February 15, 2024 • 42 mins
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How do we teach social skills like sharing, turn taking, and making friends? Unravel these themes in the latest episode of the Whole Parent Podcast. We kick off with a the struggles our kids have with sharing, debunking myths and laying out strategies that emphasize balance and respect for personal boundaries.
Navigating the tricky waters of parenting, we find ourselves teaching our kids not only about the joys of sharing but also the value of autonomy. I share personal anecdotes and listener experiences that show how giving children the power to choose what they share actually fosters greater cooperation.
We also discuss the delicate task of stepping back to let natural social consequences unfold, and the importance of post-conflict conversations, creating a comprehensive guide on nurturing interdependence among our little ones. Instead of intervening, we debrief.
Finally, we explore the power of play in building leadership and cooperation in children, with a special focus on how introverted and highly sensitive children engage with their peers. By incorporating child-led play and the "Yes, And" improv technique, you’ll learn how to cultivate a safe space for your child's social development.
Our discussion concludes with an invitation to share the insights gained from our podcast, creating a supportive community that thrives on collective wisdom and understanding. Join us on the Whole Parent Podcast for a heartening discussion that celebrates every child's individuality and the art of sharing in parenting.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jon Fogel (00:00):
So the first thing that I want to say is that
introversion is a feature, not afailure.
So if you feel, like man, I myfailing as a parent because my
child is an introvert, please wegot to change that mindset.
I'm not saying that that's whatyou feel.
I'm saying that many parentsthat I've worked with deep
underneath the surface is thegreat fear that their child
won't be successful becausethey're an introvert.
(00:20):
Nothing can be farther from thetruth.
The world has changed byintroverts.
The whole parent podcast is onthe air.
Hey guys, welcome to the wholeparent podcast.
(00:40):
My name is John.
I am at whole parent on all thesocial medias and for my whole
life I have wanted to saysomething like that because I
grew up in Chicago, still livethere today and or Chicago land,
I should say, because I was notfrom the city proper and I grew
up listening to Chicago Cubsbaseball and that's how they
started every broadcast.
So thanks for indulging me onthat.
(01:02):
Well, let's get into talkingabout parenting.
That's what we do on thispodcast.
We answer real questions fromparents like you.
Occasionally now we host gueststo talk about their areas of
expertise.
I'm super excited to have someawesome guest episodes coming up
soon, but mostly we just talkabout parenting.
We talk about how we can raiseresilient, psychologically,
relationally physically healthykids, socially healthy, as what
(01:27):
we're talking about in thisepisode social skills, and how
we can do so with confidence.
Because you get so muchcompeting advice and input out
there on social media andparenting books, we're just
trying to put it all together.
I am a dad of three and, yeah,so I'm just kind of bringing you
along for the journey, as, as Itake in what what I have, I've
(01:48):
helped hundreds of parents togrow and change and parent more
effectively parent withoutpunishment, parent without some
of the harmful things that mayhave been done to many of us,
and so that's what this podcastis all about.
And today, like I said, we aretalking about social struggle.
So I want to just jump right inwith our three questions from
four from today.
(02:08):
They come from Owen, sophia andAudrey, and I'm actually going
to start in reverse order withAudrey.
Today, audrey says Hi, this isAudrey.
My child's name is Jake, he issix years old and he is an only
child.
Jake is often, or sometimes,sorry, has difficulty sharing
toys and taking turns whenplaying with other children.
It leads to conflict duringplay dates.
How can I teach Jake to share?
(02:31):
Audrey, thank you for anamazing question about sharing.
We have not talked about sharingyet on the podcast, and I think
it is long overdue, becausesharing is one of the most
difficult things that kidsstruggle with all the time, kids
who are only children, as inthe case of Jake, and I wonder
if you pointed that out.
It's interesting to me thatgenerally people don't tell me
(02:53):
in their question whether theirchild is an only child or
whether they're a youngest orwhatever, or the oldest, unless
the conflict or the thing thatthey're asking the question
about is related to siblingissues.
In this case, I wonder if thereason that you pointed out is
because you think that maybeonly the fact that he's an only
child leads to him struggling toshare, and to that I say we
(03:16):
don't have data to support thatonly children struggle with
sharing any more or less thankids who have siblings.
So if you're kind of beatingyourself up, maybe we should
have had another kid or whatever, and I don't know your
circumstances, obviously, butthat's not necessarily true,
right?
We don't see that kids who areonly children really struggle to
(03:39):
share any more than kids whohave siblings and in fact I know
of many cases where youngersiblings have a harder time
learning to share and we'll getinto why that might be
developmentally than olderchildren tend to and again,
that's just anecdotal.
We don't have a lot of datathat I'm aware of and if you
have data supporting that,please shoot an email over to
(04:03):
podcast at wholeparentacademycomand let me know, because I'm
always looking for more researchthat I can read so that I can
answer these questions to thebest of my ability and with the
most efficacy, and I am alwaysopen to correcting when I have
made an error.
But as far as I'm aware, thereis no data to support the idea
that only children have any moredifficulty sharing, and that's
(04:25):
because sharing is adevelopmental challenge for kids
.
It's something that they haveto learn how to do.
It doesn't come naturally tokids.
It only happens through socialrelationship and actually
practice sharing.
And it doesn't have to be witha sibling.
It can be in a daycareenvironment, obviously.
(04:48):
Jake is six years old.
I don't know if he's in atraditional schooling
environment, but it canabsolutely happen at school, it
can happen on play dates, it canhappen so many other places.
We can teach our kids to sharein so many ways.
We can even, in some ways,teach our kids to share with us.
We can be some of the earlypeople who they can share and
take turns with, and we're goingto actually get into that with
(05:08):
another question here.
And so, audrey, if you'relistening I hope you're
listening because you'vesubmitted a question, but make
sure to listen to the wholeepisode, because some of the
stuff I'm going to say to Sophia, who is our next question, is
also going to relate and behelpful also to Jake.
So there is no data that I'maware of, in other words, to
support that.
Any number of siblings makes youshare earlier or better.
(05:31):
However, many, many kidsstruggle to share, and it's
something that is almost nottalked about.
What I hear on social mediamost often is don't make your
kids share, right or don't?
A better way to say that mightbe don't impose authoritarian or
dictator status type stuff,type punishments and threats and
(05:53):
bribes and things like thatauthoritarian parenting tactics
in order to make your kids share, and to that I say yeah, I
wouldn't advocate for imposingauthoritarian tactics on your
child in almost any situation,certainly not to teach social
skills, because they aresomewhat anti-social skills
right.
When you go authoritarian andyou say you must share, you must
do this, you must do that, andwhen you become a tyrant, that
(06:15):
teaches your child to enact thattype of power over those who
they feel that they may havepower over, and again that's
kind of getting into our nextquestion, but so I don't want to
go too deep into that.
But children struggle to share,ultimately because they are
going through a developmentalprocess where they are
establishing a sense of autonomy, an agency, where they didn't
(06:38):
really have that autonomy andagency earlier on.
And I've talked about this inmany places on social media and
I'm sure I will talk about it onthis podcast so many different
times.
But kids exercising andlearning how to express their
own autonomy and having agencyis a really important
developmental step.
They are learning their placein the world as distinctively
(06:59):
separate from their family unit,while also being interdependent
or intra-dependent on theirfamily unit for care and support
, and that's a positive, goodthing.
Right, we balance dependenceand independence to make
intra-dependence orinterdependence, which means you
go out and you seek help whenyou need it.
(07:22):
And in this process ofdeveloping independence where
there was only dependence before, when you're a toddler, or when
you hear the toddlers who sayme, do, me do, or I want to do
it, which obviously Jake is sixyears old, so he's probably way
past that point of saying I mustdo everything for myself, or
just saying no arbitrarily toeverything, or demanding or
(07:43):
whatever.
Those types of toddlerbehaviors are what we see, that
autonomy seeking behavior comeout and manifest, as in toddlers
, oftentimes in young gradeschool age kids.
We see that autonomy seekingbehavior manifest as having a
difficulty taking turns, losingas well, failure, early signs
(08:05):
that kids are really reallystruggling to lose or fail and,
of course, sharing.
And so, counter-intuitively,one of the best things that we
can do to help a kid share is toactually establish certain
things that they don't have toshare.
This is similar to my advice totoddler parents, and this is
just a little toddler tidbit foryou in this episode that's
(08:26):
going to be more about olderkids than toddlers.
