What if experience shows that the secrets to raising a healthy and happy child are hidden behind simplicity? Sometimes small practical everyday actions are enough to make the role of parent lighter and more pleasant and to guarantee the child the growth and attention he deserves. Let's see them together with these 10 rules:
Observe and listen to your child:
The eyes are the mirror of the soul and watching a child avoiding the superficiality allows him to feel loved, accepted, to feel that he exists for the love of mom and dad.
Always remember that he is not an adult:
Many times have heard parents say "Do not cry that you're grown up!" Addressed to children of three to four years? Really at that age are they so big? We do not believe it. It is important that children can fully live their childhood: play, be loved, served, helped, pampered, supported.
If we do not, we feed them a big gap that they will look start looking for ways to fill that void with various bad acts (smoking, partying e.t.c) in the years to come when they start to grow up.
How to apply advice in practice? Here are two important tips:
Avoid the "forced" imposition of rules: The child learns by example and through imitation. The rule sets him to project him early in an adult mode that is not suited to his age. For example, if you want to wash your teeth at the end of all meals, avoid the lecture and take it by the hand, go to the bathroom together and start washing them, giving you the opportunity to observe and imitate you.
If you want your child to learn or collaborate, always involve him through game. For example, the cleaning of the bedroom can become the game of the pirates who clean the ship and then there will be you who are the captain, then there will be the hub, etc. You will see that the following day he will ask you: " when will we clean the room again, mom?"
Make sure that you live a harmonious daily rhythm:
For the child, routine and small daily rituals are fundamental because they give him security, they orient him even when he does not yet have the notion of time, they give him a sense of boundary within which he can move serenely. To achieve this harmony you can:
- Make the times of the day as similar as possible from day to day;
- Avoid changing places at the table or eating once at the table or occasionally changing places on the couch, etc.
- Create a goodnight ritual and a good morning ritual that will accompany your child gently to sleep or the day's recovery.
- Engage in games that are very busy in the evening which are in favor of silence, soft lights and quiet readings or games that do not energetically feed them but encourage calm and the transition to sleep.
Do everything to be yourself serene and happy:
A child learns by imitation and absorbs everything from the environment without the possibility of filtering. Having a good example to follow avoids having to spend time and effort with an old-age educational method made up of impositions, repetitions, prizes and punishments.
Take your own space to recharge yourself with the things you like to do and resolve your conflicts with the past and the rancor you have for others and yourself: very often when we get angry with our children, the real motivation is hidden behind our frustration and not in what they may have done their.
Prevent the loss of natural self-confidence:
A child is born with an extreme trust in life and its possibilities, only that sometimes unknowingly the adult undermines this security, for example when we compare them with others (the child believes that we prefer others to him and begins to lose confidence).
Keep your innate self-esteem high:
Accepting children and young people for what they are is the golden principle to make them always feel confident, strong and capable. Let him experiment and learn through the game, avoiding being too close to him with rational explanations on the why of things.
For example, if your child wants to touch the pot on the fire and you do not want to let him get burned, it is useless to tell him and explain it to him, perhaps even sketching a theory about heat. If he feels the impetus to do so, he will try to satisfy him anyway.
So what can you do? Let him experiment (which does not mean going away from the kitchen and letting him burn himself ). You can tell him with love that he can touch the pot but carefully because it burns (while it is heating on the fire and does not burn).
He will activate his defensive resources, feel the heat in advance and go calmly, but in the meantime he will be able to try, to respond to his curiosity and to verify it in practice.
Avoid the fuse that turns on the "whims":
The whim is always the expression of a child's need that has not been accepted. Before you get angry and take on the same floor ask yourself what you missed, what he is telling you, what you may have done wrong in interacting with him. This applies not only to younger children but also and always for teenagers.
Be as neutral as possible and instead of getting angry, try to ask yourself: " Why are you behaving like this? If I were in his place I would like to see someone who gets angry and does not understand me or would like to be understood and welcomed? "
Give in quality time:
Better two hours spent with our children in complete presence and total dedication than a whole day together in boredom and frustration.You can start by taking an hour in which you feel can be at your disposal and without thinking about anything else you're just with him , follow his games, listen to him, have fun.
If you have things to do and also take care of yourself, do your best to involve him in a fun way.
Do not let him think that the load of the washing machine or the dinner to be prepared are more important than him: talk to him as you prepare, or involve him, always making him feel first.
Be authoritative and non-authoritarian:
Do you like impositions and restrictive obligations? Even your child does not like much.
Authoritarianism leads to the need to rebel and to transgress, while authority is perceived as a guide, support and understanding, fueling the sense of trust:
- Always ask your child the reasons for his behavior, give him a good example, if he is already a boy you can explain to him why things (maybe helping with examples taken from everyday life).
- You behave yourself impeccably so as to be a good example for him
Listen to him, welcome him and understand him so that you esteem him: the esteem towards the children is the real tool to be an effective guide. You do not need anything else to be heard.
In the event of emotional distress, the reception and "getting" on his side are essential to make him feel supported and able to express himself freely.
Pay attention to his fears:
Whether it's a child or adolescent, it does not yet have the inner maturity to face independently what scares him. Ridiculing him or teasing him when he is worried about something or afraid is not helping the child transcend his fears. Make sure that nobody ridicules him in the environment around him.
And finally, you solve his fears for him by showing him how to do it through your example of neutrality, lucidity and security: he will have much confidence and esteem towards you and will have the tools to complete his affective maturity so as to be autonomous once in adult stage.
Conclusion
What can make these suggestions ineffective?
Only one thing: forget them or let the initial difficulty in getting used to applying them has the upper hand on your willpower in the early days.
They are principles that totally respect the nature of a child and their real needs in the phases of growth. They are the same ones that we used in a residential center for children in foster family for five years, obtaining excellent results, as well as during the support to many parents in difficulty with the daily management of their children.