Negotiating with a child

How a Humanistic Parent uses negotiation to help their children learn how to think critically and better navigate social interactions.

I realize a lot of parenting experts counsel against negotiating with a child. They say it erodes parental authority. I think they are wrong. I negotiate with my child all the time. Negotiation is an important skill. It helps the child learn to use their words to get what they want and that is so much better than them thinking the only way to get what they want is through a tantrum. It helps them develop verbal skills, reasoning, and compassion.

Here are some basic negotiation techniques to help you get the most out of your child:

Treat negotiation like a game.

Negotiation done well is fun. Sometimes I throw in absurd conditions into the negotiation to see what my son will do with it.

Both sides must be willing to give and take a bit.

This helps your child understand and learn that you will be flexible only if they will. Reciprocity is a good thing for kids to learn.

You can’t always get what you want.

I often allow my son to attempt negotiation even when I know what he is trying to negotiate isn’t something he will succeed at. As he “forces” me to give him good reasons why I won’t give in, he learns quite a lot about my reasoning in the process. And, assuming I have a good reason why not to give in – he deserves to know what those reasons are.

Diminishing returns:

This is a trick I learned from my dad. If you offer a fair deal and your child refuses it – trying to get more, you start negotiating in the other direction, meaning, the deal the child is getting keeps getting worse and worse. For example, if you are negotiating a weekend bedtime and you offer an extra ½ hour and they want an extra hour – you might drop it to 15 minutes and if they keep trying to get their hour – drop to 10 minutes, 5 minutes, regular bedtime, ½ early. The reason to do this is because part of the art of negotiation is knowing when to stop and take the deal you have if it is a good deal. It doesn’t take long for them to understand that the more they protest, the more they are losing and they should take a good deal when it is offered.

Do you negotiate with your child? If so what are some of the techniques you use? 

Ethics requires courage

As a Humanist parent, like all parents, I want my son to succeed. More importantly, my hope is that he will become ethically courageous. I know that he will be well served if he can become confident in himself. 

Whether it is dealing with bullies or doing the right thing in a difficult situation, the problem seems to be one of confidence. If they are confident in themselves, they will have the courage they need to stand up and be ethical.

The problem with this is that teaching kids to be confident doesn’t help them. That is because confidence isn’t something you can teach. It has to be earned. The real question we should be asking is how to encourage kids, and adults for that matter, to learn the skills they need so that they can overcome the challenges they face so that they can become confident as individuals. The answer is in the root of encourage. And that is courage.

With my son, our biggest challenge is to get him to try. He has fears and in order to teach him new skills, we have to help him overcome those fears. Even learning to ride a bicycle required him to overcome the fear of falling. Our job is to help him find the courage to try and try again until he succeeds. As he succeeds, he gains confidence.

The same holds true to being an ethical person. The will to be good is there. The challenge is to be courageous enough to stand up for what is right. There are no shortcuts that work.

Part of being a Humanist is to choose to live life courageously. We don’t expect things to be easy. We expect to have to work to overcome the challenges we all face in life. So don’t focus on helping your child to be confident. Help them to be courageous instead. Having courage will serve them better throughout the course of their lives than being overly confident will.

How do you find courage? How do you help your child overcome his or her fears to become courageous? 

Cuddle Your Kids

File this under Humanistic Parenting.

It turns out that how much you cuddle your children impacts how their brain develops. (See article in NY Times here: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/21/opinion/sunday/kristof-cuddle-your-kid.html?ref=todayspaper&_r=2& )

Early childhood stress can be toxic to the development of the prefrontal cortex. In other words, good character development, the ability to think before you act, which is tied to brain anatomy, is flexible and impacted by how we treat our children.

More love means more resilient kids. Success in life isn’t just a measure of willpower. It is also a matter of basic brain capabilities. Cuddling and nurturing our children when they are young has a long term impact on their resiliency and fortitude as adults. It isn’t the only factor, obviously, but it does play a part.

I personally love the lovey dovey part of parenting. The fact that it helps my son become a better person, bonus!