More Strategies to Engage With Your Child

We’re all wired to see things in opposites because that’s how we learn to differentiate and recognise things quickly.

This means that a toddler learns bird<>not bird; and eventually an eight year old might differentiate greenfinch<>not greenfinch.

When it comes to feelings and behaviours, these “constructs” (opposites) take on personal overtones. And these personal opposites are really important for how we understand things.

Why does it matter?

An example: Supposing a child’s teacher says they’re “lazy”. The teacher says they would prefer the child to be industrious and “get homework done on time”. The parent hears this as the teacher meant it – after all, they’re supposedly the experts on the child’s learning. So they adopt that version of events. But the teacher is still using their own “opposites”.

That teacher has a construct: laziness<>getting homework done.

Let’s engage with that child and ask what they think their pair of opposites is: “What’s someone like who gets their homework done on time?” we ask. 

They immediately say: “They won't have friends.” 

The inference being that people who work hard don’t have friends, no one likes them – or perhaps they don’t have time to make friends? (Ask them which!)

Now we have a reason why the child doesn’t get their homework done on time or looks “lazy”, as the teacher calls it. They value having friends over being a goody-goody.

So, how is this relevant to engaging with your child who’s anxious about something?

Well, we tend to assume what’s going on for our children. Take their words at face value, how we understand them. I know I’ve been guilty of this! 

So a good tactic is to notice the words (concepts/phrases) they use and ask them what, for them, the opposite would be. It may not be what you think. And the answer helps us understand them better.

If we can accept our child's version and work from that, we put ourselves in their shoes to help them sort it out. They’ll also feel more understood and engage with us to solve the anxiety or problem.

Sometimes your child will not tell you what’s wrong or what they’re worried about. Not because they’re secretive and refusing to engage, but because they can’t explain.

We can, however, get round the problem – by being devious!

Pictures inspire stories in children. They love stories, they invent stories all the time.

So harness this gift to engage with them and find out what’s going on in their heads.

How to do this?

Just like you might buy a normal set of playing cards, you can buy a set of picture cards. 

My recommendation is to investigate OH-Cards.  

OH-Cards.com has lots of detail about them and lists of world-wide distributors. The UK distributor is Penny Davey. (I have no financial interest in the companies.)

I recommend the Saga set – you may never need any others. They can be used for a few years, too, as your child grows up. The leaflet that comes with them has lots of ways of playing with them. But I offer two good ideas below.

Have some fun with your child when you are looking for an activity to do together. Learn the words, and take advice from your child! They may well know how to do rap style better than we do.

The diagram gives you my words, but it's up to you and your child how you do the stresses and voices and make it fun.

Why gratitude? Because it puts anxiety in perspective for a while and brings the thinking brain back on board while you engage with your child.

I've used it with many children, though. The last two lines are said one against the other, if you can work out my bizarre marking-up!

They’re not the first toy you think of buying but they’re  useful for engaging your child in many ways:

• a lovely furry friend to cuddle and stroke (which is self-soothing)
• conversational interactions – really useful to build on social skills 
• understanding and conveying reactions and emotions – again helping to express themselves
• a sense of freedom – separating what they know they should say and do from what they wish to say and do. Puppets can be allowed to do whatever they like!
• playing out a situation – this is where you may glimpse the underlying anxiety, so having a habit of playing with puppets makes it easy for your child to use them like this too
• solving a problem – when a child has solved something in play, they can usually solve it in real life afterwards.

As a family, use a sheet of paper as the game board. Chop small shapes (24 rough circles will be fine) from another sheet. 

Keep one aside for the starting place. Write the numbers 1-6 on the rest – have the same number of 1s as 2s as 3s etc. There's one number over. That's to write on the head in a moment.

Stick the un-numbered piece down in one corner of the game board. Then stick the numbered pieces randomly after it to form a snake shape.

Draw a big snake head at the end for the finish spot. Write the unused number on it. Place all game pieces on the tail. Take turns to throw the dice (oops, it’s a die, actually!). You move your piece to the next number on the snake that matches what you threw. 

