Gentle Parenting

Praise is OKAY and helpful as long as: 1. It's TIMED well. It isn't rushed and allows room for a child to first revel in her own sense of accomplishment -- as this is what builds intrinsic motivation. Intrinsic motivation is the inclination to participate in an activity for its inherent enjoyment, instead of for a reward, or someone's approval. Intrinsic motivation is as natural to us as breathing is. It's how we learn to crawl, walk, and talk. We can easily steer a child from their own sense of triumph when we rush in to praise. 2. It's AUTHENTIC. It is true, comes from a delight in your child, and is given FREELY without any expectation of return. On the other hand, if the goal is to elicit more of the desired behavior, it isn't praise; it's manipulation.  3. It's for the EFFORT and not the outcome.  Why: - Praise based on outcome is conditional. If we'd only praise for a 'good'/expected outcome (and hold back praise otherwise), we convey t...

Being a sensory-avoider myself, I understand more than most how overwhelming it can be to be around a child that screams a lot. As with anything parenting, if we go with the goal of cuing in to a child's perspective (rather than with the one-sided goal of nipping/modifying behavior), we'd find it much easier to respond in a way that's not only gentle but also helpful and effective. Let's take a look at some of the reasons little ones scream: 1. It's the best/easiest/only way to get our attention. As adults, we tend to tune our kids out a lot, whether it's when they're repeatedly calling our name, telling us a story, showing us something, or needing us a lot of the time. When they scream however, they instantly have our full attention. The solution hence is to change this dynamic. Respond to your child the FIRST time she calls you. Responding could mean answering her question, tending to her request or even communicating that you will get back to her in a lit...

  We all sometimes get the urge to distract our kids from their feelings and behavior, and it's understandable why: it's convenient, an easy way out of a difficult situation, and we can move on as if nothing happened. However, as Pam Leo said, "Crying is the healing, not the hurting." Tears are powerful ways of getting difficult feelings up and out of our system, so we can move to a lighter and happier state of mind, return to seeing things through clear lenses, and with clean, fresh and undiluted mindsets. When we distract, we get kids to push their feelings back in. Unresolved feelings hog mental bandwidth (that can instead be channeled towards playing, learning, adapting and living), create "blind spots" (biases in thinking) and convert to triggers and repressed emotions that spill out in unhealthy ways. Have you had a meltdown that came out of 'nowhere'? Disliked someone for 'no reason'? That's all from the unprocessed gunk in your ...