Dear Lord,
So far I've done all right.
I haven't gossipped,
haven't lost my temper,
haven't been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish, or overindulgent.
I'm really glad about that.
But in a few minutes, God,
I'm going to get out of bed.
And from then on,
I'm going to need a lot more help.
Your best tool in the morning is to prepare the night before. If you are still frustrated YOU get up a half hour earlier. That one thing will make your day go better.
9. Logical Consequences (Continue)
We had a large van and I would just pull over to the side of the road and wait. I would just sit. They just wanted to go and not sit. If they just said, “Fine we are done.” I would say, “No we need to work it out.” Instead of getting after them for arguing or not putting on their seat belts. They know as soon as you slow down and move over. They don’t like it. My husband made the kids get out of the car and clean the highway for an hour. Talk about good car behavior. What are good car voices? There is training. If you choose outdoor behavior in my vehicle you get to be outdoors.
10. Time Out
Usually not used correctly. You can’t teach any child anything if they are out of control. You can lecture them & yell at them. Time out is the opportunity for either you or them to get yourself calmed down so we can talk. You have to do it at Level zero. You can be firm, but not angry. “You need to go down to your room until you can be nice.” They aren’t going to go down there and sit and think about how ‘nice’ they are. That will only make it worse. You say, “I need you to go calm down.” Usually they go to the room and then come right back. Usually you say, “You aren’t calm down, get back down there.” You do that over and over until they come out in tears. They just have to get calm enough to be able to talk to them. If they have themselves under control right away let them come out. When they are calm you must teach!! Very important!!
Sometimes you as the Mom need time out. It’s ok for you to say I need to go to my room for a minute. Children tend to not like that. They repent pretty quick. If you have brilliant red children that throw amazing temper tantrums, their time out may be “That’s too noisy for the house, when you are through come back in and we’ll talk.” If they are destructive or loud remove them, but once they are calm then teach and train. You can check on them. It lets them know that you haven’t banished them forever.
Grounding…depending on how you use it can be time out. If you say, “You can’t go to the party.” It’s giving them time away for the purpose to learn.
It’s ok for them to be up there playing. It’s just a time to calm down. You need to go up there to them. You can then have them sit on your lap and talk. When you are teaching you should make it positive. That’s when it’s internalized.
You don’t have to feel bad to come back, but you have to be calm. When they are at a place where you can talk part of the discussion needs to be about respect.
Class member: How do you know when teaching becomes lecturing?
How you feel…usually you aren’t at level zero. Is the child still engaged? If they aren’t then you are lecturing. If you are doing all the talking then you are lecturing.
11. Distract or Change Direction
If they are into books you give them a toy. You change direction. There is no lecture, no punishment, it’s just you having intervention to change behavior. As a Mom you can understand and hear when the wrestling goes too far. Disengage them and go take the garbage out. The bottom one says go feed the dog. You change their direction. You can get children who are on the verge of fighting and you can say, “Let’s go build a puzzle”. Mother’s can read that.
As they are older if your daughter picks out a dress that you don’t like you can say, “look at these over here.” It doesn’t have to be a lecture. It has to be done before the battle starts. Disengage before that happens.
12. Questions
They have to be a little bit older. After about the age of 4 it becomes more effective. It’s very effective with teenagers. It’s part of “Come Follow Me”. This is difficult to me. This is a spiritual gift. This is one I pray for. I ask “yes and no” questions. It takes a talent to get them to engage. The object of asking questions is to get them to be self taught. You ask the question where the answer is what you would have lectured to them, but they are the ones saying it.
The person who does the talking is doing the learning! You want them to do most of the talking not you. Your job is to ask the question that gets them talking. It’s a gift, but it’s one the Lord will bless you with.
13. Role Playing
We usually tell kids to go in the room and figure it out and come back out and tell us what they have learned. This is where you work with them and give them the dialogue. You say the words and have them repeat it. They role play the situation. Have this in FHE.
Example: Sally (8) you get to be the Mom and I get to be the daughter. We are going to role play jobs. You react like they would. Let them feel what it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes.
Role play Book of Mormon stories. Let them see how it feels. They become much more sensitive and have more compassion when they are in someone else’s shoes. Have them role play what it would be like to have a handicap. Create situations where they can role play.
This is a teaching tool where you teach them things they haven’t figured out yet. You can’t hold them accountable to do things you haven’t taught them to do. This teaches them to communicate with one another.
