Learning to listen to your child is a must for parents. Once parents learn to listen to their children first, you will have a much smoother time getting them to listen. Parenting is hard, partly because children are often emotional. From the first day of life, children cry a lot. Parents don’t yet know how to deal with such emotional little people or how to handle these emotional episodes that can occur every now and then. Parents are under a lot of pressure when their children have emotional outbursts. When faced with a child who has a tantrum, parents are often at their wits’ end, even if they have no temper at all. Especially for preschoolers, who have a developing sense of self and have to deal with so many new experiences every day, tantrums are a normal expression of emotions. When parents can deal with their children’s tantrums rationally and guide them to learn to manage their anger, children will not throw tantrums. Among them, learning to listen to children is a must for parents. As long as parents learn to listen to their children first, it will be much smoother for you to get them to listen. Today’s article is edited from the book “Listen to Your Child”. The author, Patty Huvelle (USA), provides parents with ways to help them cope with these often difficult moments from the perspective of listening to their children, around topics such as how to deal with their children’s various negative emotions, how to avoid conflict with them, and how to build a close relationship with them, while There are some basic ideas for parents to help maintain the precious relationship between parents and children, among which the method of how to listen helps to alleviate not only the child’s worries, but also the parents’ worries. What he wants to tell parents most is that you have the power to help your children deal with negative emotions and give them a better focus to perceive, learn, and open themselves up to friendship, cooperation, and joy. Join us to learn the 8 lessons in this book! Lesson 1: Dedicated Time The approach of scheduling dedicated time with children can be a good solution to the problem of parents rarely getting to spend time with their children, and can be a relatively easy and proven way to close the relationship between parents and their children. When we dedicate time to improving our relationship with our children, the deep-seated need for love and intimacy that is common to all of us is also met. Scheduling dedicated time with children is a lively form of listening to children. The child tells the parents about his or her life and feelings through play. From the beginning you need to give your full attention to the child. This is not careless play or casual communication. You have to pay attention to all of your child’s performance, including speech, expressions, intonation, posture, movements, and so on. Specify how to schedule dedicated time: 1. Schedule a short but guaranteed period of time. During this time there should not be any interruptions, no phone calls, ignore the doorbell, do not take care of other children at the same time, do not go to make tea and pour water. 2, do not let you worry and fatigue things. Spend the time you have chosen to appreciate the wonderful child you have brought into the family. 3, during this time, let the child have the power to dominate you. 4. Let your child know that you do appreciate him. Let your concern, interest and approval show on your face, in your voice and in your touch. 5. Expect new situations to occur. The anticipation and interest that flow from your words will encourage your child to seize the opportunity to reveal new things about himself to you. Restrain yourself from directing your child to play or “teaching” him how to play better. Lesson 2: Listening during play There is a special way of playing that not only makes children happy, but also helps to relieve their hesitations, fears and worries. The game is child-oriented, and the role of the parents is to develop the child’s self-confidence and cheerful character through laughter. The point of the game is to be intimate and lively with the child, making sure not to hurt the child’s self-esteem. I call this game listening in the game. The basic principles of listening in games: 1. Be physically touching and loving. Feeling the love of others for themselves can best make children feel safe. 2. Be sure not to overpower or overtake the child. Your goal is to keep your child entertained and feeling superior at all times during play. Be just the right amount of challenge and success. 3. Master the intensity of the game. Your role in the game should change as your child’s needs change. 4. Don’t let your own problems get mixed up in the game. It is not easy to obey your child’s leadership in the game. We have our own preferences and, sometimes, the games our children want to play can make it difficult for us. 5.When you need to tell your child that something cannot be done (the situation is not yet dangerous), try to tell them by listening through the game. 6, be lively, do not take into account your “dignity”. The more you play, the more natural and relaxed the child will be, and in the laughter to increase confidence. Lesson 3: When your child is crying When your child starts to cry, perhaps we can do something different to directly adjust your child’s emotions. As long as we stay with our child and listen to him, without interrupting his crying, his worries will gradually dissipate as he cries and the crying will stop. Here’s why: Crying heals wounds. As you give your child the opportunity to exclude his feelings of hurt, he will become stronger and more confident afterwards. When your child cries and you are ready to listen to him, you should at least do the following: 1. Check that the child and the environment are safe. First check if the child is physically injured or if the environment is dangerous. If so, take immediate action. 2. Do not show uneasiness or give advice. Your advice, or obvious uneasiness, will only prevent him from understanding what is happening. 