Source: The Indian Express
During this unfortunate time of the pandemic, children are locked up at home unable to follow their normal routine. This has decreased their physical activities and increased screen time for them. This situation has become a new challenge for parents.
As parents, we definitely must discipline our children, but we need to avoid forcing our thinking on the child. Especially for teenagers, we can only empower them with the correct information, with logical reasoning, and then let them make an informed decision. Here are three such magical phrases that you can say and phrases that you must not say to your child during this lockdown.
1. Never hesitate to say ‘I love you’: These three magical words can never go wrong. Back up your words with actions, spend time with your child playing, hugging, chatting, and discussing their problems. Never say ‘Oh, you drive me mad’.
2. Replace your ‘No’ with ‘Let’s do it this way’: If your child is doing something in an inappropriate way, instead of saying ‘don’t do it’ or ‘you cannot do a single thing right’, ‘you are so annoying, always spoiling things’, you may try using words like ‘Okay, let’s try it again to do it better’, ‘Everyone can go wrong, let’s try again, no one is perfect’, ‘Let’s clean the mess together, let me help you clean it’. Replacing a “no” can work wonders for your child.
3. ‘Everything will be okay’: These words can be reassuring to a child and help them face the current circumstances. Every experience teaches us new things so this phase shows that we are all in it together and soon everything will be fine.