14. Proper Apologies
Read this article---A Better Way to Say Sorry (4 step process…)
Class member: I have a daughter that will say ‘sorry and ask for forgiveness’ right after she hits, but the other child isn’t ready to forgive the other one. What do you do then?
Class member: We did this last year and did it in a FHE. I wrote on cardstock the steps. My then 7 yr old was so mad at his sister for something she had done 2 weeks before. She didn’t even care that it was bothering him. In the role play she brought up the scenario. She went through the steps and got to the end and said ‘will you forgive me?’ The anger he had held onto was just gone.
It is what creates understanding. If you feel like someone really understood how their behavior affected you it creates feelings of forgiveness.
What we really want to do through all of these tool we want to teach our children to become resilient. We want them to feel empowered in their life. At home they feel like they can fail and get up and things are good. They feel like they can lose a job and find another one. They can face failure or set backs with enthusiasm and simply move forward. That is hard to teach in this world.
Raising Resilient Children:
(Conquer a set back) How your children are going to use agency to choose to make good things happen:
1. Validate back to them the emotion.
Get them to tell you how they feel and reflect back the understanding of how you feel. “I can see how that would make you feel really sad.” “I’ll bet that hurt when the teacher lashed out at you.” “That must be frustrating to have worked so hard and not have it work out.” You have to listen and maybe even ask more questions. This sets the stage and lets you in. It creates the feeling of ‘you understand me.’
2. You are going to give them the power and the responsibility to solve the problem.
The next thing out of your mouth is NOT “Let me tell you what to do.” Instead you say, “What do you think you are going to do about that? I’m interested in seeing what ideas you have for handling that. I really believe you are going to figure it out.” You express faith in them and their ability to find a solution. If they have no clue…sometimes they really are clueless….part of teaching is to help them find ideas, but not to tell them what to do. If any of their ideas are good go with them and support them.
3. Ask permission to offer some ideas.
Be careful…you ask permission to offer choices or ideas…NOT asking permission to tell them what to do. You would say something like…”I think other kids may have…” “You might think about…” “A possibility might be….” Offer more than one idea. Offer several ideas. You aren’t there to sell them your idea. You are there to open up their box so they can think out of the box and think of possibilities. It doesn’t haven’t to be resolved that day. This is usually not an event. This is a process of thinking. The child is putting ideas through their head. First they have to get over their failure. You are trying to give them the faith and motivation that they can move forward and come up with a solution.
4. Help them look at the consequences.
A couple of days later you meet again…”What have you thought about…” They say, “I’ve decided I’m going to….” If you think it won’t work you DON’T say that. They need to learn that through their experience. Ask “What do you think the consequences might be?” They aren’t thinking past the solution. Let them fail. Let them see what happens. Don’t be sad if they fail. They learn to be resilient by failing and getting back up and trying again.
5. Let them go forward with their choice.
That sounds good. Is there anything I can do to help you? Say, “Let’s try this and see how it works.”
6. Bring them back and have the child evaluate the experience.
What worked well? What would you change next time? What did you learn? Did it work perfectly? If it’s a failure you still come back and evaluate it. Don’t let them give up!
Class member: It makes me nervous to think about the fact that I know consequences that they might not know about.
If the consequences are serious intervene. If it’s just going to be embarrassing let them try it. We become this hovering mother to protect them. They need to skin their emotional knees sometimes. If it’s a serious consequence you should say, “Do you think this might happen?” If they say, “No, I want to go forward.” You support them. They need to fail. If they fail in little things growing up, they will be far less likely to fail in big things and quit when they have grown up. They need to fail and then teach them to get back up.
Class member: Isn’t that what Heavenly Father does for us? If we think we are better than Heavenly Father then maybe we need to reevaluate.
This life is for us to learn how to handle agency properly.
“Forget Me Not” Uchtdorf
“While understanding the “what” and the “how” of the gospel (parenting) is necessary, the eternal fire and majesty of the gospel (parenting) springs from the “why.” When we understand why our Heavenly Father has given us this pattern for living, when we remember why we committed to making it a foundational part of our lives, the gospel (parenting) ceases to become a burden and, instead, becomes a joy and a delight. It becomes precious and sweet.”
So far I've done all right.
I haven't gossipped,
haven't lost my temper,
haven't been greedy, grumpy, nasty, selfish, or overindulgent.
I'm really glad about that.
But in a few minutes, God,
I'm going to get out of bed.
