1. Take a deep breath, kneel down and get on their eye level and make eye contact as you explain firmly the benefits of doing the thing that you want them to do.
2. Explain a scenario of how it has benefited them in the past.
3. Explain how doing it will make you feel (but don’t dwell on how not doing it will make you feel).
4. Try a bit of positive reinforcement i.e. highlighting the benefits for them doing the thing that you want to do going forward.
5. Try a bit of negative reinforcement i.e. getting them to avoid the thing that will happen if they don’t do it.
6. Reward older children with a pocket money scheme for doing things that you want them to do.  Reward charts can work for younger children.
7. If all else fails resort to bribery!  That usually works.

What techniques work for your kids?  What about younger kids?  Please contribute your views below.

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When turning for guidance on these matter, the world is rife with conflicting messages.

On one side of the coin we have – “If he doesn’t want to participate, just leave him be and let him decide what is right for him”. But at what age to children become old enough and capable of knowing what is best for them?

After all participating in sports promotes a healthy lifestlye, builds confidence, promotes working in teams and learning to think from the perspective of others. These are all invaluable in terms of a child’s growth and development. This leads on to an argument on the other side of the coin where the benefits are tremendous, so isn’t it worth pushing through the barriers and persevering to get your child enthusiastic to participate?

As a six year old (Alex), my little boy says he does not want to play football. He says it makes him feel nervous, he hates confrontation and the idea that he could get hurt. But every week I go through the pain of taking him and sometimes feel like a pushy parent…why?

Because when he is doing it, I can see a seed of pleasure and enjoyment about what he is doing. Although he says he doesn’t enjoy it, clearly there are some aspects that he does enjoy without realising it. When he scores or saves a goal he loves the sense of belonging (the high fives), when he races he loves to win.

I have found the key to getting my kids motivated is to give clear direction about what is going on and asking for extra support from others around me. For example, asking coaches to give support so that it is not always ‘mum nagging’.

I strongly believe that he will gain so much more from overcoming his fears and gain greater pleasure from participating over time, than the pain he thinks he feels up until now.

Advice from the Experts
———————–
I asked Lewis Howes (sports networker and ex-american footballer) for his advice and guidance for parents on the subject of sports participation.

“Playing a sport can be one of the most important things a child ever does growing up. It encourages competitiveness, helps you grow physically and mentally, and gives you opportunities to fail, but more importantly gives you opportunities to get back up once you fail.

Parents should encourage their kids to participate in some type of sports because those kids will have team building, and leadership skills throughout their entire life that they may have never learned if it weren’t for the experiences they gained from playing sports.”

Summary
———

This week, Alex has turned to me and said he was sad because there wasn’t any football. While we may still have our ups and downs, this is most definately progress. Oh and did I forget to mention that it’s taken me over 9 months to reach this point.

As an experienced parent, what are your thoughts and experiences on pushy parenting when it comes to sports? Please do leave your comments below.

Do Your Children Have Good Table Manners?

What seems pretty straight forward to us adults in demonstrating good table manners is a pretty challenging set of rules for the average toddler and child. Any of the following sound familiar…and on repeat?

• Sit up straight
• Don’t talk with your mouth full
• Eat with your mouth closed
• Sit still while you are eating
• Say thank you to whomever has made the food
• Don’t bring toys to the table
• Wash your hands before eating
• Don’t use silly and offensive words
• Use your knife and fork
• Don’t bash the table
• Eat all your dinner up
• Don’t put too much in your mouth
• Eat more than one pea at a time
• Take your elbows off the table
• Stop burping, stop grunting
• Don’t play with your food
• Say “please may I leave the table?” when everyone has finished
• Put your knife and fork together when you have finished (if you are really lucky)

and the list goes on….

When you look at a list like this, it’s no wonder really that children often feel a bit bewildered and forget their manners, exactly which quantities they should put into their mouths and when they should have their mouth open and closed.

A major contradiction lies in that children love to play and be on the move and would much prefer to snack as they go to maintain their energy levels (for most from their own point of view on energy rich sugary foods). The temptation to play and make a squidgy mess out of perfectly solid food is just too tempting. In fact, we are asking our children to do quite the opposite of their natural urges i.e. sit down, sit still, eat plenty all in one go and don’t play with their food.

So bearing in mind that there is such a lot to remember and it goes against natural urges, we can remind ourselves that our children have not been sent here from another planet to test our patience at the dinner table. They are simply acting perfectly well according to their natural instinct and are not too dissimilar from millions of other children.

So here’s our opportunity to take stock and put our patience into practice…which lets face it may take many years, but is well worth the investment.

The crucial thing to remember is that mealtimes are for the benefits of time spent eating together around a table and not to get too hung upon on manners. It’s more a case of rectifying where children need guidance and giving positive praise for great manners.