3. Get close to your child and gently wrap your arms around him so that your eyes meet. A caressing and loving gaze is the most powerful support we can give our children. 4. Kindly ask your child to tell you his troubles. You have to say to him that you want to understand his worries, and then, just listen to him patiently. 5.If you find that your child is afraid of a particular thing, assure him that you will protect him from harm. 6.Don’t comment on your child’s emotions. Your listening can gradually weaken the grip of bad emotions on your child. Once the entire listening process is completed, the child’s own good judgment will be restored. 7. Allow your child to cry freely, without time limits. 8. Your child may need a nap after a good cry. 9. After listening to your child’s full cry, notice the newfound comprehension, enthusiasm, and creativity in your child, as well as his more energetic play. Lesson 4: When children are afraid Children are born with little knowledge of the world and expect love, warmth and understanding. When something happens that they can’t understand, or when they are often left out, it can easily make them feel afraid. Children are sometimes more sensitive than adults, and many things that adults feel indifferent about can frighten children. Children are especially unprepared for sudden, painful or unaffectionate situations. A few principles to help your child get over his fears: 1. Hold your child close and make sure he can see you clearly as long as he wants. A frightened child needs you to just lean on him, and you should act as if you are sure everything is okay. 2, even if the child desperately wants to push you away, you have to insist on being close to him. 3. Explain to the child why you are staying by his side. The fuller the explanation, the more he can trust you. 4.If the child attacks you, you have to prevent yourself from getting hurt. Children can become violent in fear. 5.Let the child know that he is safe now. 6.Hug your child. Into giving hugs to children this step, you need to be gradual and careful. 7, as soon as you feel fear or anger, please immediately stop trying to help the child. Only when we are sensible ourselves, we can try to help our children get rid of their fear. Lesson 5: When Your Child Throws a Tantrum For most parents, the sight of a child throwing a tantrum is unpleasant. But if you can notice how the tantrum greatly helps the child, you’ll turn to praise it. Most parents never get a chance to observe how a tantrum restores their children’s ability to think and learn. That’s because when children exude their emotions, everyone around them gets mad at them or scares them. Despite the fact that every healthy child has tried again and again to use tantrums to ward off feelings of frustration, we keep thinking that children shouldn’t throw tantrums. Once you can grasp the pattern of your child’s tantrums, listening to them is no more difficult than listening to them cry. A few general guidelines for listening to your child’s tantrums: 1. Be close to your child, but don’t try to comfort him. Most tantrums are not very long, and you may have to stick around for 5 to 15 minutes to listen. Once you are listened to, the tantrum will pass quickly. 2. Take the child to a secluded place. If you and your child happen to be in a public place, you can discreetly take your child back to your car or some other more private place to weather the “storm”. Lesson 6: When Children Are Angry When children are angry, that’s when we as parents face a full-blown challenge. Their emotions are intense, and we feel we should respond accordingly. When faced with an angry child, we need to remain as calm as possible and give him or her the opportunity to let out his or her inner anger. The essentials of listening to an angry child: 1. If your child appears angry, stay with him and understand the nature of the problem as best you can. 2. Take stock of your own state of mind. Are you cool-headed and able to listen at the moment? 3, give your child warmth and affection, do not force him to accept, but keep giving. 4. Stay with your child and continue to listen. 5.Explain to the child why you want to stay with him. 6.If the child punches and kicks you, protect yourself. If you can handle it, don’t walk away and let him fight. 7.Don’t let your child break valuable objects or hurt others in anger. 8. Restrain yourself from the desire to lecture, reprimand, or criticize your child. Lesson 7: Say No to Your Child When our children become irrational, they are asking us for help. They need us to say “no” to them, to make sure we care about them, and to restore the emotional bond between us. For a child who is on the verge of a violent outburst, your gentle but firm “no” is a gift. If you can stay with your child and listen, then your gift is perfect. Remember this three-part process for saying no: Listen – Say No – Listen Again Lesson 8: Enter Parents and friends of adolescents can offer real help by following four basic steps: 1. Separate your own worries from those of your child. If our goal is to be a supporter of our children and help them learn to take control of their lives over time, we need to understand their perspectives, their motivations for doing things, their worries, and their troubles. But if we are haunted by our own worries, we will not be able to approach our children and understand them well. 2, learn to listen to teenagers. Listening is the basis for building close relationships. To be a competent ally to your teenager, listening is a key skill that needs to be learned. 3, help children to heal emotional damage. The most helpful thing a listener can do is to provide him with the full attention he needs to keep his emotions cathartic until basic recovery. 4. Respect, support and appreciate your child. In order to learn quickly and well, your child needs your unwavering support. He needs you to show your support with words, warmth and loving attention.