And from then on,
I'm going to need a lot more help.
Your best tool in the morning is to prepare the night before. If you are still frustrated YOU get up a half hour earlier. That one thing will make your day go better.
9. Logical Consequences (Continue)
We had a large van and I would just pull over to the side of the road and wait. I would just sit. They just wanted to go and not sit. If they just said, “Fine we are done.” I would say, “No we need to work it out.” Instead of getting after them for arguing or not putting on their seat belts. They know as soon as you slow down and move over. They don’t like it. My husband made the kids get out of the car and clean the highway for an hour. Talk about good car behavior. What are good car voices? There is training. If you choose outdoor behavior in my vehicle you get to be outdoors.
10. Time Out
Usually not used correctly. You can’t teach any child anything if they are out of control. You can lecture them & yell at them. Time out is the opportunity for either you or them to get yourself calmed down so we can talk. You have to do it at Level zero. You can be firm, but not angry. “You need to go down to your room until you can be nice.” They aren’t going to go down there and sit and think about how ‘nice’ they are. That will only make it worse. You say, “I need you to go calm down.” Usually they go to the room and then come right back. Usually you say, “You aren’t calm down, get back down there.” You do that over and over until they come out in tears. They just have to get calm enough to be able to talk to them. If they have themselves under control right away let them come out. When they are calm you must teach!! Very important!!
Sometimes you as the Mom need time out. It’s ok for you to say I need to go to my room for a minute. Children tend to not like that. They repent pretty quick. If you have brilliant red children that throw amazing temper tantrums, their time out may be “That’s too noisy for the house, when you are through come back in and we’ll talk.” If they are destructive or loud remove them, but once they are calm then teach and train. You can check on them. It lets them know that you haven’t banished them forever.
Grounding…depending on how you use it can be time out. If you say, “You can’t go to the party.” It’s giving them time away for the purpose to learn.
It’s ok for them to be up there playing. It’s just a time to calm down. You need to go up there to them. You can then have them sit on your lap and talk. When you are teaching you should make it positive. That’s when it’s internalized.
You don’t have to feel bad to come back, but you have to be calm. When they are at a place where you can talk part of the discussion needs to be about respect.
Class member: How do you know when teaching becomes lecturing?
How you feel…usually you aren’t at level zero. Is the child still engaged? If they aren’t then you are lecturing. If you are doing all the talking then you are lecturing.
11. Distract or Change Direction
If they are into books you give them a toy. You change direction. There is no lecture, no punishment, it’s just you having intervention to change behavior. As a Mom you can understand and hear when the wrestling goes too far. Disengage them and go take the garbage out. The bottom one says go feed the dog. You change their direction. You can get children who are on the verge of fighting and you can say, “Let’s go build a puzzle”. Mother’s can read that.
As they are older if your daughter picks out a dress that you don’t like you can say, “look at these over here.” It doesn’t have to be a lecture. It has to be done before the battle starts. Disengage before that happens.
12. Questions
They have to be a little bit older. After about the age of 4 it becomes more effective. It’s very effective with teenagers. It’s part of “Come Follow Me”. This is difficult to me. This is a spiritual gift. This is one I pray for. I ask “yes and no” questions. It takes a talent to get them to engage. The object of asking questions is to get them to be self taught. You ask the question where the answer is what you would have lectured to them, but they are the ones saying it.
The person who does the talking is doing the learning! You want them to do most of the talking not you. Your job is to ask the question that gets them talking. It’s a gift, but it’s one the Lord will bless you with.
13. Role Playing
We usually tell kids to go in the room and figure it out and come back out and tell us what they have learned. This is where you work with them and give them the dialogue. You say the words and have them repeat it. They role play the situation. Have this in FHE.
Example: Sally (8) you get to be the Mom and I get to be the daughter. We are going to role play jobs. You react like they would. Let them feel what it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes.
Role play Book of Mormon stories. Let them see how it feels. They become much more sensitive and have more compassion when they are in someone else’s shoes. Have them role play what it would be like to have a handicap. Create situations where they can role play.
This is a teaching tool where you teach them things they haven’t figured out yet. You can’t hold them accountable to do things you haven’t taught them to do. This teaches them to communicate with one another.
14. Proper Apologies
Read this article---A Better Way to Say Sorry (4 step process…)
- I’m sorry for…. (be very specific) “I’m sorry for saying no one wants to be your friend.”
