Developing Autonomy and Confidence in Kids | Parenting 101

Foreign welcome everybody. Today's presentation on Child Development 101. Today we're talking about the period from two years to six years and developing autonomy and initiative. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. Today we're going to examine how the child is starting to develop self esteem through initiative and independence and explore what can go wrong in each stage and what can be done to repair the damages. Now, I know you're scratching your head going now, yes, we can reparent ourselves. If our parents struggled because they had their own mental health issues, because they were going through a divorce, because there was extreme poverty for whatever reason, if our parents were not able to meet our needs in the way that we needed them met, it doesn't mean all is lost. We can reparent ourselves so we feel safer and more empowered. We're going to start again just like we did last week with Maslow. Maslow does the hierarchy of needs. The lower level is our biological needs, our food, our water, our medicine that keeps us and our shelter, if you will. And then the next one up is safety. And, and we need to recognize the importance of children having these things in order to feel safe enough to learn. If we're not getting our basic needs met, then we may not feel safe and empowered. We may feel stressed or unsafe all the time. When we are in fight orf flight, when we're feeling stressed, our higher order thinking, our prefrontal cortex kind of disengages and so learning is impaired no matter what age you are. And remember, we have Maslow's hierarchy. There's biological, there's safety, there's love and belonging and self esteem. And we need to recognize that during this period children are starting to kind of go up that hierarchy. Obviously they're not going to get to that point of self actualization at some point. 6 But they're starting to have more needs. And obviously an infant needs to feel love and belonging on some level. But they may not recognize it in the same way that a toddler or a young child would. In addition to biological and safety needs, the toddler is now developing self esteem, believing, hey, I'm lovable for who I am. Yeah, I might screw up, I might make mistakes, I might misbehave, and my behaviors are not always lovable, but I am lovable. And I know that's semantics, but it's really important as caregivers, whether you're a teacher or a grandparent or a parent or whatever kind of caregiver you are, that we make sure to differentiate for the child between, you are a good child. Your behavior was a bad behavior. That was a bad choice. You are not a bad person because the child internalizes that they hear you. If. If they hear regularly, you are bad. You're a bad boy. You. You know, you are bad. Then they internalize that that was bad, that behavior was bad. That is something external that they can do something about. They also start learning because of this that they're lovable. Even when they make a mistake. We all want to be lovable, and we all will. We're all going to make mistakes. And how the parents and caregivers respond is crucial. I remember when my son was little, he had started at. At preschool, and he loved his preschool and everything. And he had also started going to the orthodontist because his pallet was not wide enough. So they put something called a pallet spacer in, and they had they tighten that palate spacer a little bit every week to try to expand the upper palate, which sounds absolutely barbaric, but it's kind of like braces on steroids, if you will. But there was this one night that Sean comes running back, and he is just beside himself because he said, I didn't mean to spill the paint. I didn't mean to spill the paint. Meanwhile, he's, like, gushing blood from his nose, which was, you know, terrifying and traumatic. I'm like, oh, my gosh, they tightened it too much. And, you know, he's bleeding. I don't know what's going on. Ultimately, he was messing around in the kitchen, playing in a clothes hamper, and he fell down and gave himself a bloody nose. That's what actually happened. But we had never painted, and I didn't understand what was going on or why he was so upset. But then I realized at school, they do paint, and they're not supposed to make messes with the paint. And apparently he had gotten in trouble at school, or somebody had gotten in trouble at school for spilling the paint. So now he was, like, freaking out that I was going to be mad at him. And. And so it was important that, number one, we figure out why he was bleeding and calm him down and get all that taken care of, but also to let him know that he's lovable, even if he would have spilled paint. Okay, so we clean it up. But helping him recognize that, okay, you know, mom and dad have got your back is. Is really important when a child does something at preschool. There was a little boy that was in my daughter's preschool class that Went through a phase where he bit a lot and he bit hard. And we can explore maybe why he was biting later, what that behavior was saying. Ultimately, it was important that the child know that they're lovable even when they bite. Biting is not acceptable, but they are acceptable. And the teacher and his parents and, you know, the therapist had to work all that out with him. But it's important because the child was trying to communicate something. And quashing that without trying to figure out what they were communicating just sets the tone for that behavior to come out some other way. Because they still haven't gotten their need met during this period. They're developing self efficacy. I'm capable of trying new things. I'm capable of picking out my own clothes. I'm capable of going to the bathroom all by myself. There is a video on YouTube that I still watch with regularity. I think I've probably watched it a hundred times where this little boy is sitting on the. On the toilet, and he's so excited because, you know, his dad wanted him to go poo in the toilet, but he didn't go poop. He went pee. And he says, I didn't go poop. I went pee. And he. He just kind of bears down and makes this kind of gravelly sound. And the dad's just laughing hysterically because the kids being so cute. But the child is, you know, figuring out that, hey, I'm. I'm doing the right thing. If I make a mistake, my caregiver is there to help