Why Reasoning with Small Children Rarely Works

When confronted with children who're acting out (crying, arguing, or throwing tantrums), many parents try and talk them through it. Sometimes this approach takes the form of tough pragmatics: "I'm sorry, Sally, but that's just the way it is." Other times it can be placating, even to the point of offering rewards in return for a change in behavior: "O.K., if you stop crying right now you can have a popsickle."

Unfortunately, we parents often overlooks or skip a simple step that can make all the difference to a child. We don't stop to listen to him or her. Being the adults, we have the tendency to assume that we better understand the situation and immediately take charge in directing the interaction. What's more, we often take an overly intellectual approach to doing this. We reason with our children, even though their young minds aren't developed enough to operate in this manner.

We might reason with them by saying, "You'll have to out your toys away and get into bed. Because if you don't get a good night's sleep, you're going to be tired and cranky tomorrow." But young children have little conception of "tomorrow" anyway; they truly live in the moment, the ever-present now. They experience their emotional life the same way, too; they don't anticipate emotions like happiness or sadness occurring in the future, they simply feel them when they arise. So the children keep crying, and all our arguments do nothing but confuse them further.

Usually, all they want in these situations is our acknowledgement. They may not be able to intellectualize their emotions yet, but these intense feelings are still all that they have to work with. If they can't express them to us they'll feel separate and thus more frustrated or despondent. They want to be heard.

We could acknowledge their feelings by echoing them back: "You're really sad because you have to put the toys away." They may reply with a simple nod, and quiet down. By doing this, we aren't giving in our letting go of our own rationales. We're just communicating at a child's level, that place of direct feeling. "I know it's hard when you're having fun and you have to stop."

When we interact like this, we're not handing over our authority but just taking time to listen and let our children express themselves in the way they know how. Rationalizing their feelings away will seldom work - and it wouldn't be healthy for them if it did. Rather than trying to impress upon them our ideas of right and wrong, we can make our own judgments while still acknowledging their feelings.