/grandchild relationship. We had such a wonderful time with our grandkids, but the time was short. We always want to make the most of our time together and find ways to connect even when we are half a world away.

I took the points and a few quotes from a great article at: care.com The article is called: 10 Things Grandchildren Can Learn From Their Grandparentsgra

“The relationship between a grandchild and grandparent is a very special one. While grandparents act as an authority figure and provide unconditional love, they also get to spoil their grandkids in a way parents simply can’t. But beyond that, grandparents also wield incredible influence. Here are ten things grandchildren can — should — learn from their grandparents.”

History- Learning history from books can be dry and hard to remember. Stories heard from a loving grandparent will be remembered for a lifetime. World events interpreted through a grandparent’s life can change a child’s perspective on the world they live in.
A New Skill Set- There just isn’t time to teach many skills in school. Grandparents learned handcrafts, car repair and so much more that they would love to teach their grandkids.
Wisdom- Grandparents have life lessons and other advice to share because they’ve often lived through the same or similar experience — possibly more than once. Knowing how grandparents dealt with problems in their lives, and knowing that they got through everything just fine, makes children feel they’ll be okay, too.
Family History- Grandparents can give their grandchildren a connection with real people in their family. It helps children feel they belong to a family, even if they can’t see all of these other family members.
Humor- Teasing is a part of growing up. When grandkids are teased by a loving grandparent, they can learn how to react when teased by their peers.
Listening- Listening to grandparents, helps kids learn to listen carefully to others.
Games- Grandparents can teach games that don’t rely on electronic devices. Children can learn the joy of playing with real people. (One of my happiest childhood memories was playing canasta with an old lady in our neighborhood for the privilege of picking as many cherries as I wanted!)
Emotional Support- Often children and teens will talk to their grandparents about things they don’t feel free to talk to their parents about. Grandparents can be an impartial source of help.
Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff- “Grandparents have lived long enough to realize not to get upset over the little things; life is too short. Young grandchildren think everything is hyper-important, but can learn to adjust their priorities after discussing problems with their grandparents, who have a broader world view.”
Mail- Grandparents can be great penpals. Snail mail means children have some souvenirs of their conversations with their grandparents. Email may be more immediate and accessible. However, they do it, mail helps children read and write and learn from people who really love them.
I want to add one more. Faith- Grandparents’ strong faith is a wonderful influence on their grandchildren. Go to church together, pray together, and find hope and joy together.

“Grandparents come with years’ worth of wisdom and love to share with their grandkids. Take the time to get to really know and learn from them while they’re here. They’ll cherish the time they get to spend with their grandkids and, in turn, the kids will gain insight and character they can pass onto their own children and grandchildren someday. There’s no better way to pass on family traits than through time spent with one another.”

Read the original article at: www.care.com

If your parents are not able to spend time with your children, adopt grandparents for your children. Perhaps in your church or neighborhood you will find some people to act as grandparents to your children. It is worth the time and effort and will brighten the lives of both your children and their ‘grandparents.’