Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Talking does not help, I wish I could get him to listen !


I am sure most of you are familiar with these words of desperation. I agree that talking does not help, but because the wrong people are doing the talking and listening. Kids should be doing the talking and reflecting and we the listening, guiding and challenging them with our questions.

 The CPS - Collaborative Problem Solving approach   process promotes relationship and many cognitive skills. But what happens if you try to gather information about his concerns and perspectives and the kid answers – I don't know. Here we need 'Drilling down techniques' to help us get a clear understanding of the kid's concerns. And what happens if the kid tells you to shut up or he does not want to talk about it, and then the CPS process would begin with ' I have noticed that when I want to talk to you about 'homework' you are not keen to talk to me about it- what's up? And if the kid still does not want to talk, we can focus on non-emotive general chatting. Here we can build trust and connection and also introduce the CPS language of concerns, perspective taking, mutually satisfactory solutions, family and individual goals. Kids don't talk because it may be a trust issue, they see the process as another way of parents imposing their will or find it difficult to articulate or even define their concerns.

 Some parents complained to the Barbara Coloroso that their son used to listen to them, but know he is involved in a bad crowd and he now listens to them. She answered – nothing has changed – he used to listen to you, now he is listens to them. When kids do the talking and reflecting they develop their own values. So let's listen to them so that they will talk to us.