Montessori Radmoor

Dear Parents,

School in full swing, after school activities beginning and copious amounts of sleepovers and playdates, your child will have the opportunity to engage in many social situations. With those great opportunities, come successful interactions and interactions where mistakes and misunderstandings occur. As parents, it becomes important for us to celebrate their successful social navigation as well as helping your child take responsibility for their actions and choices made when things don’t go so well. Most of all, it is important to help your child realize that they have a responsibility to think about their actions and choices before they act upon them.

Remember, we want to promote a system of responsibility and accountability for actions in and outside of our home. James Lehman calls it a “Culture of Accountability, “and it means that each member of the family is responsible for their own actions and behaviors, each person is responsible for following rules and expectations, and each is responsible for how they respond to stressful or frustrating situations. The simple truth is that most kids, and even some grown-ups, don’t take responsibility for their actions. Without accountability in place, kids blame others for their actions, refuse to follow rules they find unfair, and find ways to justify their behavior.( https://www.empoweringparents.com/article/how-to-create-a-culture-of-accountability-in-your-home/)

When Children (and adults) do not act with accountability when making choices or take responsibility, they have a tendency to blame others for their behavior, refuse to follow rules, and find ways to justify their behavior. So, with this in mind how do we help our children live lives where they see their own part they play with accountability in their successes and challenges while engaging with others?

Be clear about expectations and set clear limits. 

Imagine that your child may be having challenges helping to clean up at their friend’s house after they have had a play date or sleep over. Discuss with your child the reasoning why it is good manners to pick up after themselves when they are over at a friend’s home. Explain how this is an expectation for them. Talk with them about the fact that visiting a friend’s house is a freedom and that cleaning up after one’s self is a responsibility. Ask them if it makes sense that if they choose not to help with cleaning up after themselves does it make sense that they should have the freedom to go to a friend’s house.

Help them figure out how to follow the rules

Sometimes it is difficult for your child to figure out what is expected or what they can do to implement the expectation set forth. They may not think that the expectation is fair or may not like a rule they are expected to follow. A simple question, such as, “What can you do to meet this expectation or rule?” Remind them of the expectation; it could be not calling names even if they are very angry at a friend or sibling. They are in charge of their feelings. They can be mad, but to call someone a name to hurt that person is a choice. If the rule is that if they call a person a name they will have to go home, then the follow through must happen. Ask them, what they could do instead of calling names? Sometimes it is helpful to role play, if a rule or responsibility is new or a struggle for them. Have discussions about times that you may have failed with the same responsibility and what you wished you had done differently. You could also discuss how you were feeling inside at a time you acted with accountability and responsibility but really wanted to do or say something else instead.

Use cueing

Many times cueing is a wonderful way to help your child have success with responsibilities and rules. For instance, if you have spoken with your child about the importance of cleaning up after themselves after a play date or sleep over, you could give them a gentle reminder before it happens. You could say,” We have been discussing lately about the importance of acting responsibly when you are at a friend’s house, what can you do to remember this expectation?”

Consequences should relate to the behavior and be short term.

Remember, we all make mistakes from time to time, but following through is very important. Listen to your child with empathy when they have made a mistake, guide them to see what could have happened differently, and what they need to work on for next time. Also, you need to follow through with the consequences that have been set forth as a known rule beforehand. It is important that the consequences relate to the behavior. As an example it could be that you had spoken with your child about calling their sibling a name when their sister was angry that their turn was over on the swings. Remind your child that they may be angry that their sister called them a name, but the rule is that you do not call names. The consequence that you may have set down before hand is that if there was name calling they could not be on the swings for that trip to the park the rest of the visit. They cannot blame each other, they chose to call names. Talk to them about their emotions, validate their feelings, but still hold them accountable for their choice to call names.

Communication with your child is vital for perusing the social circuit in society. We all have choices that we make on a daily basis that affect ours and others lives. Your child at this moment is at the very beginning of this practice, and learning to recognize their part in interactions with others is a crucial social skill for life.

Sincerely,

Christine

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