Does your child not listen to you when you speak to him? That ended!
Do you feel that when you talk to your children it seems that you are talking to the wall? Get rid of that bad habit now.
There are many parents who complain that when they speak to their children it seems that they are absorbed in another world, that they do not listen to them and they do not understand what they are told. There are even parents who decide to take their children to the ENT thinking that their children have a hearing problem, and what is their surprise when they realize that they hear perfectly! But they seem to listen, what they want.
Are you sure they listen to what they want? Perhaps it is that you do not address your children in the correct way and what you think is ignorance is simply that there is no effective communication. In today’s world there is a lot of noise and children pay much less attention to what you say. Attracting children’s attention can seem like an uphill battle, and it’s no wonder why. You are competing against television, video games, and many other distractions to get your child’s attention. As if that were not enough, children also tend to have selective hearing.
But from now on, don’t worry about this because with a few simple changes in communication with your child, you will have the key for your children to listen to you from now on … the first time you speak to them!
Index
GET RID OF ALL DISTRACTIONS
If you yell at your children from another room and your child is playing, they will not listen to what you say, and it is totally normal! It is necessary that to communicate with your children you avoid distractions. Mute the television or pause a video game , turn off the music … do whatever it takes to get your child’s full attention.
It is also important to make eye contact to make sure he is really listening to you, you can even put a hand on his shoulder additionally to better understand what you want to say.
TELL HIM, BUT DON’T ASK HIM QUESTIONS
One of the most common mistakes parents make when giving instructions is not saying them, if not asking. If you ask your child to pick up his toys, don’t give him the option to say no. If you ask something like: ‘Do you want to pick up your toys?’ It is likely that the answer is no .. . On the other hand, if you say: ‘Please pick up your toys right now’, your child understands what he has to do and that there is no other alternative.
Give your child some time to start doing it, depending on the order it can be between 5 seconds to 5 minutes. For example, if your child is playing with the tablet, you can tell him in 5 minutes you must have put the tablet down and be picking up the toys. ‘ After those 5 minutes have passed, you will have to remind him: ‘Now put down the tablet and pick up your toys’. It’s a respectful way for your child to prepare to switch activities.
GIVE ONE ORDER AT A TIME
Young children and children with attention problems do not respond well to multiple commands, so it is best to give one command at a time and divide the instructions if necessary. It starts with one instruction at a time. Wait until your child completes the first task before giving new directions.
Some older children and teens can handle a couple of orders at a time and must have the ability to work their way through a list. Say things like: “It is time to do the tasks in order of list.” Then you should have enough capacity to do first one task and then another on your own, you can provide them in writing if necessary.
To make sure your child has really heard what you said, ask him to repeat it out loud. This way you will know what exactly he has heard and ensure that he has understood your expectations, giving him the opportunity to clarify if there are any doubts.
REINFORCE POSITIVE BEHAVIOR
Whenever your child follows the instructions, give him positive consequences to reinforce his good behavior. Praise his accomplishment or give him a small reward depending on the effort he has made in accomplishing the task he entrusted. Try not to be material things, so the rewards can be going out to the park or having an ice cream with the family.
Ideally, the rewards are surprises and only once in a while, because if you tell him that he will have a reward, you will be bribing him. If you bribe him for doing a good job then he will want his reward whenever he does something and it may happen that without reward he does not want to do things well. And if you do not comply, negative consequences should always be the order of the day.
Dr. Tabriella Perivolaris, Sara's mother and fan of fashion, beauty, motherhood, among others, about the female universe. Since 2018 she has been working as a copywriter, always bringing to her articles a little of her experience and experience as a mother and woman.
