“Just tell me the truth,” is a phrase any parent anywhere will at more than one point utter to their children. Yet when the child you’re saying this to is a mere 3 or 4 years old, you realize you’re not quite sure how to define “being honest” to him. On top of that, you have a dawning realization that this is a crucial moment in your parenting journey. It’s no longer just about fulfilling basic needs and oohing and ahhing over this sweet baby, but helping to shape the person your child is going to become. (Gulp).
So that begs the question, how do you explain the concept of truth and honesty to a toddler/preschooler?
If you'd like the answer to that question, I direct you to my latest article. The truth about teaching honesty to kids.
I vividly recall the first time I had a conversation with my daughter, urging her to tell me the truth. For the most part she's an extremely cautious girl and this translates into almost every area of her life, including things that have the potential to get her in trouble. However, in this instance the 'kid' beat out the 'caution.'
She had colored on her closet doors. Wanting to give her the chance to tell me the truth, I asked her if she had done this. I could see the wheels turning as she weighed the consequences of admitting she had done this versus pretending she had no idea how those crazy scribbles had wound up on her closet door. She tried to talk her away around it at first claiming ignorance...You know, in the way a 4-year-old might. At that point I was throwing around this unknown word, "truth" at her. "I just want you to tell me the truth honey. I won't be mad if you tell me the truth. I just want to know what happened and then we can talk about what to do."
She still wasn't quite sure what road she wanted to take, but eventually told me what happened. We had ourselves a nice conversation and she got the task of attempting to clean it up, but it left me thinking...How do you explain truth and honesty to kids in a way that makes sense. Obviously it's something that needs to be taught, but how...
Only after I saw an episode of Special Agent Oso, which talked about breaking down honesty in three simple steps did I dust off this thought and decide to put it into an article. So there you have it, our first venture into truth telling and honesty and what led to a breakdown of keeping it real for your kids in having these conversations.
So that begs the question, how do you explain the concept of truth and honesty to a toddler/preschooler?
If you'd like the answer to that question, I direct you to my latest article. The truth about teaching honesty to kids.
I vividly recall the first time I had a conversation with my daughter, urging her to tell me the truth. For the most part she's an extremely cautious girl and this translates into almost every area of her life, including things that have the potential to get her in trouble. However, in this instance the 'kid' beat out the 'caution.'
She had colored on her closet doors. Wanting to give her the chance to tell me the truth, I asked her if she had done this. I could see the wheels turning as she weighed the consequences of admitting she had done this versus pretending she had no idea how those crazy scribbles had wound up on her closet door. She tried to talk her away around it at first claiming ignorance...You know, in the way a 4-year-old might. At that point I was throwing around this unknown word, "truth" at her. "I just want you to tell me the truth honey. I won't be mad if you tell me the truth. I just want to know what happened and then we can talk about what to do."
She still wasn't quite sure what road she wanted to take, but eventually told me what happened. We had ourselves a nice conversation and she got the task of attempting to clean it up, but it left me thinking...How do you explain truth and honesty to kids in a way that makes sense. Obviously it's something that needs to be taught, but how...
Only after I saw an episode of Special Agent Oso, which talked about breaking down honesty in three simple steps did I dust off this thought and decide to put it into an article. So there you have it, our first venture into truth telling and honesty and what led to a breakdown of keeping it real for your kids in having these conversations.
RSS Feed