me. As we try new things, as we get out of our comfort zone, as we do things, as we take initiative, and instead of having our caregivers choose all of our clothes and all of our food, and our caregivers do everything for us and tell us basically what they think we want. We are as young children starting to figure out and try new things and say, I think I want this instead. And if I make a mistake, my caregiver is there to help me. If I make a bad choice. You know, like the little boy that was biting everybody, the caregivers were there. They didn't abandon him because he was making a bad choice. They got curious and they tried to figure out and understand what's going on here. I can set boundaries and keep myself safe. This is another thing that children are starting to learn, that they can say no. You know, you remember the terrible twos and the, you know, even worse threes. It doesn't rhyme. But where children are starting to try to develop that autonomy, and you tell them to do something and say, no, I don't want to. Well, they're trying to test that boundary. They're trying to assert what they want versus what you want. They're trying to figure out where they end and you begin. This is mom, mom wants me to do this, but I want to do this. And they're starting to figure out what their thoughts, wants and needs are. In the early stage, two to three years, you have, according to Erickson, autonomy versus shame and doubt. The child is developing will and, and again, this goes back to those terrible twos. I don't like that term so much. That's what a lot of people refer to it, at least in my generation. But during the two year old period is where the child is starting to exert independence. You're starting to see their little personalities come out. What they like, what they don't like, what they want. But they're also trying to test the guard rails. They're trying to figure out, okay, how much can I get away with? What is caregiver going to allow me to do? Is, you know, how, how far can I push this? So autonomy is when the child starts feeling like, hey, you know, I can do things myself. Shame and doubt comes in if they're constantly being corrected. For young children, for example, when they start trying to dress themselves, they want to pick out their clothes. You may not agree with what they're picking out, but if it is appropriate for the weather and the setting, then, you know, you've got to figure out which battles you're going to pick. When my children were little, in the summer, we'd have summer clothes in their, in their closet. In the winter, we'd have winter clothes in their closet. So I knew that whatever they picked was going to be weather appropriate. My son was pretty easy and he matched things pretty well. He was not ever into bright colors, so most everything in his closet matched. My daughter, on the other hand, was a free spirit. She would put plaid with polka dot and be very happy about it. Thank you very much. Did I think it matched really well? No, but she did. And she, she was very proud of her outfit. And sometimes she would put on her little feather boa. Okay, I think it's a little over the top, but you like it. Let's go for it. Obviously these were for appropriate circumstances, you know, but it was important to try to allow them to experiment with what, what they wanted, what they thought would be good, what they thought they would like. I remember one time, my son, he was older than three years, but he Wanted. I used to make smoothies a lot, protein smoothies and stuff. But he decided he wanted to try a pizza smoothie. And, you know, honestly, I was like, well, I eat pizza. I like it. So, hey, why not? Let's try it. Oh, my gosh, that was the most disgusting thing I've ever tasted. And he agreed it was the most disgusting thing we've ever tasted. But we tried it. I didn't say, no, that's, that's waste of pizza, or that's a bad idea. I said, okay, let's try it. Let's see what happens. In autonomy versus shame and doubt, we have interferences in developing that sense of personal capability. If parents are overly strict, if they're constantly controlling and helicoptering and keeping the child from making mistakes or exploring their individuality, the child can start to feel. Feel inadequate. But on the other end of the spectrum, you can also be too permissive if you're saying, yeah, it's a free for all, do whatever you want. The child often feels anxious because the child is looking to you for guardrails. They're looking to you for guidelines of what can I do here? When my children would go to preschool, they knew that at preschool these behaviors were acceptable and these behaviors weren't. And at home, these behaviors were acceptable and these behaviors weren't. Give you an example. When my, when my son was little and at preschool age and, and again, I don't really see the problem with it, but his preschool had an issue with it, but he hated taking a bath. So in order to get him to take his bath, we would play the gross out game. And I would sit in the bathroom with him and we would say, see who could say the grossest word that would gross people out? And words like pus and diarrhea and mucus often came up. And I know y' all are going doc snipes, I'm trying to eat lunch here. Sorry, I won't go there anymore. But. And we thought it was hilarious. You know, we tried to gross each other out, but apparently that wasn't, you know, appropriate for polite conversation at school. So he had to learn there are certain things you can do at home that you can't do at school, and, and, and vice versa, of course. But it typically was. And certain things you can do at grandma's house that you can't do at home or that you can do at home that you can't do at grandma's house. So children start learning, but they do want some level of guidance. I've shared with Y', all, before that, we went to my grandmother's house one time, and my son knew he wasn't supposed to touch the television at our house. Anywhere you don't touch the television. But this was a new place and he wasn't sure and he just wanted to make sure he knew what the rules were. So he walked over to my grandmother's TV and he looked at me and he said, no touch. I said, that's correct, no touch. He looked at me, he looked at the tv, he touched the tv, looked back at me and he said, timeout. I said, yep, timeout. And he toddled himself back into the room that we were