A little toddler tidbit if yourchild's saying no to everything,
there's a chance, so there's agood chance that it's because
they feel that you are saying noto everything, and so one of
the ways to help your child tosay no less is to say yes more
yourself, in the same way withsharing with a kid like Jake,
(08:46):
who's six years old establish acouple of things, a couple of
items whether they'resentimental objects, you know, a
stuffed animal or even a newtoy that they might get and say,
hey, this object is notsomething that you have to share
, and also appreciate thatthat's not an item that you
would want to bring to a playdate or that you would want to
(09:09):
have out when the play date isat your house, because it's
something that you cannot share.
So we do this with myseven-year-old all the time.
He has certain things that hejust does not want to share and
we actually give him the agencyor the decision-making ability
to decide which of those objectswithin reason we'll get to that
in a moment he doesn't have toshare and by identifying a few
(09:33):
objects that he feels he doesn'thave to share, then it allows
him to feel like those otherobjects he can share and it just
comes down to I need to knowwhat belongs to me, I need to
know that I have power over thethings that belong to me and in
the process of learning whatbelongs to whom and who who's
(09:55):
does this which toys are mineand which toys are for sharing
and which, or whatever.
In the process of establishingthose kind of seemingly rigid
boundaries, right, we actuallywind up increasing our child's
capacity to share.
And before you say, well,that's not how it's going to be
when they grow up and you knowthey're going to have to learn
to share, even those hard,difficult things to share.
No, they're not.
(10:16):
You don't.
In fact, most of us don't.
I have done marriage counselingfor many, many couples and one
of the things that will come outin marriage counseling
sometimes is a partner who hasviolated deeply violated the
trust of their partner by takingsomething that was a
non-sharable item and and usingit.
(10:38):
Primarily this is a laptop or acell phone, right?
Not that one partner should behiding things from the other.
Obviously, open, openness andtransparency are values and
relationships, but it can feellike a massive violation of
privacy and trust to takesomebody's cell phone, for
example, and go through theirtext messages.
You would not allow someone Idoubt you would allow someone to
(11:01):
, or just anyone to, do that.
You may have one person in yourlife who you feel comfortable
with allowing to do that, but byand large, you would not allow
other people to go through yourthings in that way.
Kids are not different.
They are trying to establishwhere they end, and part of
understanding where they end iswhere does my stuff end?
What do I have control over?
(11:22):
And kids who feel that theyhave no control over any of
their stuff Will then grasp forthat control.
They will try and act out thatcontrol and they will try and
say well, you can't shareanything with me because nothing
belongs to me, so therefore Imust scrap and take whatever I
can.
So you can do this in a coupledifferent ways.
(11:43):
I know parents and this isprobably a conversation for a
sibling episode as well, becausethis happens a lot in sibling
relationships but you can have abox or a shelf when you know
and not a lot of things, butwhere they can take a few things
that really deeply aresentimental, that they really
don't want to share, and thingscan can move right.
They can go from being anon-sharable item when it's
(12:04):
brand new and they're veryexcited about it and they want
to be careful with it, and thenit can become a shareable item
as they somewhat lose interestin it or or as they are less
attached to it or whatever.
But you can have those itemsthat are non-sharables and just
appreciate that that's.
You do that too as an adult.
This is not a bad thing forthem to do, and sharing is is a
part of autonomy seeking anddevelopment.
(12:25):
Learning to share is a difficultskill.
It requires a level often ofperspective taking that young
kids just do not possess and sounderstanding that that saying
how would you feel if?
Might not really work on a sixyear old.
Very well, you will.
You will enact this kind ofcounterintuitively by actually
picking out the items that theydon't have to share.
That can be super, superhelpful as a tool.
(12:48):
The the last piece is that Idon't think by and large, unless
it gets physical, that weshould intervene in the moment
when our child is struggling toshare.
Obviously, this is withinreason.
Take every piece of advice thatI give Within reason.
But I think as much as we cannot intervening in the conflicts
(13:09):
that arise between our childand another child Related to
sharing, the more they actuallycan start to understand the
negative social consequencesnatural social consequences as,
in fact, the natural negativesocial consequences of
withholding some thing fromsomeone else.
Right, if you're playing someGame that you really don't want
your friend to play while yourfriend is over and they get
(13:31):
upset at you.
That's actually okay.
It's okay to allow that tohappen.
You don't have to save yourchild from discomfort and in
fact, oftentimes the helicopterparents who swoop in and save
their child from any negativesocial interaction and any
amount of discomfort are thesame parents who wind up with a
child who lacks any level offrustration, tolerance.
So you actually One of the waysto teach your child to share is
(13:55):
to let them not share and thensuffer the social consequences
of not sharing.
It's not.
It's not a pretty or a funthing to do.
I don't like doing it myself.
However, it can be an effectivetool, because the mistakes that
we make, social or otherwise,are often some of the biggest Uh
ways that we learn, apart frommodeling right.
(14:15):
So that's another way that wecan help our kids to share is to
share with them and identifywhen we're sharing.
Oh sure, I am happy to sharethis with you.
Right, it's every kid that Iknow eats off their parents
plate when they get somethingdelicious.
You know, you get.
You know, whatever a frenchfries that we ordered restaurant
, some of you get french fries.
Your kids are going to try andpick off your plate and if you
let them do that, just use thatas an opportunity to direct
(14:37):
their conscious attention andsay sure, I'm happy to share my
french fries with you.
So then that's modeled for them.
But the other way that we learn,outside of modeling often, is
through the natural consequencesof our actions and the mistakes
that we make.
And so allow your kid to makemistakes related to sharing and
then process those mistakes withthem later.
Oh, I saw that you were, youknow, not in the moment, but I
saw later.
(14:57):
You know, hey, jake, I noticedthat you were hanging out with
Ben and Ben Got really upset atyou.
What was that all about?
Be curious, you know.
And then that will open up thatdialogue.
For, oh well, I wasn't sharingthis thing or I didn't want him
to touch my x, y, z, and thenyou can kind of explain yeah,
that is really hard.
It's hard when we don't want toshare and a kid wants to share
(15:18):
with us, and those can beamazing moments.
So it's.
I'm not saying don't do anything.
I'm saying oftentimes allow theinteraction In to occur again,
unless it gets physical orviolent in any way, but allow
the negative interaction tooccur Without your intervention.
Your intervention is going tocome on the back end as you
process that with your child,and this especially is true for
(15:38):
older kids like six, seven,eight I know that doesn't sound
older, but school age kids Ishould say that's less effective
with like a toddler, two yearold, three year old, who's
struggling to share it's.
They're going to have a hardtime processing it later with
you, just from a vocabulary andand communication standpoint,
verbal communication standpoint.
So I hope that that helps and Iwant to transition right away
(16:00):
no break right into this nextquestion.
I've lined these two questionsup back to back because this one
is actually very, very similar.
It's about Caleb, who is agefive, but it's different enough
that I wanted to cover both,right?
So this is from Sophia.
She says my child's name isCaleb.
He's age five.
I've noticed that Caleb, when heplays with his friends, he
always takes charge and hedoesn't allow his friends to
(16:22):
make any decisions during theirimaginative playtime.
I'm afraid this is going tostart to start to frustrate his
playmates and I'm concernedabout the impact that I might
have on his friendships.
How can I address the situationand help Caleb learn to
cooperate and share in decisionmaking during his play with his
friends?
Really really good question,sophia.
I think a lot of us see this,and the first step in this is
(16:45):
you you pointed out I'm afraidthis will start to frustrate his
playmates.
The first thing I want to say iswe need to be observers and not
predictors often times becauseour predictions.
It is true that Caleb at agefive, at age 25, acting this way
(17:06):
, that will likely frustrate hispeers and co-workers, but at
age five, children develop theirown social relationships that
can look pretty differentoftentimes than adult
relationships, and so what feelsto us like a child is being a
dictator sometimes is actuallyjust that's the, the way in
(17:28):
which their playgroup has kindof elected a leader, and so I
don't.
I don't want you to get intothe trap of saying I have to fix
something that isn'tnecessarily broken now.
I think it's a great idea tohave your have a conversation
with Caleb Outside of the of hisplaytime.
You know if he's at the parkand he's always taking charge.
You know, maybe on the car ridehome or or the next you know,
(17:51):
an hour later after snack orsomething, to have the
conversation between what itlooks like to be a leader who
enables and who lifts up people,versus a tyrant or a dictator
who commands people.
