If Your Child is Struggling to Follow Directions, Here’s What’s Not Helping…

We’ve all heard of the emotional piggy bank, love tank, or bucket, but do you know how that has to do with your child’s behavior?

If your child is struggling to follow directions, you might be dipping into their emotional bucket without even realizing it, but you can change that, and improve your relationship with your child by making one change in the way you communicate with your child

Stop asking so many questions.

It’s commonly known that the magic ratio of praise to demand is 5:1. This has been studied by John Gottman, and other researchers and means that for every one demand or negative statement you make, you should be making about five positive statements. This is known to improve behavior, and build rapport - but what counts as a positive statement? And What is a demand? Well for young children, asking questions is a demand, because a demand is any communication that comes with a requirement or expectation of a certain behavior being performed. When someone asks a question, the expectation is that it will be answered. Questions can be a particularly challenging demand for many reasons…

• They may not have good language skills, so responding might be a difficult task (even if they appear to be very verbal!)

• They may feel shy, making it difficult for them to engage.

• If they don’t respond, that may be considered “bad behavior.”

When we think of our communication with children, it is important to ask the question “what demand, if any, does this place on my child?”

How to shift questions to remove demand:

• Make “I wonder” statements (I wonder what you want for lunch?)

• Make comments (instead of “what’s on your shirt?” try “I see a dragon on your shirt. I bet you like dragons!”)

• Narrate (instead of “how tall are you making that tower?” try “I see you building such a tall tower!”)

When you ask questions, you are placing a demand. By being thoughtful about language, you can reduce the number of accidental demands, and really improve the impact of the ones that count. This simple shift in language can improve the way your children respond to you, help build language, and make following directions more likely to happen when it’s most important.

You’re still a great mom though, even when you’re asking questions ❤

Claire