sleeping in and sat down for his time out. But he was just making sure that the guardrails were still there. He was making sure he knew what was accepted and acceptable in this particular situation. So not being overly permissive, saying, hey, we're at grandma's house. You know, grandma can decide whatever she wants you to do. No, we have a certain set of safety rules. And even as a young child, we would explain to him why you don't touch that because it's dangerous, it could hurt you. This was back when TVs weighed like a million pounds. My son's 25 now. So anyhow, other interferences for developing autonomy, this toddler age, where they're potty training, they're learning to dress themselves. You know, these are pretty formative times as far as what's going to happen next. Lack of praise for exploration and experimentation. If they're never able to try anything, then they can't get praise for it. But if, when they try things, they're criticized for it, like I suggested my, my daughter would put together outfits that I didn't necessarily find appealing, but they worked for her. She, there were a lot of things that she wanted to try to do. And this, this is true throughout childhood, but it really starts in this, this young age. And we want to praise them for trying, Praise them for experimenting. If you, when you're trying to potty train them, when they go into the bathroom and they try to go to the bathroom, even if they can't, but they tried, they thought they needed to. Well, that was good to try. You know, that was, that was an awesome, awesome try. Or if they told you a little bit too late, you know, they told you, I've got to go pee, pee. And like 30 seconds later they're going in their, in their pull ups. Okay, you know, you need to tell me a little earlier next time. But you noticed it and that was good. So we want to make sure that we're praising progress, we're praising experimentation. Manifestations of a lack of autonomy and shame include low self esteem and a need for external validation. If the child doesn't feel good about themselves, if, if they are, if their entire selfworth is based on whether you approve of what they do, what they think, what they feel, then they're going to have a lot of problem later in life when they are not constantly getting feedback and guidance from other people. There's a lack of self awareness, especially in the overly strict parents when, where the child is told what to eat, what to wear, when to think, when to b, when to toilet. You know, some people will try to potty train their toddler like they potty train a puppy, and it just doesn't work the same way. Putting them on a rigid schedule usually isn't going to be exactly the way to do it. Um, so the child has difficulty developing self awareness because they're always being told what to think, what to feel and what they need. The other end of the spectrum, the overly permissive parents are saying, do whatever you want. So the child lacks awareness of how they impact others. They lack awareness of their own internal cues because there's nobody saying, hey, what's going on? Do you, you know, you seem like you're getting antsy. Do you need to go potty? And we need to make sure that we're paying attention, we're consistent, we're attentive, we're responsive to the child. We want to. Another manifestation of poor autonomy or, or a lack of a sense of self esteem is a lack of motivation. Why should I try to do something if when I do it you're just going to criticize me or I'm going to do it? And it may work, it may not, but you're not even going to notice if you're overly permissive and I can do what I want. Is there a motivation to do it? Because there's no reward. A lot of times in terms of establishing or re. Establishing a sense of autonomy and getting rid of that shame and doubt, getting rid of that need to have external approval all the time, developing a sense of your own thoughts, wants and needs. Encourage the child or if you're reparenting, encourage yourself to explore and experiment and see how you feel about it. If the, if you're encouraging the child to do it, encourage them, hey, let's. You want to try that? Let's go out and try it. Let's see what it is. You know, Going back to that pizza smoothie, we tried it, we experimented. We found out it was really gross, but we tried and we had a good laugh over was like, okay, well that didn't work out. Let's try something else. We want to encourage children when they get curious. Sean developed a fascination with birds. Haley developed a fascination with worms, frogs, and mud. Okay, when she was a little bit older, I think she was four, she took one of my baking trays out and in, into the, into the yard and, and filled it with mud and then made a obstacle course for the little frogs that she had caught, which, you know, was kind of sweet, but it kind of stressed out the frogs. But I digress, you know, okay, let's explore. But eventually I had to put the kibosh on it because she was stressing out the frogs and, and one of them actually died. So, you know, my heart broke and I was like, okay, we're not doing this anymore. Too stressful on the frogs. But I had to praise her for her ingenuity putting together this. And she loved, she loved amusement parks and she thought the frogs would love it. So we talked about that. Praise your child or yourself when you try, even if you fail, okay, you tried, you failed. That means you learned that you still need. There's more you need to learn. You learn ways not to do it. You had the confidence, you had the courage to get outside of your comfort zone. You tried out for the T ball team. And maybe you didn't make it, or maybe everybody made it, but you sit on the bench the whole time. All right, but you're learning, you're trying, and that's what's important. Reassure the child that they are loved as is. They are loved for who they are, even when they make mistakes, even when they don't succeed. Because none of us is perfect at everything. None of us is perfect at anything all the time. And do the same thing for yourself. If you're trying to reparent yourself because you received a lot of criticism or you receive no feedback at all, regularly reassure yourself that, that you're awesome and encourage yourself to explore and experiment and find out what you like. And you know, the heck if anybody else likes it. There's a song called the Middle and