So that's, I think that that'sa great conversation to have,
but just to approach thatconversation not from a place of
(18:11):
judgment but from a place ofteaching.
So not to say you are being adictator or tyrant, but instead
to say like hey, I noticed thatyou often seem to be leading the
games.
I would just wonder you know,do you think that other kids
would, would like to have anopportunity to lead?
And again, they're going tostruggle with perspective taking
.
This early right, five yearsold, it's hard to perspective
(18:34):
take, but you can start to buildin those kinds of conversations
that can lead later to thattype of perspective taking, an
empathy that will allow him tonot just be a leader but also to
be a collaborator.
So I think that that's a bigpiece.
And the biggest piece in playbetween becoming a leader and a
(18:56):
dictator or a tyrant is to is towhat, what?
How do they handle whensomebody pushes back?
So a tyrant or a dictator thisis, this is human history and
adult psychology, not just childpsychology, but but a tyrant or
a dictator, when somebodypushes back, they double down
and they clamp down right,that's.
You see it in politics.
(19:16):
You see it in toxic workenvironments.
That's how people do this and,by the way, this is toxic
parenting too.
When your child pushes back ona boundary that you have, are
you the leader of your familywhere you're able to process
through that and get them onboard and and yeah, you may have
to hold the boundary it may notbe super happy for them or
you're a person who anyoppositional force just makes
(19:40):
you defensive and double downand punish and threaten and or
bribe right, you can do it onthe other side.
That's the actions of adictator versus the actions of a
leader or a person who iswilling to take criticism and
adapt and involve everyone.
And I actually have a reallygood game that you can play with
your child, caleb.
That comes from the world ofimprov.
(20:00):
Someday, by the way, I have,I'm in the process of writing a
book.
I'm I've written a book.
Now it needs to be edited andrewritten and then goes through
a big, long process.
It's not going to be coming outuntil January of 2025.
But one day I do want to writeanother of either this next book
or a book sometime in thefuture about the, the
(20:22):
relationship betweenimprovisation or improv games or
the act that.
You know I'm from Chicago, sothis is a big part of our
theater scene is improv andbeing a really great parent,
that really great parenting isimprovisational.
But I have an example that Iwant to kind of tease here.
That is a really good way thatyou can help to teach.
So everything I said to Audreyabout Jake you can take all of
(20:44):
that here too.
If he is being a dictator, ifhe is kind of forcing his will,
that's one of the things thatyou can do.
All the stuff that I said rightWith that, not just about stuff
, but but about who gets to taketurns leading to but, but not,
but not so much that you're justassuming that he's being a
dictator wouldn't, when inreality he might just be a
leader, right, and he might be.
(21:05):
In the end, it might not be theproblem that you think that it
is not to say that you shouldn'taddress it, not to say that we
should only be disciplining ourchildren and by disciplining I'm
meaning teaching right, that weshould only be teaching and
parenting our children when theydo something.
That's a problem.
No, engage with them in allaspects of life and that's how
you're going to avoid 90% of theproblems is by disciplining
(21:26):
them when there is no problem.
But but you can also do this,and so I want to take this
opportunity, just for like fiveminutes, to kind of go down a
nerdy improv rabbit hole withyou guys, because I think,
sophia, if you did this withCaleb and many parents on this
podcast listening to this rightnow, if you did this with your
kid, you would be reallyastounded by the results.
And so what this is is it's themost basic form of improv, and
(21:48):
it's called yes and improv.
It's one of the basic rules ofimprov is that when you are in
an improvisational scene withsomeone else, when you guys are
acting on a scene, that your jobis to go with whatever they say
, to say yes to whatever they'reoffering and and not to do
what's called blocking, andblocking is when somebody says
(22:10):
something in an improv scene andyou immediately respond by
saying no, that's not what justhappened by playing a game like
this with your kid, where theyare having to also say yes, and
to everything.
First of all, the kids loveimprov stuff like this often
because it feels like you, asthe adult, are entering their
world of imaginative play.
(22:30):
It's hard for adults to doimaginative play.
It's easy for kids.
We need rules like yes, and,and it helps us to get into a
childlike space.
So your kids will probably loveplaying a game like this with
you.
It might be challenging, itmight cause some controversy and
conflict.
When there is a way to play, asas with board games or whatever
(22:51):
else, I strongly recommend, ifyou're going to play a board
game with your kid, make sureit's age appropriate so you can
follow all the rules, becausewhen you start throwing the
rules out the window, thenactually the game breaks down
and it doesn't become a teachingmoment.
Same thing is true for a yesand improv game.
So basically, what you're goingto do is you're going to.
You can Google these orwhatever, but you're going to
start with some sort of prompt.
(23:13):
We're going to the store, butwe're in medieval times or we
are flying on the back of aunicorn.
It doesn't matter what.
The prompt is right.
Just Google improv startingprompts for kids and you'll find
, I'm sure, dozens of them.
But the but, the role of thegame is that as you act this out
together, as you do, imagine ofplay together again.
This is you and your child, notyour child and other children,
(23:34):
although I suppose you could dothat as well.
Every time they bring somethingto the table, you have to say
yes to that thing.
So if they're calling somebodyon their cell phone, or if
you're calling somebody on yourcell phone in this, in the game
that you're playing, and theysay, all of a sudden you realize
that your cell phone isactually a snake, you can't say
no, it's not a snake, it'sactually just a cell phone,
(23:55):
because I was calling a pizzaplace and that wouldn't make any
sense.
You have to react and respondoh my God, it is a snake.
Oh, and like freak out, right,so.
So that's how you play on yourside.
But then you're going toencourage them to accept the yes
and posture to what you bringto the table.
So then we went up into ahelicopter and jumped out with
(24:15):
parachutes.
If your child says no, I don'twant that to be the game, push
back a little bit, right, fiveyears old, we can start to push
back a little bit and say well,that's, that's the game that
we're playing.
We have to say yes to whateverit is and you can adapt and
adjust and move the you know,move the story forward and and
really emphasize that yesposture.
(24:37):
To play this type of game thenallows for your child to be in
that leader mindset rather thanthe dictator mindset or the
tyrant mindset, that when kidsbring valuable insight into
their play that they're going tobe more likely to say yes.
And it also becomes, if you dothis enough, a step that you can
(25:00):
, a shorthand way for you tointervene with your kids, which
again, I don't, as I kind ofsaid earlier, I don't really
like intervening with your, withkids when they're in social
interactions with other kids,because that's they're learning,
that that's happening is inthose peer interactions.
But if you find your child isfrustrating their playmates by
being too controlling of thegame, then you can say, hey,
(25:23):
caleb, let's do some yes, likelet's just you and me, they
don't have to know about this,but let's try and do a little
yes, and with this let's try andbring in a posture where when
they bring something to you,you're not going to block that
and and and belittle it or pushit down.
You're gonna actually go withit.
So that's, that's the yes andimprov game that you could bring
to your child or you can bringto the relationship that can
(25:45):
really really do some amazingthings.
Before we move on to Owen andZoe, which is a little bit
different we're gonna be talkingabout a shy kid here and we're
gonna talk about social skillsand social interactions beyond
relationship to sharing ortaking turns.
I just want to make one quickcall to action, which is as if
(26:06):
you've heard more than thisepisode.
You've heard me say it.
We have had so many amazingpeople download and listen to
and let me know that they'veheard and that they've been
benefited from this podcast,that they've found value in it.
Well, we have had only afraction of a percent of those
(26:27):
people actually go and take thethree minutes that it takes to
review the podcast, whetherwriting a review or just hitting
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Simply doing that allows thispodcast to thrive and flourish
and and get to the next levelwhere we can start to do.
(26:48):
Even.
We get even better guests on tojoin me at some of the amazing
types of people that that Ialready have lined up.
But the only reason I've beenable to line those people up is
because our podcast is reachingmore people, and the reason our
podcast is reaching more peopleis because a few of you have
gone and done the review andrate for this podcast on your
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(27:08):
For those of you who have, ifyou can rate it on another
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But for those who have not donethat yet, really, this is your
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This podcast is 100% free toyou, right?
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All I'm asking in return isthree minutes of your time to go
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(27:31):
episode to also tell you oneother way that you can really
really help us, and that's toshare it with a friend.
Ok, so, without further ado,let's hit our last question,
which comes from Owen.
He says hi, my name is Owen.
My child's name is Zoe.
She is four.
I've noticed that Zoe seems abit shy around other kids and
struggles to initiate play.
