How to Actively Listen to Your Child

One of the most difficult tasks, when it comes to children, is learning to communicate effectively with them. In fact, a good majority of the time, we may feel as though the child is not listening to us. However, the fact is, the child may feel just as frustrated with adults, because they feel the adult is not truly listening to them. Sometimes, we as adults forget to actively listen to our children.

In order to be a successful parent, it's critical we learn to hone our listening and communication skills with our children. We, as parents, can sometimes forget that we should set aside some time every day for our children. The time should be used to have a heart to heart conversation with our children. It's important during this conversation, that you listen attentively to your child, not just speak. Remember, just because they are children doesn't mean how they feel, what they think, and what they express are insignificant. We need to ensure the child feels that we truly believe everything mentioned above has worth and meaning to us.

Human nature seems to dominate us when it comes to interacting with our children. We tend to react to what they say or feel, instead of actively listening and responding to it. Our own experiences, both past and present, tend to be what we rely on when dealing with our children. What is needed is to let our children express themselves in an open and safe way to us; without us being prejudiced or judgmental. Most important, when dealing with our children, we need to let them express themselves to us without fear of negative repercussions.

If a child is expressing themselves to us and we merely react to what they are saying, we are delivering the wrong message to them. We are unintentionally communicating to them, that what they have to say is unimportant and irrelevant to us. By actively listening, then thoughtfully responding to the child, while they are communicating to us, we are helping our children get a sense of self worth. If we take the time to actively engage the conversation by asking questions about why our child feels how they do it allows our child to explore and communicate their feelings better to us. It also enables us to practice our active listening skills.

It also gives us, as parents, a deeper understanding of who our child really is. Actively listening and thoughtfully responding gives us more of an opportunity to help our children work out and solve problems. In fact, it can enable us to help our children with problems they may have bottled up and not been able to resolve themselves. Your children will also be glad that you can empathize with them and truly understand them on a deeper basis.

During these conversations with your child, you must absolutely make certain they get your full attention with no distractions. Actively listening takes a full effort on our part. Don't try to engage your child in conversation while reading the paper, watching television, doing housework, or while on the computer. It's essential that we make full eye contact with our children while actively listening and engaging in conversation with them. Stay calm while they speak. Don't interrupt or pass judgment. Ask probing questions when necessary. Watch the tone of your voice. By doing these things, it will be a lot easier to help your child with the problem. Don't let emotions rule the conversation

Another critical point is to make sure you allow your children to express themselves even when they are upset. It's usually our tendency to not allow our children to get upset, angry, or frustrated. We usually want to divert our children from this behavior. However, this can be a damaging thing to do on our part. It's important to focus on why the child is acting out or why they feel the way they do, not the bad behavior. Truly listen to them, ask probing questions. This probably can be one of the hardest things for us as parents to do. It's imperative we work on this skill. If we can effectively employ this tactic, we will be able to offer our children solutions and alleviate bad feelings instead of inadvertently causing the child to bottle up their emotions, and in turn, causing more damage.

We can't underestimate the feelings and experiences of our children just because they are children. When we actively listen and engage in conversation with our children it sends a signal to them that we truly care. We can help them solve their problems, by letting them know they're not alone, by actively listening. Of course we have experiences we can share with them as well. The most important things are to actively listen and to respond to them, not react to them.