As I was driving down the street the other day with my kids in the car, my 2 1/2-year-old, Xander, piped up and said, “Mom I want to go get ice cream!”
This wasn’t in my plans for the day, so I replied, “No, Honey. Not today.”
A few blocks down the street Xander said, “Mommy! I want to go to Lowe’s!”
Again, I said, “No, Honey.”
A UCLA survey from a few years ago reported that the average one year old child hears the word, No!, more than 400 times a day!
As I thought about this statistic and my conversation with my son, I realized my response wasn’t acknowledging what he WANTED.
In fact, just saying “No,” like I did was telling him, in essence, that he didn’t want to do those things.
So, a quick shift in my response and this is what it looked like…
Step 1: Acknowledge what the child WANTS
“Oh yeah? You want to go get ice cream, huh?”
That was easy…
Step 2: Now Tell Them “No” or “Yes”
“Well, Sweetie, that’s not in the plan for today.
We will have to do that another day.”
Step 3: Distraction, Distraction, Distraction!
If your kids are anything like mine, a “No” often ends up in a bit of grouchiness.
When that happens, I just point out something else that would interest them. This can be
something I can see from the car, ask them what they are going to do/see when we arrive at our
destination, or what they want for lunch.
After you have acknowledged the child’s wants, they are generally pretty easily redirected and you can change topics without much effort.
Next time you are going to say, “No,” Take a minute and give this simple 3-Step Process a try!