How do I encourage her todevelop social skills and be
(27:53):
more confident in interactingwith children Her age?
Great question, owen.
I think this is another placewhere I want to.
I want to.
I'm not going to push back, I'mnot saying that but I want to
make sure that we identify somethings before I give my tip.
And my tip is going to berelated, very, very similar to
what we just talked about withCaleb and Sophia A child led
(28:14):
play tactic that we can use orpractice that we can use to help
our child to feel moreconfident.
But the first thing that I wantto say, before I get into that,
is that we live in a culturethat really, really celebrates
and, in an exaggerated way,lifts up, prioritizes extroverts
(28:38):
over introverts.
That's just a part of oursociety.
People like extroverts althoughpeople want to have extroverts
on their podcast and they wantto listen to extroverts and
extroverts tend to get morepromotions and things like that,
although some of the bestcreative thinking and most
imaginative thinking often comesfrom introverts.
I look at it.
(28:59):
You know I am in a marriagewith an introvert and often some
of the best stuff that you'veever heard about whole parent
might come out of my mouth theextrovert but it often comes
from her brain as the introvertand so the first thing that I
want to say is that introversionis a feature, not a failure.
So if you feel, like man, I'mfailing as a parent because my
child is an introvert, please wegot to change that mindset.
(29:20):
I'm not saying that that's whatyou feel, owen.
I'm saying that many parentsthat I've worked with, deep
underneath the surface is thegreat fear that their child
won't be successful becausethey're an introvert.
Nothing can be farther from thetruth.
The world is changed often byintroverts.
They aren't always elected topublic office, they aren't
always the front person, butoftentimes, and in fact most of
(29:42):
the time, they're the personbehind the scenes.
My favorite people in the worldare all introverts.
I'll put it that way.
So introversion is a feature,not a failure, and introverted
people tend this is not totallyuniversal, but introverted
people tend to have a few closerelationships, while extroverted
people tend to have more lessclose relationships.
So we might have morefriendships.
(30:04):
We might have quote morefriends, although not always and
those friendships won't alwaysbe as deep.
Introverts will have a fewreally, really deep friendships
and the truth is what we know isthat as long as you feel
connected to people in general,it's not gonna be a big draw on
your mental health.
It's gonna be a good thing foryour mental health.
(30:24):
So if your child has absolutelyno relationships, it might be
time to implement some of thethings that I'm gonna talk about
with ChildBudPlay and practice.
But if your child has a coupleclose relationships, it's okay.
If they're not the most popularkid in class, in fact it might
be exactly where they wanna be,and it's not a failure, it's a
feature.
So just feel that, identifythat and this is the child that
(30:48):
we have.
I have introverted kids andextroverted kids.
The introverted kids of my kids, that's the person that they
are and that's not a failure.
That's a good thing about themand it's going to mean that
they're gonna be able toleverage that in amazing ways to
be physically, mentally andemotionally healthy, in the same
ways that extroverts are ableto be physically, mentally,
emotionally healthy byleveraging their extroversion.
(31:10):
So trying to force a kid intosomething that they're not
making them fit, you know asquare peg round hole is usually
going to wind up biting you inthe behind, and so don't go down
that path.
So that's the first thing Iwanna say.
The second thing that I'll sayis that beyond simply
introversion, extroversion, wealso have the spectrum of
sensitivity, whether that'shighly sensitive or tend to be
(31:34):
less sensitive, the kids thatare in that, let's say, 20% at
the top, the most highlysensitive kids.
What Dr Elaine Aron has foundin her research, as well as
other researchers who have kindof doubled down on this research
and looked at this work, whatthey've found is that for that
20% of the population that tendsto be what we might classify as
highly sensitive, what Dr Beckyunfortunately doesn't cite,
(31:58):
elaine Aron, but what she callsdeeply feeling kids, even though
it's just high sensitivity, andwhat other creators and what
other authors have called theorchid versus dandelion paradigm
or spectrum, the orchids inthat case, with these highly
sensitive kids, they often needa lot more time to observe
before they interact and soagain, not a failure, a feature
(32:21):
they will observe what's goingon for a long time before they
insert themselves.
And so my son, when he started,he's highly sensitive, he's
extroverted but he's highlysensitive.
It's kind of a not always,they're not always.
You can be highly sensitive andextrovert, or highly sensitive
and introvert, or vice versa.
He's an extrovert but he'shighly sensitive.
And so when he starts newthings, like a soccer team or
(32:43):
gymnastics or whatever,sometimes he doesn't just dive
right in, sometimes he stays inthe background or stays on the
wall and watches for a period oftime.
It's possible that Zoe, at fouryears old it's not even that
she's necessarily an introvert,it's that we're going to so many
different environments that shefeels that she has to observe
before she engages.
And so we go oh well, shedidn't play with any kids there.
We gotta try the next place, orwe gotta try the next thing, or
(33:05):
we gotta put her in sports orwe gotta put her in this,
because she's not making anyfriends Sometimes.
Just consistency of going tothe same place over and over you
go to the same park over andover, you just play with the
same group of friends over andover that allows those highly
sensitive kids that need toobserve before they interact to
do the requisite observation andassessment and then eventually,
on the fourth or fifth playdate or on the fourth or fifth
(33:28):
practice, then they'llparticipate.
And forcing them to participatebefore they have that time to
make that assessment is almostalways going to bite you in the
long term.
And then the last thing becausewe're running out of time here
and I wanna make sure that I hitthis as well is that, as with
the yes and Improv game, as withthe processing later with Jake
and Audrey.
(33:48):
Another thing that you can dowith your child is child-led
play, in other words, themleading the play with you, and
so you are a safe person foryour child.
I really, really hope so, andbecause you're a safe person for
your child, that means that youcan play with them in a way
that will feel safe to them, andso I just wanna highlight this
(34:08):
and say anytime that you spendintentional time playing with
your child and allowing them tolead, that is one of the
confidence-building things thatthen allows your child to go out
and feel that they can meet newpeople and interact and grow
and change and initiate.
As you said, play with newpeers, and so be a person who
(34:31):
plays well with your child, whodoesn't just spend a lot of time
worrying about whether yourchild is interacting with peers,
but who's practicing with them.
You are their safe practicespace, and so sit down on the
floor with your kid which I'msure you do, owen but just be
even more intentional andencourage your partner, if you
have one, to also interact inthis way.
Sit down and allow your childto lead deeply in imaginative
(34:56):
play.
Say yes to whatever they'resaying Show them that it is fun
to play with someone else andthat can really really do a
whole host of amazing things andbenefit your child.
So that's what I have for youand as well as kind of the
things that I've talked aboutwith Jake and with Caleb.
I think that this is kind of theway in which we do it.
(35:17):
We become the safe people and Ican't stress that enough.
This goes for Audrey, this goesfor Sophia as well.
We, when we become the safehome base, our children tend to
go out and interact in the worldin more confident and ways.
And sometimes you know, notsharing is a lack of confidence.
I'm worried.
What if something gets taken?
Not being the leader is a lackof confidence, right?
(35:38):
What if somebody takes my spot?
For me, the more we can be thatsafe home base and make them
feel that they belong and thatthey're securely attached to us,
the more they have that abilityto go out and and be amazing
social partners out in the world.
So I hope that helps.
All right, guys.
This is the end of the episodefor this episode on social
skills on the whole parentpodcast.
(35:59):
Thank you so much for joiningme today as we tackled some
really amazing questions fromreally amazing parents.
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(36:21):
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It's linked in the show notesbelow.
Every single Thursday, I willsend out an email.
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man, I really tripped overmyself there and sometimes it's
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(36:42):
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(37:04):
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The last thing that I'llencourage you to do is that if
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they are your child or not youwant to share this with a
(37:26):
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(37:48):
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Every single one of us needs avillage, and sometimes it takes
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that are benefiting us to ourfriends, and then you know.
Just imagine what it would belike to have somebody to discuss
the whole parent podcast within your life.
I bet you that would be superfun.
(38:09):
So that's what I have for youon this episode.
Thank you so much for listeningand until next time.
This has been the whole parentpodcast.
So the first thing that I want to say is that
introversion is a feature, not afailure.
So if you feel, like man, I myfailing as a parent because my
child is an introvert, please wegot to change that mindset.
I'm not saying that that's whatyou feel.
I'm saying that many parentsthat I've worked with deep
underneath the surface is thegreat fear that their child
won't be successful becausethey're an introvert.
