I just wanted to share this, I noticed it as I was driving in to work and it made me think, we really do say a lot of things to our children that are so irrelevant or run of the mill.
I was sitting at the traffic lights and this little boy, maybe 5 yrs, was on his scooter, zipping up towards me, when his scooter got caught on an uneven paving stone, he feel, looked at his hands and very bravely rubbed them off, I waas expecting a scream or a long howl and tears, but no, he sorted himself out. His mum then caught up with him and said 'Be careful Julian'. Not maliciously or angrily, just the usual way that we do, his response was to throw down his scooter and run off up the road screaming 'It wasn't MY fault, I was being CAREFUL'
It just made me think, why do we say 'oh be careful'? It was an unavoidable accident, but somehow it seemed the mum had led the child to think he was to blame. Crazy huh?!
Oh yes this has set me thinking. I went to this "bite size" seminar on an Adults Learning Week and they were talking about positive language and our children. They reckoned every negative warning/instruction had a positive. Their philosophy was that, just as if we say "don't think of a pink elephant", we all think of a pink elephant then if we say "don't drop that" then we may envisage ourselves dropping the item.
Bubblegum, I guess the positive to "don't drop it" would be "Let's carry that nicely to the kitchen" (although what if the answer is :oops: oh dear you didn't?) and the little lad on the scooter could have done with an "oh that's good you're not hurt, these paths can be hard to ride on". I sometimes think about how I could adapt this to the adults in my life. My eldest, with rather scary debts, however, prompts in me a comment of "Those debts will dog you all through Uni" rather than "Oh that's good you are facing up to your debts and thinking of a future strategy to tackle them" :shock:
Its tough isn't it, I think we should think up some more and the alternative way of saying it.
My mum used to say....and still says now, if I am bending down into a cupboard and the drawer is open above me (and fully aware of it I might add), she will say ' watch the drawer' and you automatically look up (and bang your head!)
Why do we do it!! :lol:
I'm forever saying to my son, 'Calm down' and really, forever, everyday, at least once! 'Calm down!' for christ sake slow down!
Anyway, I say it and he stops what ever it is he's doing (at a hundred miles an hour) and basically placates me with an 'OK', or something, while looking at me with a serious yes I'm listening to you dad sort of look.
And then goes back to what ever it is he was doing, just a little bit slower, after maybe a minuet.
hmmmmm ..
: )
I used to tell my very gullible ex husband that bogies were dead brain cells :lol:
EEeeeuuuurrrrrgggggghhhhhh gross!!
Does your son believe you Me and the boy??
Sorry, I AM sometimes a bit gross :shock:
yes my husband believed me :lol: Does your son think his nose will fall off, meand the boy?
Did anyone used to be told as a child "if you don't take that horrid look off your face, the wind will change and you will stay like that"?
Yes! And that explains why I have a constant grimace on my face!! :lol:
Ha ha only kidding, but I am growing laughter lines that I am quite proud of! I always try to laugh on windy days!! 8-)
Stop crying or I'll give you something to cry about. :lol:
As if! My lot know I'm soft.
I went to a parenting class when the eldest was really very young, and they said always be positive in how you tell them, and tell them off carefully.
Stuff like you know it's naughty to draw on the wall, rather than you're being naughty. I felt it made sense to let them know why.
My dad used to say to me, when I was asking for things incessantly, 'The only thing you're getting is a kick up the bum' he never did mind you, in fact he never ever hit me once that I recall.
I say it to my kids now and they think it's funny and say it to each other when one of them asks for something.
When they are harping on about, what's for dinner, what's for dinner, I say food!
My friend told me that when she was small her older brother used to pick on her (the usual sibling rivalry! - nothing serious!) She would say to their mum, "tell Brian"
And their mum would say "Tell, tell, tell" She now does it with her daughters!
If my kids ask what's for tea I always make up something yukky, like "nappy sandwiches and cabbage yoghurt" (told you I was gross :oops: )
:lol: me and the boy, just imagine one day in 20 years' time he will be in a restaurant and his posh girlfriend will order risotto (or nouvelle cuisine pasta) and he will say "I didn't realise iffits was on the menu"!
:? I don't get it, whats iffitts?? :?
:? I don't get it, whats iffitts?? :?
Me neither. ?
It means whatever you have got in the cupboard ie "IFFITS in, we can eat it"
OOOOOOooooooohhhhh! I seeeee! :roll:
Going back to the topic of the things we say to our children......I saw a mum in the supermarket yesterday snarling at her little boy (maybe 2/3yrs old) from about 10 m away, 'GET ERE NOW, BEFORE I BEAT YOU', snarl, snarl, she was really scowling and jabbing a very sharp finger to her side. Even I felt scared! I thought, oh he's really going to want to do as he is told now! He ran off in the opposite direction - don't blame him - I wanted to too!!
I know I have done very similar things in the past, trying to look really cross and demanding that your child returns to you, but I never saw it from the childs point of view. Why on earth would a child want to return to his mummy who is about to blow a fuse, much safer to keep your distance!! ;)
Actually, aren't they BRAVE, when you consider how little they are, glaring up at us?....but if we teach them that because we are bigger than them, they have to do what we say, then when they are bigger than us (like my boys are now) then we have no chance!
:lol: Too true :lol:
Taking my eldest to his new summer job - he left it too late to get the bus. He also almost left it too late to get there by car, and I've had to speed up the A55 - if I get points, I can't be an instructor (not like I'm heading that way in a hurry anyway 8-) )
I wasn't pleased.
So I yell "I'm only yelling at you because I love you enought to yell at you".
Even I don't understand that one :lol:
...It's because you really care that he gets there OK...
Glad your leg is a bit better today, hope you haven't hurt your knee by driving :roll:
Or like when parents say.. 'Don't drop it'
I I used to say.. 'Oh! OK then' as if to say .. duuuu! like if I do it would have been on purpose.