somebody in this chat room probably knows who sings it. It's on my Spotify list, but it is a really great self esteem building song. And it says, you know, don't worry about what other people say. You know, be yourself in the preschool age. You know, they're going to kindergarten some of them may be starting first grade. They're developing initiative versus guilt. Can I assert control? Can I take initiative to start a kickball game? Can I take initiative to ask somebody to play with me? Can I take initiative to. Which obviously builds off autonomy, where they were trying to figure out what they wanted and how they differed from others. You know, what, what mom wanted you to wear to church versus what you want to wear to church. In initiative, they are starting to do things on their own without having to be told. And that can be very liberating for a child. Again, the interferences are overly strict or enmeshed parents. If you have parents that physically are hovering over the child constantly, the child is going to start to perceive the world as a very scary place. And they're not going to want to take initiative to do anything. They're going to want to hide behind the protective caregiver. Interpersonally, when caregivers are enmeshed, when they're telling the child who to be friends with, who not to be friends with, what games to play, then the child doesn't learn how to establish relationships on their own. They don't learn how to make friends. They are just plug and chug doing what they're told emotionally and cognitively how they feel and how they think. If the parents are telling them, this is how you feel, this is how you think, or worse yet, no, it's not okay to feel that way, it's not okay to have that thought, then the child is going to start having a lot of guilt when they get angry about something or they're going to feel criticized a lot. And environmentally, overly strict or enmeshed patient par patience. Parents can really cause a child to become anxious about their environment, what their environment needs to look like and what types of things an overly enmeshed parent will tell a four or five year old child what they want their bedroom to look like. I remember, oh my gosh, one of my favorite birthdays for my daughter was when she turned 4 and she wanted a princess bedroom. So we got her what we could afford in terms of a princess bedroom and we also got her one of those little princess, you know, gown things and, and a tiara. Oh my gosh, she was so happy. She like twirled around on her little bed and she was super excited. Would I have gone for princesses? Not necessarily, but she loved it and that was fine. My son, he wanted Star Wars. Okay. You know, again, probably not the direction I would have gone. You know, I might have gone towards, you know, Blues Clues. Or something, but that's what he wanted, so okie dokie. And it was allowing them to explore what they wanted and what they liked in their environment. Lack of encouragement to take risks or explore personal interests is also obviously a problem with getting people to take initiative. If I'm not encouraged to get out of my comfort zone, I'm probably not going to do it because it's scary to get out of your comfort zone. It's scary to try out for a play or to try out for, you know, a ball team or whatever. Even to approach somebody and try to make a new friend, that's scary. We want to encourage people to take some of those risks, explore their interests. Manifestations of guilt include low low self esteem and a need for external validation. Again, because they have been criticized for or ignored for asserting their own thoughts, wants and needs. So now, in order to feel safe that they're going to get parental attention, then it is really important to recognize what they need. Difficulty making or maintaining friends. If they haven't been encouraged to figure out what they like, who they are, what their thoughts are, if they haven't developed self awareness, they haven't developed a sense of autonomy, it's going to be hard to figure out, well, who can I play with that has similar interests? If they haven't been encouraged to take risks and introduce themselves to other kids on the playground or try playing different games, then they may not know how to make friends. If they're unclear what they like, want and feel, they're going to have a lot of problem taking initiative because they don't know what they need. If they don't know what they feel, they're like, well, am I tired, am I bored, am I hungry? I don't know how I feel. Which leads to a lot of mental health problems later on because people lack that self awareness. During this period, children are really starting to develop a sense of mindfulness, a sense of self awareness of what they want. And they can have guilt for having their own needs. If their caregivers communicate to them that they are being problems, you're upset again. You need to just suck it up and get over, get over it. I haven't got time to deal with your tantrum. Wow. You know, the, the child starts feeling afraid and feeling guilty for being angry or for being scared about something. If they have needs for particular foods or something, maybe they have a food sensitivity and the caregiver says, no, you're not going to have that. You're going to eat what I put in front of you. Oh my gosh. I remember cooked carrots. I still don't like them to this day, but my grandparents always used to make me. They, I swear she made cooked carrots at every meal and I would have to eat them and I didn't like them, I hated them. And I was told, you're not getting up from the table until you eat your carrots. And so I felt guilty if I wouldn't eat my carrots or if I refused that food because I was told that that was something I was supposed to do. So we want to examine what kind of message are we sending the child. Remember, guilt is anger itself for doing something we shouldn't have or for not doing something that we should have, like those carrots. I would hide them under other food and stuff and I'd feel a little guilty about it because I knew I was supposed to eat them, but you know, they were just awful. In the four to six year old stage, children begin asserting control and power. They explore and experiment. We want to praise the child for trying even if they fail. And during this time they're exploring and experimenting with everything. They may be