(00:20):
Nothing can be farther from thetruth.
The world has changed byintroverts.
The whole parent podcast is onthe air.
Hey guys, welcome to the wholeparent podcast.
(00:40):
My name is John.
I am at whole parent on all thesocial medias and for my whole
life I have wanted to saysomething like that because I
grew up in Chicago, still livethere today and or Chicago land,
I should say, because I was notfrom the city proper and I grew
up listening to Chicago Cubsbaseball and that's how they
started every broadcast.
So thanks for indulging me onthat.
(01:02):
Well, let's get into talkingabout parenting.
That's what we do on thispodcast.
We answer real questions fromparents like you.
Occasionally now we host gueststo talk about their areas of
expertise.
I'm super excited to have someawesome guest episodes coming up
soon, but mostly we just talkabout parenting.
We talk about how we can raiseresilient, psychologically,
relationally physically healthykids, socially healthy, as what
(01:27):
we're talking about in thisepisode social skills, and how
we can do so with confidence.
Because you get so muchcompeting advice and input out
there on social media andparenting books, we're just
trying to put it all together.
I am a dad of three and, yeah,so I'm just kind of bringing you
along for the journey, as, as Itake in what what I have, I've
(01:48):
helped hundreds of parents togrow and change and parent more
effectively parent withoutpunishment, parent without some
of the harmful things that mayhave been done to many of us,
and so that's what this podcastis all about.
And today, like I said, we aretalking about social struggle.
So I want to just jump right inwith our three questions from
four from today.
(02:08):
They come from Owen, sophia andAudrey, and I'm actually going
to start in reverse order withAudrey.
Today, audrey says Hi, this isAudrey.
My child's name is Jake, he issix years old and he is an only
child.
Jake is often, or sometimes,sorry, has difficulty sharing
toys and taking turns whenplaying with other children.
It leads to conflict duringplay dates.
How can I teach Jake to share?
(02:31):
Audrey, thank you for anamazing question about sharing.
We have not talked about sharingyet on the podcast, and I think
it is long overdue, becausesharing is one of the most
difficult things that kidsstruggle with all the time, kids
who are only children, as inthe case of Jake, and I wonder
if you pointed that out.
It's interesting to me thatgenerally people don't tell me
(02:53):
in their question whether theirchild is an only child or
whether they're a youngest orwhatever, or the oldest, unless
the conflict or the thing thatthey're asking the question
about is related to siblingissues.
In this case, I wonder if thereason that you pointed out is
because you think that maybeonly the fact that he's an only
child leads to him struggling toshare, and to that I say we
(03:16):
don't have data to support thatonly children struggle with
sharing any more or less thankids who have siblings.
So if you're kind of beatingyourself up, maybe we should
have had another kid or whatever, and I don't know your
circumstances, obviously, butthat's not necessarily true,
right?
We don't see that kids who areonly children really struggle to
(03:39):
share any more than kids whohave siblings and in fact I know
of many cases where youngersiblings have a harder time
learning to share and we'll getinto why that might be
developmentally than olderchildren tend to and again,
that's just anecdotal.
We don't have a lot of datathat I'm aware of and if you
have data supporting that,please shoot an email over to
(04:03):
podcast at wholeparentacademycomand let me know, because I'm
always looking for more researchthat I can read so that I can
answer these questions to thebest of my ability and with the
most efficacy, and I am alwaysopen to correcting when I have
made an error.
But as far as I'm aware, thereis no data to support the idea
that only children have any moredifficulty sharing, and that's
(04:25):
because sharing is adevelopmental challenge for kids
.
It's something that they haveto learn how to do.
It doesn't come naturally tokids.
It only happens through socialrelationship and actually
practice sharing.
And it doesn't have to be witha sibling.
It can be in a daycareenvironment, obviously.
(04:48):
Jake is six years old.
I don't know if he's in atraditional schooling
environment, but it canabsolutely happen at school, it
can happen on play dates, it canhappen so many other places.
We can teach our kids to sharein so many ways.
We can even, in some ways,teach our kids to share with us.
We can be some of the earlypeople who they can share and
take turns with, and we're goingto actually get into that with
(05:08):
another question here.
And so, audrey, if you'relistening I hope you're
listening because you'vesubmitted a question, but make
sure to listen to the wholeepisode, because some of the
stuff I'm going to say to Sophia, who is our next question, is
also going to relate and behelpful also to Jake.
So there is no data that I'maware of, in other words, to
support that.
Any number of siblings makes youshare earlier or better.
(05:31):
However, many, many kidsstruggle to share, and it's
something that is almost nottalked about.
What I hear on social mediamost often is don't make your
kids share, right or don't?
A better way to say that mightbe don't impose authoritarian or
dictator status type stuff,type punishments and threats and
(05:53):
bribes and things like thatauthoritarian parenting tactics
in order to make your kids share, and to that I say yeah, I
wouldn't advocate for imposingauthoritarian tactics on your
child in almost any situation,certainly not to teach social
skills, because they aresomewhat anti-social skills
right.
When you go authoritarian andyou say you must share, you must
do this, you must do that, andwhen you become a tyrant, that
(06:15):
teaches your child to enact thattype of power over those who
they feel that they may havepower over, and again that's
kind of getting into our nextquestion, but so I don't want to
go too deep into that.
But children struggle to share,ultimately because they are
going through a developmentalprocess where they are
establishing a sense of autonomy, an agency, where they didn't
(06:38):
really have that autonomy andagency earlier on.
And I've talked about this inmany places on social media and
I'm sure I will talk about it onthis podcast so many different
times.
But kids exercising andlearning how to express their
own autonomy and having agencyis a really important
developmental step.
They are learning their placein the world as distinctively
(06:59):
separate from their family unit,while also being interdependent
or intra-dependent on theirfamily unit for care and support
, and that's a positive, goodthing.
Right, we balance dependenceand independence to make
intra-dependence orinterdependence, which means you
go out and you seek help whenyou need it.
(07:22):
And in this process ofdeveloping independence where
there was only dependence before, when you're a toddler, or when
you hear the toddlers who sayme, do, me do, or I want to do
it, which obviously Jake is sixyears old, so he's probably way
past that point of saying I mustdo everything for myself, or
just saying no arbitrarily toeverything, or demanding or
(07:43):
whatever.
Those types of toddlerbehaviors are what we see, that
autonomy seeking behavior comeout and manifest, as in toddlers
, oftentimes in young gradeschool age kids.
We see that autonomy seekingbehavior manifest as having a
difficulty taking turns, losingas well, failure, early signs
(08:05):
that kids are really reallystruggling to lose or fail and,
of course, sharing.
And so, counter-intuitively,one of the best things that we
can do to help a kid share is toactually establish certain
things that they don't have toshare.
This is similar to my advice totoddler parents, and this is
just a little toddler tidbit foryou in this episode that's
(08:26):
going to be more about olderkids than toddlers.
A little toddler tidbit if yourchild's saying no to everything,
there's a chance, so there's agood chance that it's because
they feel that you are saying noto everything, and so one of
the ways to help your child tosay no less is to say yes more
yourself, in the same way withsharing with a kid like Jake,
(08:46):
who's six years old establish acouple of things, a couple of
items whether they'resentimental objects, you know, a
stuffed animal or even a newtoy that they might get and say,
hey, this object is notsomething that you have to share
, and also appreciate thatthat's not an item that you
would want to bring to a playdate or that you would want to
(09:09):
have out when the play date isat your house, because it's
something that you cannot share.
So we do this with myseven-year-old all the time.
He has certain things that hejust does not want to share and
we actually give him the agencyor the decision-making ability
to decide which of those objectswithin reason we'll get to that
in a moment he doesn't have toshare and by identifying a few
(09:33):
objects that he feels he doesn'thave to share, then it allows
him to feel like those otherobjects he can share and it just
comes down to I need to knowwhat belongs to me, I need to
know that I have power over thethings that belong to me and in
the process of learning whatbelongs to whom and who who's
(09:55):
does this which toys are mineand which toys are for sharing
and which, or whatever.
In the process of establishingthose kind of seemingly rigid
boundaries, right, we actuallywind up increasing our child's
capacity to share.
And before you say, well,that's not how it's going to be
when they grow up and you knowthey're going to have to learn
to share, even those hard,difficult things to share.
No, they're not.
(10:16):
You don't.
In fact, most of us don't.
