What to do

Whew ... feeling better now and I wanted to thank all those who dropped by to wish both my daughter and me well. That was really sweet of you all (smile). I truly appreciated it.
--------------------------------------
While I was recuperating, friends stopped by with their children. One of the kids was a bit noisy and was unaware how to be calm while walking through the house. As a matter of fact, this child was really overly energetic. The Mom would scold him repeatedly because he simply couldn’t move down the hall without yelling and jumping.

I gently suggested that instead of repeatedly scolding him, let’s show him what to do---what’s expected of him. At first she resisted by saying, “Oh, he knows what to do, he just doesn’t want to listen.”

Hmmmm ... that meant that he was just trying to bug her or us. That old, them against us sensibility. I’m not a fan of that attitude--from my perspective, this child had learned that he could jump and yell and the only thing that would happen is that his Mom might raise her voice. But he showed no familiarity with how to walk calmly down a hall, and he was 4 years old.

So, I said in a mild voice, “Hey, let’s try something.”

The Mom looked at me and said, “OK.”

So, we took her little one and brought him down the hall and showed him how to walk calmly from one end to the other. Then after showing him how to do this activity, I said to him, “Now, show yourself how you walk down this hall with calmness and confidence.”

The little guy laughed at first, then went to one end and calmly (for him) walked down the hall. He had a little speed in that walk, but for this jumpy kid, well, he did just fine for his first time with instruction.

The Mom smiled at me and asked, “Is that all it takes?”

I said, “Well, what it takes is not letting your child go to the second step in an activity until he has accomplished the first step.”

That’s hard for us parents. Our impatience gets in the way and we allow, or rush or simply don’t pay attention to how well they are progressing in their daily activities. But, if we take the time that’s needed and walk our children through the steps they obviously missed, we might see a wonderful improvement in their ability to accomplish and follow directions.

Sometimes, they need to be shown what to do, even when we think they already know.

all content The New Parent © 2007

Sickness

Well, I'm sorry I haven't been posting as much recently, but my little one came down with pneumonia. Poor thing, a 105.6 fever had us concerned. She was so listless and not too hungry (which is amazing for her). We were on the verge of taking her to the emergency room when her fever broke.

The last couple of days have been better, except for the deep cough she has. Her appetite is slowly returning and so is her energy level.

I'll be back shortly with a new post (wink)!

We CAN Teach Children to have ...

Recently, one of my daughter’s preschool teacher's parents passed away. When her teacher wasn’t in class for a few days, my little one asked why. When told what had happened, she asked some questions and then let the topic go.

Suddenly, a few days later, while riding with me in the car she asked, “Daddy, do we have any flowers in the house?”

“I think so, what for, honey?” I inquired.

“Well, I wanted to bring one to school for my teacher,” she answered.

“Why is that, little girl?” I asked.

“Because her father died, I wanted to bring her a flower,” she responded.

“That’s such a sweet thing to do,” I said to her.

“Thank you,” she replied.

When we got home, we chose a flower and put it aside for the next morning.

---------------------------------------

The next morning, she made sure she had the flower to bring to her teacher. I realized that, though she had a nice thought, she didn’t have the language to present it appropriately.

“Honey, here’s what you can say when you give the flower to your teacher--"I’m sorry for your loss,” I counseled.

She repeated the phrase, smiled and off we went to the car.

-----------------------------------------

As we entered school, she waved to the administrator in the office and yelled, “Good morning!” Then while walking down the hallway to her classroom, she repeated the phrase--"I’m sorry for your loss.”

As we got to the classroom, I knelt down and gave her a kiss, opened the door and let her in. Her teacher came walking over and said, “Hi, Lucy!”

She stopped, looked at the teacher and said, “Good morning, I have a flower for you--I’m sorry for your loss.”

The teacher knelt down and with a look of wonderment replied, “Thank you, that is such a nice thought Lucy, may I have a hug?”

“Sure,” replied Lucy with a smile. Then, there was this perfect moment as teacher and student shared a hug.

