Very often the focus when it comes to listening is about children listening to adults. We spend time teaching them how to listen, whether it is at home or in school. We feel frustrated when they don’t listen to us, and worry that this is a sign we aren’t doing a good enough job as their parents.
With the holidays nearly upon us and children about to take a break from school and nursery, it is a good moment to reflect and think: what if we turned this on its head and started thinking instead about how we listen to children? The most powerful teaching tool we have as parents and teachers is role modelling. When we show children what listening really means, they are far more likely to become the good listeners we are hoping they will be. They will learn from us because they want to be like us.
When we truly listen to children, they feel respected, they engage with us better, they learn what listening means, and we build their self-esteem because they feel heard and valued. Strong self-esteem leads to improved behaviour, stronger relationships and a positive sense of self that will last a lifetime.
It isn’t always easy in today’s world to make the changes we need to in order to show children we are really listening to them. There are so many distractions - phones don’t just receive phone calls anymore, thanks to texting, WhatsApp, social media, shopping apps, news apps and email notifications, our phones constantly bombard us with distractions. We do everything at a pace that would have been impossible 30 years ago, and arguably, the expectations we place on ourselves have never been higher. We are busy and the pace of life is busy. It is harder than ever to create space, time and moments of stillness. Yet, we have to keep trying because we owe it to ourselves and to our children.
Of course, listening to children isn’t just about us creating the time, it is about giving them the skills and the confidence to express themselves. When we pause and listen to them, their confidence shoots up. We can help them practice how to talk to other people, how to make eye contact and how to speak assertively. This isn’t about nagging them to do these things, but about giving them tips and role playing conversations with them to help them get some practice in.
It’s also important to remember that children communicate in different ways. We need to listen to their words, their expressions, their actions, their play…through all of these ways of being children tell us who they are, how they are feeling, and where they need our help. When we reframe ‘getting children to listen’ as ‘working on everyone listening to each other’, we can move towards more collaborative, authentic ways of communicating and relating to one another.
“Listen earnestly to anything your children want to tell you, no matter what. If you don’t listen eagerly to the little stuff when they are little, they won’t tell you the big stuff when they are big, because to them all of it has always been big stuff.” Catherine M. Wallace
This blog was brought to you by the team of early childhood experts at Kids Love Nature. We have four outstanding kindergartens across Dorset and Hampshire which focus on connecting children to nature.