I have done marriage counselingfor many, many couples and one
of the things that will come outin marriage counseling
sometimes is a partner who hasviolated deeply violated the
trust of their partner by takingsomething that was a
non-sharable item and and usingit.
(10:38):
Primarily this is a laptop or acell phone, right?
Not that one partner should behiding things from the other.
Obviously, open, openness andtransparency are values and
relationships, but it can feellike a massive violation of
privacy and trust to takesomebody's cell phone, for
example, and go through theirtext messages.
You would not allow someone Idoubt you would allow someone to
(11:01):
, or just anyone to, do that.
You may have one person in yourlife who you feel comfortable
with allowing to do that, but byand large, you would not allow
other people to go through yourthings in that way.
Kids are not different.
They are trying to establishwhere they end, and part of
understanding where they end iswhere does my stuff end?
What do I have control over?
(11:22):
And kids who feel that theyhave no control over any of
their stuff Will then grasp forthat control.
They will try and act out thatcontrol and they will try and
say well, you can't shareanything with me because nothing
belongs to me, so therefore Imust scrap and take whatever I
can.
So you can do this in a coupledifferent ways.
(11:43):
I know parents and this isprobably a conversation for a
sibling episode as well, becausethis happens a lot in sibling
relationships but you can have abox or a shelf when you know
and not a lot of things, butwhere they can take a few things
that really deeply aresentimental, that they really
don't want to share, and thingscan can move right.
They can go from being anon-sharable item when it's
(12:04):
brand new and they're veryexcited about it and they want
to be careful with it, and thenit can become a shareable item
as they somewhat lose interestin it or or as they are less
attached to it or whatever.
But you can have those itemsthat are non-sharables and just
appreciate that that's.
You do that too as an adult.
This is not a bad thing forthem to do, and sharing is is a
part of autonomy seeking anddevelopment.
(12:25):
Learning to share is a difficultskill.
It requires a level often ofperspective taking that young
kids just do not possess and sounderstanding that that saying
how would you feel if?
Might not really work on a sixyear old.
Very well, you will.
You will enact this kind ofcounterintuitively by actually
picking out the items that theydon't have to share.
That can be super, superhelpful as a tool.
(12:48):
The the last piece is that Idon't think by and large, unless
it gets physical, that weshould intervene in the moment
when our child is struggling toshare.
Obviously, this is withinreason.
Take every piece of advice thatI give Within reason.
But I think as much as we cannot intervening in the conflicts
(13:09):
that arise between our childand another child Related to
sharing, the more they actuallycan start to understand the
negative social consequencesnatural social consequences as,
in fact, the natural negativesocial consequences of
withholding some thing fromsomeone else.
Right, if you're playing someGame that you really don't want
your friend to play while yourfriend is over and they get
(13:31):
upset at you.
That's actually okay.
It's okay to allow that tohappen.
You don't have to save yourchild from discomfort and in
fact, oftentimes the helicopterparents who swoop in and save
their child from any negativesocial interaction and any
amount of discomfort are thesame parents who wind up with a
child who lacks any level offrustration, tolerance.
So you actually One of the waysto teach your child to share is
(13:55):
to let them not share and thensuffer the social consequences
of not sharing.
It's not.
It's not a pretty or a funthing to do.
I don't like doing it myself.
However, it can be an effectivetool, because the mistakes that
we make, social or otherwise,are often some of the biggest Uh
ways that we learn, apart frommodeling right.
(14:15):
So that's another way that wecan help our kids to share is to
share with them and identifywhen we're sharing.
Oh sure, I am happy to sharethis with you.
Right, it's every kid that Iknow eats off their parents
plate when they get somethingdelicious.
You know, you get.
You know, whatever a frenchfries that we ordered restaurant
, some of you get french fries.
Your kids are going to try andpick off your plate and if you
let them do that, just use thatas an opportunity to direct
(14:37):
their conscious attention andsay sure, I'm happy to share my
french fries with you.
So then that's modeled for them.
But the other way that we learn,outside of modeling often, is
through the natural consequencesof our actions and the mistakes
that we make.
And so allow your kid to makemistakes related to sharing and
then process those mistakes withthem later.
Oh, I saw that you were, youknow, not in the moment, but I
saw later.
(14:57):
You know, hey, jake, I noticedthat you were hanging out with
Ben and Ben Got really upset atyou.
What was that all about?
Be curious, you know.
And then that will open up thatdialogue.
For, oh well, I wasn't sharingthis thing or I didn't want him
to touch my x, y, z, and thenyou can kind of explain yeah,
that is really hard.
It's hard when we don't want toshare and a kid wants to share
(15:18):
with us, and those can beamazing moments.
So it's.
I'm not saying don't do anything.
I'm saying oftentimes allow theinteraction In to occur again,
unless it gets physical orviolent in any way, but allow
the negative interaction tooccur Without your intervention.
Your intervention is going tocome on the back end as you
process that with your child,and this especially is true for
(15:38):
older kids like six, seven,eight I know that doesn't sound
older, but school age kids Ishould say that's less effective
with like a toddler, two yearold, three year old, who's
struggling to share it's.
They're going to have a hardtime processing it later with
you, just from a vocabulary andand communication standpoint,
verbal communication standpoint.
So I hope that that helps and Iwant to transition right away
(16:00):
no break right into this nextquestion.
I've lined these two questionsup back to back because this one
is actually very, very similar.
It's about Caleb, who is agefive, but it's different enough
that I wanted to cover both,right?
So this is from Sophia.
She says my child's name isCaleb.
He's age five.
I've noticed that Caleb, when heplays with his friends, he
always takes charge and hedoesn't allow his friends to
(16:22):
make any decisions during theirimaginative playtime.
I'm afraid this is going tostart to start to frustrate his
playmates and I'm concernedabout the impact that I might
have on his friendships.
How can I address the situationand help Caleb learn to
cooperate and share in decisionmaking during his play with his
friends?
Really really good question,sophia.
I think a lot of us see this,and the first step in this is
(16:45):
you you pointed out I'm afraidthis will start to frustrate his
playmates.
The first thing I want to say iswe need to be observers and not
predictors often times becauseour predictions.
It is true that Caleb at agefive, at age 25, acting this way
(17:06):
, that will likely frustrate hispeers and co-workers, but at
age five, children develop theirown social relationships that
can look pretty differentoftentimes than adult
relationships, and so what feelsto us like a child is being a
dictator sometimes is actuallyjust that's the, the way in
(17:28):
which their playgroup has kindof elected a leader, and so I
don't.
I don't want you to get intothe trap of saying I have to fix
something that isn'tnecessarily broken now.
I think it's a great idea tohave your have a conversation
with Caleb Outside of the of hisplaytime.
You know if he's at the parkand he's always taking charge.
You know, maybe on the car ridehome or or the next you know,
(17:51):
an hour later after snack orsomething, to have the
conversation between what itlooks like to be a leader who
enables and who lifts up people,versus a tyrant or a dictator
who commands people.
So that's, I think that that'sa great conversation to have,
but just to approach thatconversation not from a place of
(18:11):
judgment but from a place ofteaching.
So not to say you are being adictator or tyrant, but instead
to say like hey, I noticed thatyou often seem to be leading the
games.
I would just wonder you know,do you think that other kids
would, would like to have anopportunity to lead?
And again, they're going tostruggle with perspective taking
.
This early right, five yearsold, it's hard to perspective
(18:34):
take, but you can start to buildin those kinds of conversations
that can lead later to thattype of perspective taking, an
empathy that will allow him tonot just be a leader but also to
be a collaborator.
So I think that that's a bigpiece.
And the biggest piece in playbetween becoming a leader and a
(18:56):
dictator or a tyrant is to is towhat, what?
How do they handle whensomebody pushes back?
So a tyrant or a dictator thisis, this is human history and
adult psychology, not just childpsychology, but but a tyrant or
a dictator, when somebodypushes back, they double down
and they clamp down right,that's.
You see it in politics.
(19:16):
You see it in toxic workenvironments.
That's how people do this and,by the way, this is toxic
parenting too.
When your child pushes back ona boundary that you have, are
you the leader of your familywhere you're able to process
through that and get them onboard and and yeah, you may have
to hold the boundary it may notbe super happy for them or
you're a person who anyoppositional force just makes
(19:40):
you defensive and double downand punish and threaten and or
bribe right, you can do it onthe other side.
That's the actions of adictator versus the actions of a
leader or a person who iswilling to take criticism and
adapt and involve everyone.
