Calm Plan-Step 4

Communicate Effectively

The principles and skills of Teaching Self-Government have given my family a common dialogue or vocabulary to communicate with one another. This has taken the guess work out of disciplining and me and my child know the exact steps or consequences that will happen, which eliminates a lot of anxiety in me and my children. We have also practiced these skills many times in our home so everyone knows the plan of earning consequences. I will post more about these skills in the future, but if your craving for more info now, head over to Teaching Self-Government!

Because of the system we have set up in our home, I know that when ever a problem arises that it is most likely because someone hasn't followed an instruction, accepted a "no" answer, accepted a consequence, or some boundary has been crossed (like hurting a sibling). I already know what I am going to say and how to handle the situation so I don't get my emotions involved and take something personally (and I can remember that my child is still learning to govern themselves and their emotions). I am able to think logically and communicate effectively.

For example:

When one of my children hits another I go over to the one doing the hitting and disengage if necessary, then I say, "Just know you hit your brother on the head. Hitting in our family is a boundary so you have earned and extra chore." And that's it. Because we have practiced our system my child knows that this is their opportunity to say, "Okay," or ask to disagree appropriately, and they know the consequences of not responding correctly.

If we didn't have a system set up in our family, then the situation may look more like this. I could rush over to my children and roughly carry my child to their room and start yelling things like, "You hit your brother! You know hitting is wrong! You are going to stay in your room until you can say you are sorry!" I could even hit my child on the head and say, "See?! Hitting hurts! Do you like getting hit in the head?" Handling the situation this way will probably instill fear in the child but they may not completely understand what should have happened or why they were treated in such a way, or how to prevent it from happening again. This creates a lot of anxiety and hurt feelings, not the loving feelings we want to have fill our homes.

So an important element of communicating effectively is having a plan of exactly what you are going to say so that your bodies reaction can't control they way you act with your children.

So start setting up a system and plan of ways to communicate effectively with your family!