Baby Talk May2019

Bright Kids
Growing Up
Communicating with a
child
No matter how busy you are, as a
parent, you cannot afford to not
communicate well with your child, and
it doesn’t matter if your little one can
speak back to you or not. When there
is a good, comfortable communicating
line between parent and child, the
latter will be able to express his or her
feelings, needs and wants.
Communicating well with a child
entails that you encourage them to talk
to you so they can tell you what they’re
feeling and thinking. In turn, you must
be able to really listen and respond in a
sensitive way to all kinds of things that
they may have in their little developing
minds – not just nice things or good
news, but also anger, embarrassment,
sadness and fear. As parents, you’ll
also have to tune into your child’s body
language and tone as well as words so
you can really understand what your
little one is trying to bring out. When
communicating with a little one, it also
pays to take into consideration your
child’s age and how much can he or
she really comprehend, not to mention
the short attention span you have to
work with.
Not all children are the same though,
and they communicate in different
ways too. Some children need a lot of
encouragement and positive feedback
to express what they’re feeling inside.
Others will be desperate to talk with
a parent when said parent is busy
with household chores, working on
the computer, talking on the phone,
etc. Once again, it pays to realise that
your child’s communication needs
during this tender developing stage
is important, so do try to stop what
you’re doing and…… listen.
Remember, as they grow older, you’ll
need them to listen to you when you
have important things to tell them,
so start modelling this behavior of
listening while your child is still at an
impressionable age. Be intentional in
your efforts to listen (when your child
or spouse is talking) and junior will
learn to do the same.
Keep the flow of
communication open at
all times
It’s important for kids to know and
realise that their parents value their
thoughts and feelings, and are always
there to help them express themselves
too. One good practice is to set aside
time for talking and listening to each
other. Family meals times can make
this happen by default with
clever prompting. Get your
spouse on board with you on
this and change dinner time
into family communicating
time with jokes, laughter,
praises, etc.
With little children, it’s easy to even
just talk about everyday things as you go
through your day together. Remember,
if you keep this up and your child is used
to having lots of communication with
you, it can make it easier to talk when
sensitive or tricky issues come up in your
child’s life later on.
The many facets of communicating with a child
Building up on their
“Feelings vocabulary”
Be open to talking about all kinds
of feelings, including anger, joy,
frustration, fear and anxiety. This
helps your child develop a ‘feelings
vocabulary’. Talking about feeling
angry is different from getting angry,
though. Learning the difference is an
important step for a child learning to
communicate.
Watch for changes in
body language
Tune in to what your child’s body
language is telling you, and try to
respond to non-verbal messages too
– for example, if your child seems
fidgety during dinner, try inquiring:
“Something seems to be troubling you.
Would you like to talk about it?”.
Work together to
resolve things
As children grow and develop their
own interesting characters, it might
get exasperating for some parents
to try and deal with it. For example,
a child may take to changing his
clothes several times a day. Instead of
nagging about it, try instead to remark
positively on his new interest in /
hygiene/fashion and ask him to put
away what he’s no longer wearing, in
its proper place.
Emphasise the
importance of honesty
It’s crucial to encourage and support
your child to tell the truth at all times
and when it happens, offer praise first
before commenting on the situation.
It goes without saying too, that it will
never do for your child to catch you
telling a lie… even if it’s a little one.
Always being available
and willing to listen
This may be tricky, especially if you
have a clingy or needy child to begin
with. This also may make it difficult
to predict when your child will start
talking about something important.
The key point here is to be sensitive to
his body language, voice tone and of
course, what’s he up to at all times.
28 BabyTalk | May 2019