The other thing to remember is that according to psychologists 60-70% of behaviour is learned through non-verbal cues and body language, whilst the spoken word accounts for only about 7%. So in spite of everything we say in our long list of table manners, the majority of what children learn at the dinner table is through mimicking our behaviour. That’s right, they are copying you! Yes you are being scrutinised at the dinner table without anybody consciously realising it.
On top of this, as well as you, your children start to mimic their friends at school which adds even more to the challenge.

So the moral of the story is do as I do…not just as I say. How do you score on the list of manners?

Set boundaries and reinforce good behavior being specific about what impressed you so they can repeat that behaviour again, ignore the bad behavior and bad manners, and keep setting the good manners example and practice what you preach.

It will take a while for things to sink in, but with practice we all get there in the end.

Here are a couple of tips to make table manners a bit more interesting:

1. You could have a fun quiz at the start of the meal to see who can name a table manner.

2. You could have a day of the week dedicated to eating differently e.g. Chinese or Indian food and use different manners for different types of food e.g. in India you eat rice with your hands, sit on cushions on the floor etc.

Does your child display outstanding table manners when you go out or to other peoples homes? How does this compare to at home? Please leave your thoughts and comments below.

Keeping Up With The Pace of Change

Our research suggested that the biggest challenge of being a grandparent is keeping up with the pace of change in the modern world. The pace of change includes keeping up with how things have changed since our grandparents were parents with young children, keeping up with the rapid pace of change with the volume of information available and keeping up with the rate at which the children themselves change their mind. One week they like peppers and grapes…but the next week insist that they have never liked them. Inconsistencies in contact with grandchildren can make this even more difficult to keep up with.

Giving Grandchildren the Right Amount Of Time

Time was of the essence for many grandparents who completed our survey. Grandparents feel challeged between giving up enough of their time and sharing this equally amongst all of their grandchildren and balancing this with not being too overbearing for parents. Distance was also a big challenge for many parents. As the world has grown smaller, many grandparents do not live locally and face difficulties in spending enough quality time interacting with their grandchildren.

Keeping Grandchildren Busy with Activity Ideas

A large challenge for grandparents is thinking of activities to do with their grandchildren, but also not just duplicating what children do with their parents and grandparents.

Having Enough Energy

As bodies grow older, minds remain with the same enthusiasm to enjoy time together, but bodies do not allow grandparents to do the things they used to do. Grandparents expressed an interest in finding products that helped them physically in making more of the time with their grandchildren.

Biting My Tounge

Grandparents reported it being challenging to have strong opinions around interaction and discipline between parents and their grandchildren, but it being difficult to gague when to and when not to give their opinions. Grandparents reporting of the need to bite their tounge.

Do you identify with these challenges? How would you like to see these challenges overcome? Add to your lively debate below…

No more nappies – make potty time fun!

With a unique potty-shaped cover, these brilliant toilet training books are perfect
for helping your child make the transition from nappies to pants in no time.

Full of fun rhymes and pictures that will show your child how to use their potty,
the Potty Time series are ideal for any place and time, from before bed to
out-and-about. Bright colours and photography make the books engaging for young
children, and fun and friendly advice helps take the worry out of potty training for
parents and toddlers alike!

Each book also includes a sheet of special reward stickers which can be used for any
type of reward system, providing that final encouragement for children to become
nappy free!

Buy from Amazon

WIN Your Copy of Boys or Girls Potty Time

Izziwizzi Kids has 6 copies of the book to give away (3 girls and 3 boys). Just answer the following question and submit your entry below.

Competition Now Closed

Competition Rules
—————–

1. One entry per household
2. No entries from employees, family or friends of IzziwizziKids.co.uk.
3. Competition Closes 31st May 2010.
4. Competition is run by Buzz Internet Marketing.
5. By entering the competition you agree to receive communications from IzziwizziKids.co.uk. Your details will not be shared with 3rd party companies.

IzziwizziKids.co.uk has a set of family of four tickets to give away to a lucky winner. Just answer the following question.

What is the name of The Wiggles Dog Character? If you need help then you can find more information about the Wiggles at http://www.thewiggles.com.au/uk/about/ Competition entry close date 31st May 2010.

Competition Now Closed.

Competition Rules
—————–

1. One entry per household
2. No entries by Izziwizzi Kids employees, family or friends
3. Competition closes 31st May 2010.

The activities suit children from as young as 2 years old up to 10 years old, so you can keep siblings entertained together. Please forward the guide to all of your friends to spread the word about Izziwizzi Kids and don’t forget to post your comments right here.

If you are a grandparent with grand children under 10 years of age, we would like to hear from you.

Here is a link to the survey – Click here to take survey

Entrants will be drawn at the end of February 2010