And I actually have a reallygood game that you can play with
your child, caleb.
That comes from the world ofimprov.
(20:00):
Someday, by the way, I have,I'm in the process of writing a
book.
I'm I've written a book.
Now it needs to be edited andrewritten and then goes through
a big, long process.
It's not going to be coming outuntil January of 2025.
But one day I do want to writeanother of either this next book
or a book sometime in thefuture about the, the
(20:22):
relationship betweenimprovisation or improv games or
the act that.
You know I'm from Chicago, sothis is a big part of our
theater scene is improv andbeing a really great parent,
that really great parenting isimprovisational.
But I have an example that Iwant to kind of tease here.
That is a really good way thatyou can help to teach.
So everything I said to Audreyabout Jake you can take all of
(20:44):
that here too.
If he is being a dictator, ifhe is kind of forcing his will,
that's one of the things thatyou can do.
All the stuff that I said rightWith that, not just about stuff
, but but about who gets to taketurns leading to but, but not,
but not so much that you're justassuming that he's being a
dictator wouldn't, when inreality he might just be a
leader, right, and he might be.
(21:05):
In the end, it might not be theproblem that you think that it
is not to say that you shouldn'taddress it, not to say that we
should only be disciplining ourchildren and by disciplining I'm
meaning teaching right, that weshould only be teaching and
parenting our children when theydo something.
That's a problem.
No, engage with them in allaspects of life and that's how
you're going to avoid 90% of theproblems is by disciplining
(21:26):
them when there is no problem.
But but you can also do this,and so I want to take this
opportunity, just for like fiveminutes, to kind of go down a
nerdy improv rabbit hole withyou guys, because I think,
sophia, if you did this withCaleb and many parents on this
podcast listening to this rightnow, if you did this with your
kid, you would be reallyastounded by the results.
And so what this is is it's themost basic form of improv, and
(21:48):
it's called yes and improv.
It's one of the basic rules ofimprov is that when you are in
an improvisational scene withsomeone else, when you guys are
acting on a scene, that your jobis to go with whatever they say
, to say yes to whatever they'reoffering and and not to do
what's called blocking, andblocking is when somebody says
(22:10):
something in an improv scene andyou immediately respond by
saying no, that's not what justhappened by playing a game like
this with your kid, where theyare having to also say yes, and
to everything.
First of all, the kids loveimprov stuff like this often
because it feels like you, asthe adult, are entering their
world of imaginative play.
(22:30):
It's hard for adults to doimaginative play.
It's easy for kids.
We need rules like yes, and,and it helps us to get into a
childlike space.
So your kids will probably loveplaying a game like this with
you.
It might be challenging, itmight cause some controversy and
conflict.
When there is a way to play, asas with board games or whatever
(22:51):
else, I strongly recommend, ifyou're going to play a board
game with your kid, make sureit's age appropriate so you can
follow all the rules, becausewhen you start throwing the
rules out the window, thenactually the game breaks down
and it doesn't become a teachingmoment.
Same thing is true for a yesand improv game.
So basically, what you're goingto do is you're going to.
You can Google these orwhatever, but you're going to
start with some sort of prompt.
(23:13):
We're going to the store, butwe're in medieval times or we
are flying on the back of aunicorn.
It doesn't matter what.
The prompt is right.
Just Google improv startingprompts for kids and you'll find
, I'm sure, dozens of them.
But the but, the role of thegame is that as you act this out
together, as you do, imagine ofplay together again.
This is you and your child, notyour child and other children,
(23:34):
although I suppose you could dothat as well.
Every time they bring somethingto the table, you have to say
yes to that thing.
So if they're calling somebodyon their cell phone, or if
you're calling somebody on yourcell phone in this, in the game
that you're playing, and theysay, all of a sudden you realize
that your cell phone isactually a snake, you can't say
no, it's not a snake, it'sactually just a cell phone,
(23:55):
because I was calling a pizzaplace and that wouldn't make any
sense.
You have to react and respondoh my God, it is a snake.
Oh, and like freak out, right,so.
So that's how you play on yourside.
But then you're going toencourage them to accept the yes
and posture to what you bringto the table.
So then we went up into ahelicopter and jumped out with
(24:15):
parachutes.
If your child says no, I don'twant that to be the game, push
back a little bit, right, fiveyears old, we can start to push
back a little bit and say well,that's, that's the game that
we're playing.
We have to say yes to whateverit is and you can adapt and
adjust and move the you know,move the story forward and and
really emphasize that yesposture.
(24:37):
To play this type of game thenallows for your child to be in
that leader mindset rather thanthe dictator mindset or the
tyrant mindset, that when kidsbring valuable insight into
their play that they're going tobe more likely to say yes.
And it also becomes, if you dothis enough, a step that you can
(25:00):
, a shorthand way for you tointervene with your kids, which
again, I don't, as I kind ofsaid earlier, I don't really
like intervening with your, withkids when they're in social
interactions with other kids,because that's they're learning,
that that's happening is inthose peer interactions.
But if you find your child isfrustrating their playmates by
being too controlling of thegame, then you can say, hey,
(25:23):
caleb, let's do some yes, likelet's just you and me, they
don't have to know about this,but let's try and do a little
yes, and with this let's try andbring in a posture where when
they bring something to you,you're not going to block that
and and and belittle it or pushit down.
You're gonna actually go withit.
So that's, that's the yes andimprov game that you could bring
to your child or you can bringto the relationship that can
(25:45):
really really do some amazingthings.
Before we move on to Owen andZoe, which is a little bit
different we're gonna be talkingabout a shy kid here and we're
gonna talk about social skillsand social interactions beyond
relationship to sharing ortaking turns.
I just want to make one quickcall to action, which is as if
(26:06):
you've heard more than thisepisode.
You've heard me say it.
We have had so many amazingpeople download and listen to
and let me know that they'veheard and that they've been
benefited from this podcast,that they've found value in it.
Well, we have had only afraction of a percent of those
(26:27):
people actually go and take thethree minutes that it takes to
review the podcast, whetherwriting a review or just hitting
that five star button onSpotify or an Apple podcast.
Simply doing that allows thispodcast to thrive and flourish
and and get to the next levelwhere we can start to do.
(26:48):
Even.
We get even better guests on tojoin me at some of the amazing
types of people that that Ialready have lined up.
But the only reason I've beenable to line those people up is
because our podcast is reachingmore people, and the reason our
podcast is reaching more peopleis because a few of you have
gone and done the review andrate for this podcast on your
podcast platform.
So continue to do that.
(27:08):
For those of you who have, ifyou can rate it on another
platform, do that.
But for those who have not donethat yet, really, this is your
call to action.
This podcast is 100% free toyou, right?
This is just amazing contentthat you get twice a twice a
week, right, like it's a lot oftime to do that.
All I'm asking in return isthree minutes of your time to go
in and rate and review, andI'll be back at the end of the
(27:31):
episode to also tell you oneother way that you can really
really help us, and that's toshare it with a friend.
Ok, so, without further ado,let's hit our last question,
which comes from Owen.
He says hi, my name is Owen.
My child's name is Zoe.
She is four.
I've noticed that Zoe seems abit shy around other kids and
struggles to initiate play.
How do I encourage her todevelop social skills and be
(27:53):
more confident in interactingwith children Her age?
Great question, owen.
I think this is another placewhere I want to.
I want to.
I'm not going to push back, I'mnot saying that but I want to
make sure that we identify somethings before I give my tip.
And my tip is going to berelated, very, very similar to
what we just talked about withCaleb and Sophia A child led
(28:14):
play tactic that we can use orpractice that we can use to help
our child to feel moreconfident.
But the first thing that I wantto say, before I get into that,
is that we live in a culturethat really, really celebrates
and, in an exaggerated way,lifts up, prioritizes extroverts
(28:38):
over introverts.
That's just a part of oursociety.
People like extroverts althoughpeople want to have extroverts
on their podcast and they wantto listen to extroverts and
extroverts tend to get morepromotions and things like that,
although some of the bestcreative thinking and most
imaginative thinking often comesfrom introverts.
I look at it.
(28:59):
You know I am in a marriagewith an introvert and often some
of the best stuff that you'veever heard about whole parent
might come out of my mouth theextrovert but it often comes
from her brain as the introvertand so the first thing that I
want to say is that introversionis a feature, not a failure.
So if you feel, like man, I'mfailing as a parent because my
child is an introvert, please wegot to change that mindset.