putting on shaving cream and pretending like they're shaving, like, you know, like their dad. They may be trying to learn how to tie their shoes, which is not as easy as one might think. But we want to praise them for trying. All right, thank you for trying to do that. Now let me help you. You know, you do it as much as you can and then I'll help you the rest of the way. That scaffolding, I remember with my kids we would, when they were young we would bake together and obviously there were some things that they could do really well. Other things like measuring a teaspoon out, not so much with the little hands and the heavy things. So I would do the measuring, they would do the mixing, and all was well. Reassure children regularly that they are loved for who they are. Remember in the attachment, mnemonic, consistency, attention, responsiveness, encouragement and safety. Safety is knowing that I am loved unconditionally. I can make a mistake, I can make a lot of mistakes, but I am still loved. And you will help me try to figure out why I'm making these mistakes and do better. We want to encourage children to develop friendships with a variety of people. And, and by that I mean, you know, different people at school, but also different people in different environments. Not saying that they're going to be best friends with the, with somebody at church or with somebody down the street or, or whatever, especially if their Ages are different, but we do want to encourage children to, you know, get to know different people. You're really. If the child is really into birds, you know, okay, you're going to hang out with people that are interested in birds, but let's also try hanging out with people that are interested in art or in soccer or in something else. If you like it, great. If you don't, okay, no harm, no foul, but at least try learn about different people. And that goes a long way to helping children see diversity and recognize that nobody is a carbon copy of anybody else. We all have our own idiosyncrasies and we're all lovable because of, not in spite of a lot of our idiosyncrasies. In terms of fixing this, if you didn't develop initiative, if you feel guilty about taking initiative, if you feel guilty about saying, hey, let's go do this, you don't want to be a bother, okay, let's take a look at that. For yourself as an adult, explore an experiment. Or if you're working with a foster child, encourage them to explore and experiment. And encourage them while they're doing it, because if they start exploring, they may have been punished for that before. So we need to make sure they know they're safe. This is a safe place to explore. So, hey, let's try doing it together first. Let's see what happens. And then encourage them gradually to start taking more initiative. Sometimes they need a little bit of help to get started though. And do the same thing for yourself. Explore and experiment. Take initiative to try things and figure out, hey, do I like this or not and am I good at this or not? Some things you may like that you're not good at. I love painting and I am horrible as an artist. My, my daughter has a beautiful eye for it. My mother in law has a beautiful eye for it. My aunt actually is a professor of fiber arts at a university in Washington. I don't have an artistic bone in my body. I experimented with it and do I enjoy doing it? Sure. Is it something that I'm going to want to hang on the wall? Probably not. Praise yourself even if you don't succeed. You know, hey, I tried and I had fun while I was doing it. It's not a Picasso, but hey, very few things are. Remind yourself why you are lovable for who you are. You know, I've tried a lot of things. My mother was excellent at crocheting. She crocheted me a bunch of little outfits when I was little. And I can crochet blankets and scarves and sometimes little purses and bags, things that are square. But I don't do well crocheting with all those fancy stitches and having to count and pay attention to what I'm doing. I like doing it as a, almost as a fidget experiment, fidget activity. So I am not going to be. Because I don't enjoy it the same way she did. I am not going to be as good of a crocheter, if that's a word, as she was. But that's okay. I'm lovable for who I am. Even if I don't have a lot of those. Typical skills that one might associate with things that females like to do. And, and I, I dare say that obviously I had to think before as I was saying it, but there are some gender based activities that one would expect that I might like. If you're putting me into a very stereotyped gender role, I can't stand and that's okay. I'm lovable for who I am. Even though, you know, as a, as a person, as a female, I hate scrapbooking. Oh my gosh, I hate it. And I have a lot of friends who love it. More power to them. I love seeing the joy it brings them. But that doesn't make me any less lovable as a person because I don't have all of those qualities that mom tried to instill in me. And encourage yourself as well as the child to develop effective goal setting skills. When you take initiative, you got to follow through in order to succeed. So if I take initiative to get on the, the baseball team, well that's great. I got to learn how to play baseball so I can get on the team. So I need to set goals for what I need to do in order to be ready for tryouts. In terms of Piaget, this is the cognitive aspect of child development. In two to six years, at the two to six year place we are in the pre operational stage and we have talked about this so much in other classes because children at this age think in all or nothing terms. They think very personally. They take whatever happens as, you know, I did this or it's my fault. So all or nothing. They think in personal terms. They think egocentrically. The way I see it is the way everybody else see, sees it. They don't understand and they can't take, can't yet take different perspectives. It's not that they're trying to be selfish or self centered. They are literally cognitively unable to, to take other children or other people's perspectives. Piaget did this experiment where he had two children on either side of a pretend mountain and had a train coming through it. And on one side the child couldn't see the train and on the other side the child could see the train. Neither one of them could agree because the child that saw the train thought the other