6 Things Kids Really Need
Should you let your child play unsupervised? Allow her to walk to school
alone? In this age of information overload, parenting advice is
everywhere. Go online and you’ll find a tidal wave of tips aimed at
helping you raise your kids. But what is it that they
really need?
Above all else, children need common sense from their parents. Childhood
has become “a pressure-packed preadulthood,” says Edward M. Hallowell,
PhD, author of
The Childhood Roots of Adult Happiness: Five Steps to Help Kids Create and Sustain Lifelong Joy.
“Kids are trying to make partner in the first grade.” It’s not that
their parents don’t love them; they’ve just confused raising children
with turning out perfect products. Instead, he says, parents should
focus on making their children feel connected to their family and their
community, and success (and everything else) will follow.
1. “I Love You”s
Of course you love your kids. But do you remember to tell them? “I never
knew a kid whose parents told him too many times that they loved him,”
says Laurence Steinberg, MD, a psychology professor at Temple University
and author of
The 10 Basic Principles of Good Parenting. And
it’s more than just the words: It’s consistently showing them interest,
affection and concern. That’s why Odette D’Aniello of Tacoma,
Washington, makes sure every morning to offer her young children
“special love.”
“I sit down and I cradle each one, wrap him or her with a warm blanket
and softly scratch their back while chatting about random stuff, and
telling them how lucky I am to have them,” she says. But for many
parents—especially as kids get older, busier and less
communicative—telling them how you feel can be more easily expressed
through actions.
Louise Morgenstern of Santa Monica, California, shows her three teens
love by getting to know their friends. She even keeps a gallon of mint
chocolate chip ice cream in the freezer—for her son’s best friend. “It’s
his favorite flavor, and he comes into the house, goes right to the
freezer and scoops himself a bowl,” she says. “With teenagers, it’s not
about telling them you love them but showing them you know what they
care about. At that age, it’s their friends.”
2. Structure and Limits
Have you ever been in a restaurant where the child at the next table is
simply out of control, throwing things or refusing to stay seated? You
watch as the indifferent parents ignore her behavior and you wonder,
What’s going on?
“American parents err on the side of leniency compared with parents from
most other parts of the world,” says Dr. Steinberg. “In the last
generation or two, there has been a blurring of boundaries between U.S.
parents and their children, and it makes parents more reluctant to
impose their authority.
“Parents too often fear that their children will be angry with them if
they try to discipline them.” But the anger is only temporary, and
besides, it’s the parents’ job to teach their child, not befriend him.
“The rules you make when your child is young ultimately become the ones
he or she will live by,” says Dr. Steinberg.
Boundaries actually make kids more confident, says Lenore Skenazy, author of
Free-Range Kids: How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children (Without Going Nuts with Worry).
“That’s what gives kids the reassurance to try things. Say you’re at
the beach, and you tell your child she can only go so far into the
water. If she knows going this far is OK, then she can frolic with
abandon in that area without wondering, ‘Are there sharks here?’” Think
of discipline as the strength of parenting: You can show your kids where
the “sharks” are and where they’re not.
3. Conversation
On their way to registration for her daughter’s ninth year of piano
lessons, Maureen Anderson of Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, asked Katie, 14, a
simple question: “What do you like about taking piano?”
“Being able to say I haven’t quit,” Katie said.
“What don’t you like about it?” her surprised mom then asked.
“Practicing. Lessons. And the recitals.” Basically everything. When they
got to the music school, instead of registering for more lessons, Katie
unregistered for piano. “I learned what Katie thought by asking a
couple of questions and listening to the answers,” Maureen says.
Take the time to really “hear” your kids, because that will make them
more likely to talk to you regularly. “A lot of parents rush to solve
things for their children,” says Casey Decola, MSW, a counselor with the
Rye Youth Council in Rye, New York. “Especially with teenagers, we tend
to panic. We say, ‘You know what you should do?’ and then we tell them,
instead of listening and allowing them to fully get out what they’re
trying to say without judging it.”
Instead of offering advice, ask questions that can help them come to
conclusions on their own. “Make eye contact. Sit with your kids and give
them the respect of listening in a way they deserve,” Decola says.
But how do you get your child to talk? “It’s normal for adolescents to
want more privacy than they did as children,” says Dr. Steinberg. “But
if parents engage their teens in genuine, interested (and interesting)
conversation, the kids will talk. The problem is, too many parents ask
perfunctory questions like ‘How was school today?’ or equate talking
with lecturing.”
And keep in mind that to get the dialogue going at all, you first need
to be around. So schedule a regular walk or board game to give you
uninterrupted time together.
4. Something Shared
Have you had a moment today where you really connected with your child?
Did you share a joke, a hug or a game of catch? It’s easy to go through
the day telling your child what to do and never fully engaging with each
other. When kids feel connected to you, they learn that they’re
connected to people outside the family, and that the way they act has an
effect on others. “Feeling like you have a place in the world and
people who support you leads to happiness in adulthood,” Dr. Hallowell
says.
Connectedness should happen naturally in everyday life. “A family
dinner, car trip or regular activity can be a shared joy that leaves you
feeling close,” he says. “A lot of parents approach parenting as
drudgery, a job that’s a lot of work. What parents and kids need to feel
connected to one another is to have fun. Sometimes that can mean doing
nothing, but doing it comfortably together.”
So plan family activities, shared challenges, even regular dinners to
reclaim a sense of fun and joy. Research has shown that children brought
up this way are more socially skilled, have a better self-image and
think of home as their haven when things go wrong.
5. Playtime
“The loss of free, undirected play is the biggest loss in modern childhood,” declares Michael Thompson, PhD, author of
The Pressured Child: Freeing Our Kids from Performance Overdrive and Helping Them Find Success in School and Life.
“Kids need time away from their parents to just play.” And it’s not
just because kids enjoy play—it actually helps their brains develop
properly.
Play is the driving force of childhood, says Stuart Brown, MD, author of
Play: How It Shapes the Brain, Opens the Imagination and Invigorates the Soul.
That’s because it helps kids discover their talents and their
resourcefulness, and hones their abilities to problemsolve and get along
with others. Play exercises their imagination and stretches their
creativity, while allowing them to try and fail at things in private
without judgment. All of this helps them do better in school, says Dr.
Brown, because kids who play have nimble minds and can look at things
from different sides.
The next time you’re thinking of signing up kids for an activity, first
think about whether or not they’ve got enough time each week to just
hang out and let their imagination guide them.
6. Independence
When New York City mom Lenore Skenazy wrote in
The New York Sun about
letting her 9-year-old son take a subway home by himself, she was
vilified in the press and blogosphere as “America’s worst mom.” She has
since become an advocate of giving kids more independence and writes
about it in her book and blog,
FreeRangeKids.com.
“The way many people parent today does not prepare kids for adulthood,”
Skenazy says. “We wait for them, cheer for their every move, take them
to soccer, dance and every other lesson—and we take away their chance to
do things on their own.” Her decision to let her son ride the subway
came only after years of navigating the subway together and they both
felt confident that he could find his way.
Doing things independently is very important for a child, says Dr.
Steinberg, because children feel confident when they feel competent. So
letting him go to the store by himself or walk to town tells him you
believe in him. The same confidence emerges when a child completes his
own science fair or other school project. Of course, help him collect
the materials and ask him questions that will guide him to its
completion, but let it be his. So what if it doesn’t look as
put-together as the other parentinfluenced designs? Your child will feel
satisfied knowing that he has produced something on his own
07:30
Im Arsal
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