(29:20):
I'm not saying that that's whatyou feel, owen.
I'm saying that many parentsthat I've worked with, deep
underneath the surface is thegreat fear that their child
won't be successful becausethey're an introvert.
Nothing can be farther from thetruth.
The world is changed often byintroverts.
They aren't always elected topublic office, they aren't
always the front person, butoftentimes, and in fact most of
(29:42):
the time, they're the personbehind the scenes.
My favorite people in the worldare all introverts.
I'll put it that way.
So introversion is a feature,not a failure, and introverted
people tend this is not totallyuniversal, but introverted
people tend to have a few closerelationships, while extroverted
people tend to have more lessclose relationships.
So we might have morefriendships.
(30:04):
We might have quote morefriends, although not always and
those friendships won't alwaysbe as deep.
Introverts will have a fewreally, really deep friendships
and the truth is what we know isthat as long as you feel
connected to people in general,it's not gonna be a big draw on
your mental health.
It's gonna be a good thing foryour mental health.
(30:24):
So if your child has absolutelyno relationships, it might be
time to implement some of thethings that I'm gonna talk about
with ChildBudPlay and practice.
But if your child has a coupleclose relationships, it's okay.
If they're not the most popularkid in class, in fact it might
be exactly where they wanna be,and it's not a failure, it's a
feature.
So just feel that, identifythat and this is the child that
(30:48):
we have.
I have introverted kids andextroverted kids.
The introverted kids of my kids, that's the person that they
are and that's not a failure.
That's a good thing about themand it's going to mean that
they're gonna be able toleverage that in amazing ways to
be physically, mentally andemotionally healthy, in the same
ways that extroverts are ableto be physically, mentally,
emotionally healthy byleveraging their extroversion.
(31:10):
So trying to force a kid intosomething that they're not
making them fit, you know asquare peg round hole is usually
going to wind up biting you inthe behind, and so don't go down
that path.
So that's the first thing Iwanna say.
The second thing that I'll sayis that beyond simply
introversion, extroversion, wealso have the spectrum of
sensitivity, whether that'shighly sensitive or tend to be
(31:34):
less sensitive, the kids thatare in that, let's say, 20% at
the top, the most highlysensitive kids.
What Dr Elaine Aron has foundin her research, as well as
other researchers who have kindof doubled down on this research
and looked at this work, whatthey've found is that for that
20% of the population that tendsto be what we might classify as
highly sensitive, what Dr Beckyunfortunately doesn't cite,
(31:58):
elaine Aron, but what she callsdeeply feeling kids, even though
it's just high sensitivity, andwhat other creators and what
other authors have called theorchid versus dandelion paradigm
or spectrum, the orchids inthat case, with these highly
sensitive kids, they often needa lot more time to observe
before they interact and soagain, not a failure, a feature
(32:21):
they will observe what's goingon for a long time before they
insert themselves.
And so my son, when he started,he's highly sensitive, he's
extroverted but he's highlysensitive.
It's kind of a not always,they're not always.
You can be highly sensitive andextrovert, or highly sensitive
and introvert, or vice versa.
He's an extrovert but he'shighly sensitive.
And so when he starts newthings, like a soccer team or
(32:43):
gymnastics or whatever,sometimes he doesn't just dive
right in, sometimes he stays inthe background or stays on the
wall and watches for a period oftime.
It's possible that Zoe, at fouryears old it's not even that
she's necessarily an introvert,it's that we're going to so many
different environments that shefeels that she has to observe
before she engages.
And so we go oh well, shedidn't play with any kids there.
We gotta try the next place, orwe gotta try the next thing, or
(33:05):
we gotta put her in sports orwe gotta put her in this,
because she's not making anyfriends Sometimes.
Just consistency of going tothe same place over and over you
go to the same park over andover, you just play with the
same group of friends over andover that allows those highly
sensitive kids that need toobserve before they interact to
do the requisite observation andassessment and then eventually,
on the fourth or fifth playdate or on the fourth or fifth
(33:28):
practice, then they'llparticipate.
And forcing them to participatebefore they have that time to
make that assessment is almostalways going to bite you in the
long term.
And then the last thing becausewe're running out of time here
and I wanna make sure that I hitthis as well is that, as with
the yes and Improv game, as withthe processing later with Jake
and Audrey.
(33:48):
Another thing that you can dowith your child is child-led
play, in other words, themleading the play with you, and
so you are a safe person foryour child.
I really, really hope so, andbecause you're a safe person for
your child, that means that youcan play with them in a way
that will feel safe to them, andso I just wanna highlight this
(34:08):
and say anytime that you spendintentional time playing with
your child and allowing them tolead, that is one of the
confidence-building things thatthen allows your child to go out
and feel that they can meet newpeople and interact and grow
and change and initiate.
As you said, play with newpeers, and so be a person who
(34:31):
plays well with your child, whodoesn't just spend a lot of time
worrying about whether yourchild is interacting with peers,
but who's practicing with them.
You are their safe practicespace, and so sit down on the
floor with your kid which I'msure you do, owen but just be
even more intentional andencourage your partner, if you
have one, to also interact inthis way.
Sit down and allow your childto lead deeply in imaginative
(34:56):
play.
Say yes to whatever they'resaying Show them that it is fun
to play with someone else andthat can really really do a
whole host of amazing things andbenefit your child.
So that's what I have for youand as well as kind of the
things that I've talked aboutwith Jake and with Caleb.
I think that this is kind of theway in which we do it.
(35:17):
We become the safe people and Ican't stress that enough.
This goes for Audrey, this goesfor Sophia as well.
We, when we become the safehome base, our children tend to
go out and interact in the worldin more confident and ways.
And sometimes you know, notsharing is a lack of confidence.
I'm worried.
What if something gets taken?
Not being the leader is a lackof confidence, right?
(35:38):
What if somebody takes my spot?
For me, the more we can be thatsafe home base and make them
feel that they belong and thatthey're securely attached to us,
the more they have that abilityto go out and and be amazing
social partners out in the world.
So I hope that helps.
All right, guys.
This is the end of the episodefor this episode on social
skills on the whole parentpodcast.
(35:59):
Thank you so much for joiningme today as we tackled some
really amazing questions fromreally amazing parents.
If you liked this episode of thepodcast, please make sure that
you subscribe so that when youget a new episode that comes out
which happens every Tuesday andThursday that you'll be
notified and it'll beautomatically downloaded to your
device.
So, on Apple podcast, onSpotify, on all those places,
(36:21):
make sure that you aresubscribed to this podcast.
If you didn't know this, I havean email list.
It's really, really awesome.
It's linked in the show notesbelow.
Every single Thursday, I willsend out an email.
Sometimes it's related to whatwe talked about on the podcast
man, I really tripped overmyself there and sometimes it's
totally, totally separate.
Sometimes it's just amazingcontent that performs better or
(36:42):
is better given in written form.
I also, on there, will tell youabout exciting opportunities to
connect with me and the wholeparent platform and the whole
parent nation as a whole on thatemail list.
It's the place where you canfind out about all the upcoming
events my upcoming book that Imentioned in this episode,
upcoming live trainings that Ido, anything related to whole
parent.
You're going to get it on theemail list.
It is not a place where you'regoing to get spammed all over
(37:04):
the place.
I'm not going to send you abunch of emails about sales,
although occasionally, when I dohave something, I will send you
a note.
Hey, you might like this, butit's really a place where, every
Thursday, you just get amazingparenting content delivered to
your inbox for free.
The last thing that I'llencourage you to do is that if
you have a child in your lifewho struggles to share whether
they are your child or not youwant to share this with a
(37:26):
partner.
If you want to share this with aparent, if you want to share
this with a friend or a peer, amom friend, a dad friend please
do so.
Shoot them this episode and orshoot them any episode of the
whole parent podcast that youfeel applies to them.
That is one of the most amazingthings that you can do, not
only for me and the platform andwhole parent podcast as a whole
to keep us going, but it's alsoan amazing way that you can
(37:48):
benefit somebody in your lifefor free, that they get to just
listen to this and learn andgrow.
Every single one of us needs avillage, and sometimes it takes
building our own village bysending the types of resources
that are benefiting us to ourfriends, and then you know.
Just imagine what it would belike to have somebody to discuss
the whole parent podcast within your life.
I bet you that would be superfun.
(38:09):
So that's what I have for youon this episode.
Thank you so much for listeningand until next time.
This has been the whole parentpodcast.
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