child must be able to see the train and vice versa. They couldn't take the other child's perspective and then when they switched, it stayed the same. So the child that used to be able to see the train couldn't see the train anymore. So he assumed that the other child couldn't see the train anymore either. It's a very interesting concept, but it's one that's really important. The way I interpret the world is the way the world must be. And obviously two to six year olds are going to misinterpret a lot and that can create faulty schema that they may be carrying with them later on. Preschoolers live in a magical world where inanimate objects are alive and dreams are real. My son used to have to turn all of his stuffed animals around so they didn't look at him at night before he went to sleep. And that's very developmentally appropriate. It was nothing wrong with him. I'm like, okay, well we need to put everybody to bed. So we would turn them all around. And, and that goes with, what was it, Toy Story, Buzz Lightyear, you know, all the toys would come alive. Children believe that stuff at this age and you know, they have this curiosity. But as from a caregiver standpoint, we have to help them differentiate truth from fiction. Does this really come alive? And depending on the age of the child, you're going to deal with it differently. With a two year old, we're going to let them know you're safe. There are no monsters in the closet. You, even if they believe there are, but we also are going to help them see. Let's look together to see that there are no monsters in the closet. We need to help them understand what's going on, but we also need to help them feel safe. And at this age, children also may confabulate, we'll say that. Which may look a lot like lying, but what really happened? And, and sometimes children may actually believe something fictitious happened. So we want to help them separate truth from fiction and creativity from reality. What were you hoping was going to happen? What, what are you pretending? You know, you're pretending you're a fairy princess that has the ability to do magic. My son went through this period where he thought he had poof up powers and he could just go poof and whatever he wanted would happen. And obviously he realized that that wasn't actually going to happen. That was his creative world and we had to separate those. They have trouble distinguishing between appearances and reality. So as parents, we need to help them differentiate and safe versus danger. A dog. If they, they have dogs at home, they love dogs. Dogs look safe. Well, yeah, that's true. Your dog is safe. It doesn't mean that all dogs are safe. Remember, thinking in all or nothing terms, the truth of the matter is that some dogs can be dangerous. So truth versus fiction, reality versus, you know, their world, safe versus danger. They cannot yet examine shades of gray or exceptions. Remember I said it was all or nothing. In situations where a child is being criticized, it's mother, mom loves me, or mom hates me. There's nothing in between. It's not. This happens sometimes if you have a caregiver that has a mental health issue, for example, and some days they are mentally, physically, emotionally present and interacting with the child. And other days they are completely disengaged because they are in a major depressive episode or they're very angry because they're experiencing a lot of anxiety. The child doesn't realize that, okay, when mom's having an episode, she acts this way. And when Mom's, you know, not having an episode, she acts this way. It has more to do with mom's episodes than with me. And children can't distinguish that in two to six years old. They also have difficulty distinguishing because they personalize between is it my fault or did something else do it? If, if I come home from a bad day at work and I'm in a God awful mood, that my child may think that they did something to make me angry, may think that it's their responsibility to try to apologize or make it better. Some children will withdraw, but others will try to fix it because they feel like they did something wrong. So it's important to set that boundary and say, little person, I am in a really bad mood right now. I had a bad day at work. It has nothing to do with you. I want to go to my room and have some quiet time for a few minutes. Not because I don't want to spend time with you, I want to spend time with you, but I need to have some quiet time for a few minutes. And the child will understand that a little bit better. And they won't personalize, hey, mom came in and went straight to her room and didn't Spend any time with me. What gives Children of this age typically love to play make believe. Parenting challenges finding your make believe. How many of us, if you've had children, had difficulty getting into make believe, difficulty getting into the tea parties or the racing cars or whatever it was? I know I did. I had a ton of problem with it. I lost my make believe somewhere along the way, and that's kind of sad, but you can try. It's important that we support our children in their make believe because they are communicating and learning through their play. They're learning about taking turns. They're learning about sharing. They're learning about just interacting. In general, we want to make sure that we practice play using cares, that attachment mnemonic. We want to be consistent in how we play. We don't want to do it where sometimes we'll play with them. Other times we just don't. We don't want to. We don't have time. Go away. Could you bother me? That's not consistent and that's not attentive. We also need to be authentic. And my son used to love to play with cars. He had all the little Matchbox cars and everything. And oh my. He had one of those rubber mats that we laid on the floor that had the town on it. And, you know, it was. It was just swell and I just couldn't get into it. And I would try to sit down and play with him, and within two or three minutes he would toddle off to something else because he was bored with playing with me. I was not engaging him, and I never did get the hang of cars, I'll tell you that. I never did. But instead of trying to do that, you know, I acknowledged that he loved to play cars, and I love to watch him do it. And, you know, I didn't interact with him while he was doing it, but I just had a hard time. That's not something