Giving too many commands

If you are giving commands all day, you are annoying your children and teaching your children to ignore you.

Parents give commands all day long. Come eat, get ready, get your jacket, hurry up, let’s go, behave, put your stuff away, get a shower, do good in school, be nice, go change your clothes, be home by dark, ..you get the idea.

Imagine if this was how it was in the adult world? Imagine going to your friends house and all he or she did was bark commands at you…sit down, sit still, stop talking, be polite, eat your food, use your napkin, answer your phone, stop texting, etc…that would be annoying.

If parents think about how they would feel in an adult world being the recipient of the same strategies. Children feel the same way about this command giving, and it is understandable why children become annoyed.

Of course adults do not communicate that way with one another, because adults assume or know that other adults know or will figure out what they need to do. . So why do adults communicate with children this way? Do parents think children cannot figure things out? And how are children supposed to learn?

Ultimately the responsibility of the parent is to teach their children how to think and make good decisions. Right? If parents give a command or tell a child what to do, they are not allowing or training their children to think. When you tell a child what to do it does not allow the child an opportunity to think for him or herself and figure out what they need to do.

Giving commands is just one negative way of trying to get children to do what parents want. Parents always ask “well how in the world do we get our children to do what we want without telling them what to do?” Parents must consider the objective and be smarter. Parents are trying to motivate a child to do something that is in the best interest of the child or the parent.

It is natural for people to dislike being told what to do so it is natural for children to not like being told what to do. Children will learn to ignore their parents or at least ignore the command.

Yes children need guidance and explanations about what to do at times, but there are thousands of interactions each day when a child could just be given information and they could easily choose what to do.

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