If the child causes damage, it is necessary to recognize the innocence at the origin of the gesture and suggest how to do better without getting to scold him
“I’m going to water the plants!” Lara says, a 4 -year -old girl, and mom replies: “Yes, but be careful not to wet!”. Lara takes the jug from the kitchen, goes to the bathroom, opens the bidet tap, fills the jug up to the edge, goes to the balcony and overturns the water in the Ficus vase without realizing that you have left traces of water along the entire route that separates the bathroom from the balcony. After his work, he returns to the house all satisfied, but he feels the mother shouting: «Lara, but what did you combine?! It’s all flooded. You are a mess! ».
Lucio, a 2 -year -old boy, is thirsty. It is only in the living room (the father is in the room alongside), sees a glass containing the water on the table, and thus decides to use it. He puts himself on tiptoe, grab the glass two hands, and in the gesture of tilting it to bring it to the mouth, baton and pants. His gaze suddenly becomes sad and disappointed. At that moment the father enters the room and exclaims: «But Lucio! Is it possible that you always have to make disasters? Couldn’t you call me? ».
Look beyond
Most of the time the children act behind a positive intent and want to do something good and constructive. In our case, Lara wanted to carry out a domestic task whose mother usually deals and Lucio wanted to quench his thirst. Neither of them, therefore, acted to “make a mess. Unfortunately, children sometimes make a mistake, place, moment, and what wanted to be a good action transforms, into the eyes of the adult, into a disaster. The immaturity in reading the situation, and understanding obstacles or limits prevents the child from completing a successful task And the inconvenience, the unexpected, jeopardizes the success of the work and the positive and satisfied response of mom and dad.
If Lara had not wet on the ground, the mother would have been happy with her collaborative gesture towards the family, and Lucio’s dad would have been proud of his conquest of autonomy.
Scolding does not help
Maria Montessori teaches us that children receive positive or negative responses to them act directly from the environment: if I do well, nothing breaks, dirty or wet; If something is wrong in the procedure, dirt, wet or cocci will tell me that I evaluated what to do but I acted incorrectly. What children need are opportunities to train to be precise, attentive, ordered and calm, and strategies to do even better. The sterile scolded by the adult, therefore, is completely useless. What can help the child is instead a suggestion, advice or modification of the environment so that the baby is facilitated in performing some actions.
Let’s do some examples. Lara’s mother could have told her: “Go to water the plants but careful to put a little water in the jug, in order to avoid wetting on the ground” and, if she had not been able to intervene in advance, at the sight of the wet floor she could have said: “The water from the jug came out because it was full. Transporting a full jug is very difficult! It is better to put a little less water next time and make back and forth several times between the plant and the tap. Now let’s take the rag and dry ».
Lucio’s dad, on the other hand, being in the other room, had no way of giving preventive suggestions, but, seeing the child sorry for the incident and still finding him with his glass in his hand, he could have easily guessed the incident and comment: “Lucio, you wet because you wanted to make a very complex movement. Now take the glass from my hands and you will see that you won’t get wet ».
The alternative is there
Both children’s activities could have been successfully performed if the environment had been adapted for them. Let’s see how:
- In the first case, Lara could have used a jug, easily accessible, on which the maximum filling level had been marked. This would certainly have facilitated the task and, perhaps, the girl could have avoided the accident.
- In the second case, a small low table on which to leave a glass of water available to children, would have allowed Lucio to quench their thirst independently without being in difficulty.
In any case, recognize children the good intention of their actions reassures them on the fact that they have not had a wrong idea. Suggest to them how to do better, then, can teach him to move and act more effectively in the environment, and to understand what was the error. What matters is not to judge the intent, but help children evaluate and analyze the way they actedor the behavior put in place to achieve the purpose.
Attention request
Sometimes it happens that children do something with the intention of combining damage, such as overturning, breaking or dirtying on purpose. In these cases, behind their acting, There is an explicit request for attention: “I am tired!”; “I’m jealous!”; “I want cuddles!”; Or: «I really want to see what happens if I do it. If you get angry! ». Not yet knowing how to give a name and share these emotions, then, they put in the field of the actions that are able to master (overthrow, bang, launch, tear, destroy) to capture the attention they will certainly receive. Also in this case the intent of their action is somehow positive because they only want attention and affection. The task of the parent must then be to help them in reading your mood and suggest other ways of requiring presence: “Do you want me to be with you?”, Or “I keep you a little in your arms? Now let’s get back and then we embrace a little ». Together with the child, if he already has the skills, he is remedied to the “damage” done and then devoted himself to a cuddle with which he offers him the comfort he needs.
Another motivation that pushes children to “behave badly” is the desire to communicate to adults present that what they have to do is too complex or too simple for them, and so boredom or frustration push them to act against things. As above, The adult must try to read the intention of the child by giving him job opportunities suitable for his level of development and useful strategies to manage frustration. What may be too simple must be replaced or made more complicated, and what is still too complex must be managed together or postponed.