mommy knows how to do. We learned to do other things together that we both enjoyed, and so we were spending quality time together. We would go bird watching. We created a. We got our backyard certified as a natural habitat. We did things that we both enjoyed, and so we were spending that time together, even if I wasn't able to quite get into that play. When his sister came along, oh, my gosh. The two of them were like peas in a pod. They would play creative stuff for hours. They would play make believe for hours. It was for years on end they did this. I think they were like 11 and 14 by the time they kind of started drifting apart. It was wonderful. But I digress. Being responsive to the child when they are wanting to play make believe, not squashing everything and going, you know, that's not real. You know, you can't do this, you can't do that. That's not real. Oh, that just sucks the life out of it. It's like telling people that, you know, the person who wears the red suit, just in case any children are listening, doesn't exist. I mean, ew. You know, that just takes the. The wonder out of some of it. So make sure that you're being responsive to the child and allowing them to have some room in their creativity, allowing them to explore their creativity, but also grounding them in the present. We want to be encouraging if they are coming up with something that they want to talk about or they. When my son would want to build a fort in the living room and, you know, I could do that too. You know, I was really good at building forts and playing. Playing games around the forts, but we would do that. Okay, you want to do that? Let's go ahead and do that. So I was responsive, but again, I was also authentic. If it was something I knew I wasn't going to be able to get engaged in, I would make sure he knew that it wasn't him. I disliked it was that I just was not able to get my head into that space. And we want to be safe. That is unconditional positive regard. We don't want them fearful of sharing their creativity with us, of sharing their fears or their aspirations or their. Their stories. As long as they know that they are, you know, stories at. On some level, children focus on one aspect of a situation called centration and struggle to see the other vantage points. We already talked about egocentrism. Some. They focus on what's going on. If there's a little child on the playground that has a ball and they want the ball, they take the ball. They don't think about how it's going to make the other children feel. They don't think about the fact that other children are playing with that ball right now, and if you take the ball, they can't play their game anymore. That's. They're not capable of thinking in that many different abstract directions. We need to help them. My son's preschool teacher used to be great at this. She would say, you know what? All right, everybody, let's think about when. When you did this, how do you think that Tommy felt? And a lot of the times the child would be like, I don't know. And so then she would turn it back around on them and say, okay, let me ask you this. If Tommy would have taken your ball, how would you have felt? And they're like, he wouldn't take my ball. That didn't make me angry. And she's like, exactly. So if he did it to you and it would make you angry, do you think that when you did it to him, it made him feel angry too? It was brilliant, brilliant watching this woman work. And obviously I stole that and used it for forever and henceforth and forevermore. But it is important to recognize that a lot of times children seem selfish, seem uncaring at this age, but they're not able to take that perspective yet. They haven't been on both sides a lot of times either. Parenting challenges. Helping children find their voice and assert their thoughts, wants, and needs without being a bully, without telling people, I want this, therefore you're going to give it to me, or, I want to do this, therefore you're going to do this too. You must want it because I want it. So separating what I want and what I need from what you want and what you need, and finding that compromise, helping them learn to make good choices, not focus on immediate gratification. Yes, I hear you want that right now. Is that going to be the best choice? How is that going to impact whatever? How is that going to make other people feel? Encouraging them to focus on how. What their part is in things without taking total responsibility? Yes. Something bad happened at home. You knocked mom's lamp over and you broke it. Oh, okay. So what was your part in this? Throwing the football in the house? Okay. Is it all your fault? Well, no. You were throwing the football in the house with your older brother. Okay, well, now older brother has some responsibility because he probably knew better than to do that. So, yes, you probably knew better or knew you weren't supposed to throw the ball in the house. So you accept that. But there's enough to go around that there were other things at play. Accepting that everything isn't necessarily their fault or doing. And that goes back to internalizing things that have nothing to do with them. You know, the. A child gets angry at their sibling and says, you know, I wish something bad would happen to you. And then something bad happens to their sibling and they blame themselves. No, you didn't magically do that. Helping them see that they really don't have that much power to control everything in the world again, recognizing what their part was or why they feel bad about it. But how much control or how much input or effect did they actually have in that situation? In order to address these things as adults, as children, we need to help them develop communication skills. Assertive communication, which is, I am going to tell you my thoughts, wants and needs and you can tell me yours. I'm not going to tell you what you think, want or need because I don't know, I am going to tell you what mine are and, and then you can tell me what yours are and then we'll figure out how to compromise. You know, that's a sort of communication. Explore the notion of responsibility. Regularly looking back over, is this your responsibility? I know I'm going through some stuff with some friends right now that, you know, I, I feel bad about, but I have to recognize that in this particular situation I, I was relatively powerless. And yes, it