I smiled and slowly walked away.

all content The New Parent © 2007

5 Loving things (to do with your child)

I was spending some time the other day, playing with my daughter and thought that some of these activities might be useful to other parents. They come from a sensibility that incorporates play with learning, but in a little offbeat way (smile).

1. Animal Math--I periodically buy my little one plastic animals that have nice details and are a good representation of the animal. For simple addition and subtraction I use the animals in a story: a giraffe, a pelican and a lion are walking in the jungle, they are joined by a zebra, how many animals are there? Then on a piece of paper I write out the equation and my little one solves it by looking at how many animals there are.

She has gotten so good that she’s learned to carry in addition and borrow in subtraction and now is also doing multiplication. She loves her animal math! It also helps in naming different animals.

2. Balloon Hide + Seek--I take 3 balloons and hide them in another room. My daughter goes to seek them. When she finds one she brings it back and solves a question: it could be, what is this letter, what is this shape, what is this color and so on. When she gets the correct answer, she goes to seek the next balloon.

3. Fractions Food Party--this one is more complex, but a lot of fun. You get a fractions set--it could be fraction stax or parts of a circle. Then you pretend that visitors are coming for a meal. You can also use a toy telephone to call the deli or restaurant for a take-out food order (which teaches numbers and telephone skills).

When the food order arrives, you teach your child how to answer the door. The food is brought in and divided into equal parts based on the amount of people present. Using the fraction pieces as the food, you show what the fraction is and then hand it out.

You change the fractions as people come and go. It uses a lot of different skills and my daughter still loves to play it!

4. Hide the Letters--this one is more straight forward--you get plastic alphabet letters and hide three at a time around the room. Then, using the idea of hot + cold (warm to hot as you get closer, cool to cold as you move farther away), you help your child find and name the letters they’re looking for. This also helps teach taking and following directions.

5. Balloon Toss Skip Counting--blow up a balloon and toss it is the air. You and your child try and keep it in the air as long as you can. This requires that you each take a turn hitting back and forth to each other. As you hit it back and forth you teach skip counting--2, 4, 6, 8, 10.

Once they get the twos to ten, go to 20. Then switch to threes (3, 6, 9 ...) and so on. My little one has learned to skip count her twos, threes, fours, fives, sixes, and is on her sevens.
Once she got this, learning multiplication was fun and easy.

Let me know if you try any of these and how they work!

all content The New Parent © 2007

And So It Ends?

About three months ago we bought a wonderful, sweet tempered parakeet, who became sick and after much medical care, recently died.

My little one had begun to develop a close relationship with this good natured bird and made sure she spent time with him everyday.

Upon his death, she was confronted for the first time, with something close, passing away.

For us, it was a time to guide our little one through, what could have been a clumsy, awkward, sometimes uncomfortable situation. Instead, it turned out to have many positive elements.

I saw that our demeanor during this period, especially when discussing the situation was important. We never overstated, nor presented his death with exaggeration. When talking about his dying, we were calm, sometimes a little solemn, but never morbid.

We framed the death for our daughter--death is part of the experience of living and that’s OK--so that she didn’t become disturbed and filled with a sense of worry. Since she was about 2 years old, we have gently introduced her to the idea of death through positive stories, casual conversation and visual aids.

After framing Mattie’s (that was the name she gave him) death for her, we let the questions come from her, we didn’t probe or push her to try and do something 4 year olds generally aren’t that adept at doing--explaining their feelings about something.

We also watched to see if she might have wonderings, but not be able to fully articulate them.

All this helped her to absorb this event and move through it without diverting toward the macabre. Also, we never tried to present to her fantastic ideas that we don’t really know. If any questions were asked that we couldn’t answer or didn’t know, we gently told her that we didn’t know but could seek answers as she got older.

“Mommy?”

“Yes, honey?”

“Will Mattie be eaten by the insects?” she asked in a calm, inquisitive tone.

“No, sweetie.”
(He was actually cremated.)

“Will Mattie come back?” she asked with a soft smile on her face.

all content The New Parent © 2007