You have to throw the exact number to land on the snake's head (you did give it that last number, didn’t you?). 

First home is the winner. But the fun is making the game together. You can, of course, add some more rules or change the way it’s played. It's your game now.

But one benefit of letting your child change the rules is that it discourages rigid thinking and encourages flexibility – and finding out that it’s fun to do things differently! This leads, in turn, to less anxious thoughts when things don’t turn out as expected.

This is a fun game to encourage your child to always think of any possible “good answers”. It breeds resilience and confidence! And those things lesson anxious thoughts, which helps lead to new ideas for solving real problems. 

Buy a packet of Smarties as a treat. (Rewards are important! Choose something else if sugary things are forbidden.)

Set the packet on the table in front of you in the garden – maybe when family friends are visiting (that nicely limits how many Smarties each person can earn!).

Everyone takes turns to suggest how someone could land safely when their parachute didn’t open.

Any great (and different) idea gets a Smartie reward. To set you off, here’s a few zany ones: jump from a very small distance; land on a spring; land in a mattress factory.

I’m sure your kids can come up with brilliant ideas once they hear one of your inventive ones to start them off!

Never let them assume there’s always just one right solution in life. That sort of thinking leads to anxiety in most children.

This is good for keeping track of progress while you help your child with their anxieties and worries.

Draw the circle with the sections labelled – or if your child is older, ask them which areas of their life they’d like to have on it.

Let them know that people all over the world use this sort of chart to work out how to make their lives happier! They do it regularly to see what progress they're making.

The scale is 1-10 – mark it with dots if you like, or as 2-4-6-8 in between the middle and the outside 10. It really doesn’t matter about being exact.

Get them to draw a line where they think their score is for that day or week – or in general – for each section.

You can then ask of each section in turn: “What makes that (for example) a 5 instead of a 4 or a 6?”

And there you have it: a conversation point – something to work on and express your understanding of their feelings and viewpoint.

If that goes well, you can try asking: “What would push the score up 1 point?” This way they get to suggest their own way of improving things for themselves.

You can engage your child in conversation about what’s good to worry about and what’s not so good while colouring in a fun sheet together. You can even have a competition to see who can learn the rhyme off by heart first!

Download a copy of the sheet to print out. Make two copies. Children find that if an adult does a task at the same time, it validates the task as worthwhile.

This is very different to a teacher telling a class to get on with it on their own. Try it and see!

The point is that if your child realises some worries are legitimate to keep them safe, they can then start to learn which ones are not so good – these are the ones we call “false alarms”. 

You can discuss the meaning of the emoticons when you start and work out which bit of the rhyme they relate to. Your child will delight to tell you what they all mean. Pretending to be ignorant is a good skill to develop when wanting a  child to feel empowered!

While you’re colouring together, discuss some examples of each kind.

Eg sticking fingers in electric sockets, running across a road, believing a ghost might be under the bed, worrying what will happen tomorrow. That sort of thing.

It can be an ongoing conversation in the days ahead, but this activity kicks it off – and you can remind each other of the rhyme regularly!

The pretty useless one is WHY?

That’s because it usually refers to something in the past and makes your child defensive. Better to focus on moving forward when something stupid/bad/unwanted/unwise has happened! 

So which ones should you try? Here’s the top 3: 

1. OPEN questions. 

Anything that does NOT lead to yes, or no, or I don’t know. 

Go instead for How, Where, When and Could..., because they definitely open up answers. 

2. ASSUMING ones. 

I love these. Ask it like you’re assuming something will be happening, or has happened: 

“Who could you ask to help you with X?” (You're going to ask someone!) “What has gone right today?”(Something has!) 

3. GUESSING ones. 

They’re great for the “I don’t know” response that your child will surely give you sometimes. 

Try: “Well if you did know, what might...” (because “if you did” cuts off their limiting belief that nothing is known or can be done.) 

Or try: “If you were good at X, what would go better in class?”