- This is wrong because…. (this is the step we miss when we tell them to just say I’m sorry. They have to identify why what they did was wrong. This allows you to accept responsibility for your behavior.) “This is wrong because, it hurt your feelings and made you feel sad.”
- In the future I will… (very specific. This has to be something positive. They make a commitment in the apology.) “In the future I will keep my mouth shut.”
- Will you forgive me?
Class member: I have a daughter that will say ‘sorry and ask for forgiveness’ right after she hits, but the other child isn’t ready to forgive the other one. What do you do then?
Class member: We did this last year and did it in a FHE. I wrote on cardstock the steps. My then 7 yr old was so mad at his sister for something she had done 2 weeks before. She didn’t even care that it was bothering him. In the role play she brought up the scenario. She went through the steps and got to the end and said ‘will you forgive me?’ The anger he had held onto was just gone.
It is what creates understanding. If you feel like someone really understood how their behavior affected you it creates feelings of forgiveness.
What we really want to do through all of these tool we want to teach our children to become resilient. We want them to feel empowered in their life. At home they feel like they can fail and get up and things are good. They feel like they can lose a job and find another one. They can face failure or set backs with enthusiasm and simply move forward. That is hard to teach in this world.
Raising Resilient Children:
(Conquer a set back) How your children are going to use agency to choose to make good things happen:
1. Validate back to them the emotion.
Get them to tell you how they feel and reflect back the understanding of how you feel. “I can see how that would make you feel really sad.” “I’ll bet that hurt when the teacher lashed out at you.” “That must be frustrating to have worked so hard and not have it work out.” You have to listen and maybe even ask more questions. This sets the stage and lets you in. It creates the feeling of ‘you understand me.’
2. You are going to give them the power and the responsibility to solve the problem.
The next thing out of your mouth is NOT “Let me tell you what to do.” Instead you say, “What do you think you are going to do about that? I’m interested in seeing what ideas you have for handling that. I really believe you are going to figure it out.” You express faith in them and their ability to find a solution. If they have no clue…sometimes they really are clueless….part of teaching is to help them find ideas, but not to tell them what to do. If any of their ideas are good go with them and support them.
3. Ask permission to offer some ideas.
Be careful…you ask permission to offer choices or ideas…NOT asking permission to tell them what to do. You would say something like…”I think other kids may have…” “You might think about…” “A possibility might be….” Offer more than one idea. Offer several ideas. You aren’t there to sell them your idea. You are there to open up their box so they can think out of the box and think of possibilities. It doesn’t haven’t to be resolved that day. This is usually not an event. This is a process of thinking. The child is putting ideas through their head. First they have to get over their failure. You are trying to give them the faith and motivation that they can move forward and come up with a solution.
4. Help them look at the consequences.
A couple of days later you meet again…”What have you thought about…” They say, “I’ve decided I’m going to….” If you think it won’t work you DON’T say that. They need to learn that through their experience. Ask “What do you think the consequences might be?” They aren’t thinking past the solution. Let them fail. Let them see what happens. Don’t be sad if they fail. They learn to be resilient by failing and getting back up and trying again.
5. Let them go forward with their choice.
That sounds good. Is there anything I can do to help you? Say, “Let’s try this and see how it works.”
6. Bring them back and have the child evaluate the experience.
What worked well? What would you change next time? What did you learn? Did it work perfectly? If it’s a failure you still come back and evaluate it. Don’t let them give up!
Class member: It makes me nervous to think about the fact that I know consequences that they might not know about.
If the consequences are serious intervene. If it’s just going to be embarrassing let them try it. We become this hovering mother to protect them. They need to skin their emotional knees sometimes. If it’s a serious consequence you should say, “Do you think this might happen?” If they say, “No, I want to go forward.” You support them. They need to fail. If they fail in little things growing up, they will be far less likely to fail in big things and quit when they have grown up. They need to fail and then teach them to get back up.
Class member: Isn’t that what Heavenly Father does for us? If we think we are better than Heavenly Father then maybe we need to reevaluate.
This life is for us to learn how to handle agency properly.
“Forget Me Not” Uchtdorf
“While understanding the “what” and the “how” of the gospel (parenting) is necessary, the eternal fire and majesty of the gospel (parenting) springs from the “why.” When we understand why our Heavenly Father has given us this pattern for living, when we remember why we committed to making it a foundational part of our lives, the gospel (parenting) ceases to become a burden and, instead, becomes a joy and a delight. It becomes precious and sweet.”
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