<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cOwww! Stop!<\/p>\n
\u201cGet out!”, yelled Seth.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo! I was here first,\u201d whined his little brother, Timmy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI called \u2018shotgun\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter I was getting in the seat.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cDoesn\u2019t matter. I called it. Get out!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOwwww! You\u2019re hurting me! Mommy!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMommy, I called ‘shotgun’ and Timmy won\u2019t get out.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMommy, Seth is pulling my arm.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ann approached the car and said, \u201cI hear a lot of yelling and screaming. Seth, you look very angry.” She turned to her younger son and said, \u00a0“And Timmy, you look very upset.” \u00a0To both of them she continued, “I want each of you to tell me what is going on. Seth.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhoever calls \u2018shotgun\u2019 gets to sit there. I called \u2018shotgun\u2019 first and Timmy won\u2019t get out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ann observed, \u201cSeth, you\u2019re angry because you called \u2018shotgun\u2019 first. Because you called it, you believe you should get to sit in the front seat.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah\u201d<\/p>\n
Then she turned to her younger son and said, \u201cTimmy. Tell me what happened.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI was getting in the seat when Seth called \u2018shotgun\u2019. I didn\u2019t even know he was there. It\u2019s not fair. He always yells \u2018shotgun\u2019.”<\/p>\n
Their mother said, \u201cYou sound upset and frustrated. You believe what happened wasn\u2019t fair.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah. Seth always yells \u2018shotgun\u2019 before I can even think about (doing) it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ann put her hands on her sons’ shoulders and said, \u201cBoth of you think you are right. You are both good at figuring things out. I am going to go read my book while you two work\u00a0out a solution that feels fair to both of you. Come find me when you are done.\u201d \u00b9<\/p>\n
(10 minutes later)<\/p>\n
\u201cMom. We know how we are going to handle it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah. We have the perfect plan,\u201d beamed Timmy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI can\u2019t wait to hear it,\u201d Ann responded, eager to hear what her little lawyers had fashioned.<\/p>\n
Seth began, \u201cWe have a system worked out so we know whose day it is to get \u2018shotgun\u2019. No fighting.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah. And today is my day,\u201d announced Timmy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s right. Timmy gets to sit in the front on the even days of the month and I get to sit there on the odd days.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd on the even days, Seth also has to set the table,\u201d added Timmy, pleased with the way the day was turning out.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat is a brilliant plan. I never would have thought of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah. Pretty cool, eh, Mom. We\u2019re good at this stuff,\u201d Timmy said as he hopped back in the front seat and closed the door.<\/p>\n
Ann turned to her son and said, \u201cSeth, does Timmy know that tomorrow is the 31st and you\u2019ll get two days in a row?”<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a lot to teach my little brother, don\u2019t I Mom.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI never doubted that,\u201d Ann\u00a0chuckled.<\/p>\n
__________________________________<\/p>\n
Here is the basic recipe that Ann followed with the boys:<\/p>\n
Recognize how each of them is feeling<\/em><\/strong> When parents resolve conflicts for their children, they offer external solutions to problems that rob their children of important internal work that needs to be done. These parent solutions often deliver messages that children are not capable and need to depend on others to resolve their problems. In the example above, development of competence in the areas of logical thinking, communication and relatedness were promoted. The mother also modeled empathy and served as a reminder that fairness and caring are essential to moral integrity.<\/p>\n ____________________________<\/p>\n \u00b9 Example after example of how to do this can be found in Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish\u2019s classic book, Siblings Without Rivalry<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Whenever possible, make external processes internal. In this example, instead of resolving a conflict between her sons, Ann acknowledged their perspectives and how they were feeling. Then she restated the problem to be solved and left them to figure it out for themselves. Whenever possible, conflict and its solution should remain with the child. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[56,75,39,54,52,60],"class_list":{"0":"post-790","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-applying-ideas","7":"tag-communication","8":"tag-empathy","9":"tag-internal-discipline","10":"tag-listening","11":"tag-logical-thinking","12":"tag-resilience","13":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=790"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":797,"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/790\/revisions\/797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.childproofingforadolescence.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n Have each give their side of what happened<\/em><\/strong>
\n Recognize each person\u2019s perspective<\/em><\/strong>
\n State the problem that needs to be figured out<\/em><\/strong>
\n Acknowledge their capability of finding a solution together<\/em><\/strong>
\n Walk away and let them handle it<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n