With this one, there’s always a way forward according to their answer – they’ve named it themselves!

Sorry about the pun – but you know kids these days. They'll love saving up three loo rolls to make into people!

You're going to get the guys to talk together about solving a worry or anxiety. So – when you've used enough loo roll (the reasons shall remain secret until you have three inners!), find some thick paper or card and either three dabs of sticky-tac or three paper clips like I did here.

Your child will draw three faces for you to cut out – however they see "worried", "thinking" and "no problem any more" (which I'm calling "solved").

It's really important your child draws them if they're old enough – and truthfully, they will know what each is, even if you can't quite tell which is which. Children just know!

You can start with Worried, bring the guy forward and ask what they're worried about.

Or you could start with Thinking and ask what the guy's thinking about so much.

Or you could even start with Solved: "What would this guy be looking so pleased about? What happened to solve their worry?"

I'm sure you can work out how to play with these little guys a bit and help your child to talk. Make it fun, and let them answer each other (your child supplying the answers, of course). Let's listen in:

"So this guy says they've worked out how to not worry in class? What do you think they'd be saying to this other worried little guy that might help?"

Or: "But this thinking guy here says it might not work because of X. What could this happy guy say back?"

"Why do you think this worried little guy might agree to try it out?"

That's a little bit of a trick, that last one. The question assumes the worried guy WILL try it out. The question merely asks WHY he's agreeing!! Maybe the happy guy looks so confident and happy?

And the good thing about all this play-acting? Your child will talk more freely because it's about these guys, not about them at all! But it goes in.

You all start the same picture on your own piece of paper – printer paper is fine. Use coloured crayons or markers. 

Set a timer for, say, 5 or 10 mins. When it bleeps (no arguments about not being finished with their own bit yet!), you swap drawings to continue the next one (if there are two of you), or pass it to the next person clockwise (if there are more).

Topics that work well include 

• a super-full flower garden, 
• a space scene, 
• a farm, 
• the beach, or 
• a city scene. 

When you receive the drawing from the other person, you first have to say something complimentary or "what you like" about what the other person has already done so far.

You then carry on for another 5 or 10 mins on the image you now have in front of you, and then pass it on again. And again. Until you all decide to finish the game. Timings will depend on the age of children you have.

The point is, no one gets to own the painting, which means no one can try to be a perfectionist with their own masterpiece.

Plus it’s good practice for socially finding something nice and truthful to say about someone else’s efforts.

It's just a bit of fun, but it’s doable at home with no need to explain why you're doing it. 

But if you did think about it, in addition to perfectionism and social skills, it dovetails nicely with issues like confidence, belonging, anxiety and doing something outside of a phone or tablet!

You could, instead, all work together on one long piece (think blank wallpaper three feet long) if you like and that, too, involves agreement as to 

• what might go where, 
• who does which bit and how, and 
• accepting all offerings with enjoyment.

Pin the result(s) up somewhere for a while. It’s a reminder of a good time well spent!

You’ve heard of that game where you draw a head on a slip of paper, fold it over and hand it to the person on your left?

Here’s a different version for when everyone’s exhausted one evening but it’s not quite time to put the children away and have some free time! Use the time profitably, discussing emotions in a fun way!

Give everyone that slip of paper. Get them to draw any single bold squiggly line on it (see left side of image below).

Pass it to their left. The person who gets it has to give it a head, an expression, arms and legs (in beautifully considered positions!) and then pass it to their left (see right side of image below).

The third person has to show this drawing to everyone and decide/say what emotion that poor person must be feeling – and why! Just a bit of fun. You can all argue. These are just example lines. Exercise your Van Gogh!

You can play a family game with the following idea from an early-ish age – at least, when children don’t mind balloons popping! Or you could use envelopes instead of balloons (see instructions) but that isn’t quite so much fun!

You need (say) 5 balloons, 5 small slips of paper (big enough to write a sentence on in writing your child can read, if they're readers), a pin or needle, and a felt marker.