How To Teach Child Respect? The 10 Steps Guide
What influences us the most? To me, its human behavior, specially when it’s rude and disrespectful.
What if it comes from your child? Will you accept that kind of behavior? Would you want your child to be considered as disrespectful in front of others? Of course not!
With that concern, it’s important to know how to teach child respect.
Parenting may seem difficult, but putting efforts in all parenting tasks is worth the results. Children learn from us, from the surrounding. If they lack respect, the pointer will be put on your nose. To not let you feel down ever in your life, follow the steps shown below.
How To Teach Child Respect
1. Simmer down
The most important thing to remember when you are teaching respect to a child is calmness.
Once my seven-year-old champ was playing with his ball in the bedroom. He was making a banging sound continuously while I was working on my laptop.
I told him once, twice, thrice and kept saying to stop playing there. Instead, suggested if he can go out to play.
But he didn’t listen to a single word. I was yelling, screaming while working on my laptop, but he didn’t answer me.
And the ball hit the screen. My irritation level raised so high, I couldn’t control myself. I scolded him, yelled at him, but he left the room.
Then I realized I didn’t even make eye contact with him to give instruction. Secondly, I was continuously screaming and didn’t understand that he enjoyed playing with the ball. I could have been kinder. My words could have been polite but the anger didn’t leave any space for tolerance in the room.
When you will learn to respect the child, you will know how to explain respect to a child.
2. Determine the cause
Whenever you feel something inappropriate about the behavior of your child, you need to communicate with them. The communication can be carried positively.
The child may absorb some abusive words or disrespectful habits when around different groups which will reflect in his day-to-day life but it is you who has to keep a track of his language.
Children are innocents. Your child may not even realize the meaning of the words he uses. The other kids influence his behavior and communication style. If you keep up with him, aware him with their meanings, explain him nicely and calmly he may stop using them. Plus, you will come to know the root cause of the language or the behavior.
3. Respect Your Child
Give respect to take respect. You can help your child to be respectful by creating an atmosphere of respect at home. There are many ways to show respect to the child, here are some –
1. Allow your child to make choices
Children have a tender mindset. They do not sometimes like the things forcefully asked them to do. You can ask your child to select clothes from his wardrobe, you can ask him about his favorite dish and cook it for him once a week. Your child will learn self-respect from this and also about his rights in the future.
2. Listen
Sometimes we are so busy that we look over their work. We don’t invest our energy in acknowledging their efforts or listening to what they may have to say.
Sometimes we even respond with irritation. This irritation will make him grow with the mindset that there are hardly good listeners, and he doesn’t have to be a good listener if nobody listens to him.
One of the ways to teach a child respect is listening to all his stuff, his ideas, his feelings.
3. Use good manners when interacting with your child.
By showing grace and courtesy to your child, you inculcate the habit of good manners in him. He will own the value of self-respect and also learn the proper way to treat people.
4. Earn, Not Demand Respect
In our culture we always want our child to be obedient. He must follow instructions and do everything what we want him to do.
Do you know there is much difference between being obedient and being respectful? When you say do like this, speak like this, live like this, somehow you want your child to obey you. Let him understand why you want him to do so? Explain to him its importance.
He definitely gets your point and behaves accordingly, you will attain a peaceful parenting approach and earn respect from your child.
5. Avoid Comparison
An old saying, “Comparison is a thief of joy”. By confronting your child in any way to his peers, you don’t only spoil his joy but also raise a disrespectful child.
Why this is so? Because the child ends up feeling left or depressed. By doing this, you will break his self-confidence. He might start behaving aggressively and also start avoiding you. Alternatively, help your child to cope up with his frailty. You will share an ultimate bond with your child by doing this.
Definitely he will adore you and it will help him to become a respectful child.
6. Discuss Disrespect With Your Child
Most of the time discourteous behavior result in an immediate consequence. What you need to do is, come in response only after identifying the seriousness of the matter.
Always leave a calm-down corner between you and your child. Do not try to inflict any kind of punishment, sorry but it will never help you to reach your goal. Teach him effective communication skills and flourish a healthy parent-child relationship.
7. Apologize For Mistakes
It’s okay to be frustrated and upset sometimes, just remember that how you respond to those feelings isn’t okay always. Explain the reason to your child that why you react like this? Try to make a positive connection with the child.
By confessing your mistake you can make your child learn how to react when he does something wrong. Also, he will learn that it’s okay to make mistakes but how to cope up with its circumstances in the future.
8. Demand Good Manners
Commencement of good manners is to show respect to another person. Teaching good manners requires nothing but it can help you to conquer everything.
In any manner, do not accept rude behavior from your child. Otherwise, he will form a habit of behaving disrespectfully. Use positive language with your child, also you can instruct them in a good manner by showing it to them before only.
For example, before going out for dinner, you can tell him about table manners. He will understand it and behave accordingly. Sometimes children don’t even know that they are doing something wrong, it’s not their fault, right?
We should always try to help our child to learn the particular things before scolding them at any situation.
9. Don’t Take Child Behavior Personally
Parenting is a beautiful phase, where we learn to balance between thinking and feeling. Eventually both are important and do not let your feelings to control your actions
Children unknowingly push buttons to generate frustration in us. It’s a challenging part of our parenting journey to not take the child’s behavior personally.
What you need to do is in such a situation? Focus on your child’s action, not his feelings. Try to communicate with him and make sure he understands avoiding such conduct in the future.
10. Acknowledge Your Child’s Effort
Your child always wants your approval first in anything. Appreciate and motivate him to do better if he is trying really hard to achieve something. Its important to recognize his efforts and guide him.
When you comprehend his work whether it’s his academics or other activities, he will feel proud of himself and feel motivated to try harder next time.
Final thought
Simple tips and tricks are talked over in the above article, I can understand it’s not easy to achieve all but you can try to follow it one by one and improve your relationship with your child. Your child will respect you more and your family life will become peaceful and enjoyable.
Well, what else you want your child to learn? Leave us in the comments.
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This article shows you ways to teach children respect and strengthen your relationship with your kids. They are not easy, but they will help you raise respectful children and create a happy family.