sucks and I feel bad for them, but it's not my fault, it's not my responsibility. Even though there's this little voice in the back of my head saying, well, are you sure about that? But children need to recognize what was their, what part of this was their responsibility? They failed a test. Okay, well did they study for the test? Yes. Did they? And they still failed the test. Okay, well then it's your responsibility to try to figure out how to pass the test the next time. But you did everything that you could. It's, you know, and, and maybe it was the teacher's fault for not explaining it better or checking it. There are other. We need to look at what other factors played in. Explore all aspects of situations, including other vantage points. A lot of times when I'm working with clients, I'll step back and I'll say, okay, I hear what you're thinking and feeling and telling yourself about this situation. I want you to step out and pretend that you are your best friend. What would your best friend tell you about this situation? What would their vantage point be? What would your boss's vantage point be? What would your parents vantage point be? Whatever. Have them take different people's perspectives to see if they are getting the full picture. Children often have difficulty putting into words how they feel or what's going on inside. This leads to high levels of anxiety and acting out and difficulty self soothing. They have. They don't have the words so they communicate through actions. When they're feeling scared, when they're feeling bored, when they're feeling whatever. So we want to look at behavior as communication instead of disobedience or acting out. When children are stressed, they are in fight or flight. They are not naturally able to to downregulate or self soothe. So we need to help them by being responsive, helping them learn how to downregulate and develop those distress tolerance skills. We want to pay attention to verbal and nonverbal cues to help the child label feelings. Angry, sad, scared, excited. We want to help children learn to identify sensations, urges and feelings associated with emotions. What did that feel like when you were scared? Did you have. My son used to talk about anxiety as having carnotaurs, a type of dinosaur. I have carnotaurus in my tummy, mommy. Okay. Teach children to check in with themselves periodically to identify their thoughts, wants and needs. Create a validating environment. Even though I may not think this is scary, I can see how you would at 6 help child learn to tolerate emotions because sometimes you gotta tolerate some anxiety, but it's not going to overwhelm you. Children often use everyday objects in conventional and unconventional purposes. So we want to honor their creativity in the right time and place. My children used to love to use my pots and pans as percussion instruments and you know, okay, that's fine. Right time and place, not fine if I'm trying to talk on the telephone or we have company over. Probably not the best time to get out the, the pots and pans and the, and the big old spoons. We want to get outside of the box. Yes, there are certain ways we do things, but our children are going to come up with their own creative ways. You just because it's not the way we do it. Is it the wrong way? Does it mean it's wrong? And usually the answer is no, they just came up with a creative way to do it. Preschoolers also love to ask questions both to learn facts as well as to learn how to interact with others. So we need to be careful not to get impatient with the question of mommy, why is the sky blue? Mommy, why does the cat meow? Mommy, why does you know? Oh my gosh. Well, they don't know these things. We have all this knowledge that we absorbed over 20, 30, 40 years. They don't. So they're curious and we can turn it back on them. Say, why do you think that is? Or what do you think happens? Help children learn how to answer their own questions and learn to self regulate in mutual conversations. That means take turns instead of being the one that's always talking. Helping them learn to ask a question, wait for the answer, or tell a story and then give somebody else the chance to talk. And encourage children to figure out their own answers. Children at this age are little scientists trying to see what Happens. What will happen if I drop my ball of play doh. Into the aquarium? Let's check it out. In the same way, they test rules and boundaries to make sure that they're the same. Have the rules changed. So the parenting challenge. Cleaning the aquarium, which can be a challenge sometimes. Making sure the child understands why you don't want to put things in the aquarium. Being consistent and understanding the child's motivation from the standpoint of learning or curiosity or communication, as opposed to wanting to be devious or disobedient. Children at this age crave structure, so we need to be consistent and steadfast. If bedtime is 9 o' clock or 7 o', clock, then bedtime needs to be at that time every night, not, oh well, if I whine enough, can I get you to push it up an hour and then an hour? Then you start getting this creep. Being consistent is really important. Children begin to use strategies for remembering, but they often use inappropriate and ineffective strategies. So we need to help them differentiate truth from fiction. Did you really take out the garbage when I asked you to, or are you telling a lie? They may think that, oh well, I intended to do it, so I must have done it, when in reality they didn't do it. So we want to help them differentiate truth from fiction, identify intentional lying from ineffective recall, because they will try to lie in order to avoid punishment. That's, you know, normal human behavior. And help children start learning to be mindful and aware of what's going on. If I ask you to do something, I need you to remember to do it. So what can you do to remember? How can you increase your recall? Toddlers and preschool age children are learning that it's okay to have their own needs, wants and feelings, to communicate those wants and needs, and to try new things even if they fail. They're starting to develop emotional regulation skills. And in terms of self esteem, children are learning that they are lovable for who they are, reducing the need for external validation and fears of rejection, isolation, failure, the unknown and loss of control.