Tag Archives: talking

Family Meetings

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Family meetings are times for families to come together and discuss issues that affect the household. Topics can be about anything, from school, to chores, to vacation planning. You could also hold meetings just as a way to ensure that your family spends time together on a regular basis, with no agenda to the meetings at all. Family meetings are a great way to promote open discussion between yourself and your children. Children whose families engage in regular family meetings are less likely to get into trouble, abuse drugs or alcohol, develop depression, or have poor self-esteem. Any member of … Continue reading →

Vocal Power

So… my son has figured out that he has a secret power over his parents and that power is the ability to produce a LOUD VOLUME in quiet places. He now happily talks to himself or his shadow as he plays with his toys or tries to fit something that had been discarded onto the floor into his mouth (his recent favorite is unused tissue paper). This babbling has broken into a new found vocal power that he unleashed at us while we were at church this past Sunday (while out of town). Luckily my son is cute. This stops … Continue reading →

Toddler Talk

Because my son’s name is Jake, I call his toddler speech “Jakelish” because it is part English and part something I do not understand. We joke about “Jakelish” because we can’t make out what my son is saying. “Toddler talk” can sometimes be hard to distinguish. The problem is that my son talks too fast sometimes. He doesn’t slow down to speak. He is talking, but he isn’t speaking clearly enough for us to understand him. I would consider it cause for concern except that I’ve never really been able to understand any toddler when he/she talks. I have looked … Continue reading →

Getting Kids to Talk About Things when They don’t Want to

There are times when our children desperately need to talk to us but they simply will not open up. As a concerned parent, we wonder whether we should badger and push them to talk to us, or respect their privacy and trust that they will talk to us when they are ready. Of course it depends on the child, but I think that we parents can develop skills and behaviors that can help our children to talk to us about those subjects and topics that are tough. I like to think of myself as a decent communicator and an open … Continue reading →

Finding Balance between Talking and Listening

It is no secret that one of the foundations of good parenting is communication. We have to be able to talk to our children and understand them (as well as have them understand us) in order to have any influence over them at all. It may seem as though the parent who talks the loudest and the longest would have the advantage, but being able to listen is equally important. In fact, achieving a balance between talking and listening is a good rule of thumb for any communication challenge or relationship. Listening is not just about saying “Uh huh” at … Continue reading →

What Are You Talking About?

I often wonder whether some married couples talk to each other at all. The number of times I have heard one half of a couple talking about something they’re planning or hoping to do or have done, and then find their marriage partner knows nothing about it. It’s like they exist in two different worlds and the two never meet. ‘Don’t they ever talk to each other?’ I say, as I think of the hours my husband and I spend talking about all sorts of things. And yes, many of them are probably the same things we talked about when … Continue reading →

Without the Children: Would You Have Anything Left to Talk About?

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In a recent article that I wrote I discussed how the order of priorities suggested in The Power of a Praying Wife had caught me off guard. I went into discussion about how the book tells us to put our husband before our children. After much thought on the subject, I realized that the statement is true. After posting the article, I received a reader comment from Dale. Her comment once again got my wheels to spinning. In her comment she remarked about how when children are put first, there is nothing left when they move out and leave home. … Continue reading →

Foster Discussions and Keep Communication Open

Have you ever had one of those stretches where you were so busy and distracted that it dawned on you that it had been a couple days since you really sat down and talked with your child? When this happens we get filled with guilt and remorse and wonder how on earth we could let such a thing happen… As busy single parents, we really have to make the extra effort to foster discussions with our kids–the older the children get and the more busy we all become, the harder it can be to carve out the time to chat. … Continue reading →

I am NOT the Same Parent I Used to Be

Just as my children have grown and changed over the years, I know that I too have changed quite a bit. Sure, there are some core values that have remained but parenting has changed me. Other life adventures have had their way with my personality and personal skills as well, but I think it is important to acknowledge that I am so not the same parent I started out as all those years ago. I think we have a tendency to think that our children have changed and we have “always been the same” or that when we reach adulthood, … Continue reading →

Talk Softly…And They Might Listen

For some reason, we parents have a tendency to think that if we just talk louder or get “more up in their face” our kids might actually hear us and respond. I have found just the opposite to be true. If I can stay calm and talk softly and surely, my kids are much more likely to listen and stay open and receptive than if I rant and yell and get forceful with them. Many years ago, my sister-in-law shared with me that she had discovered that instead of nagging, if she quietly asked her kids to do something, and … Continue reading →