Setting Early Childhood Expectations

In early childhood, setting positive expectations takes some extra effort and creativity. A universal challenge for parents is having well-behaved and cooperative children while in public places. A helpful strategy is to speak with young children before entering a store about your positive expectations of their behavior while in the store. You could say something like, “Mommy needs to go into the store and it will go more quickly if we work together. So I expect that you will have a cooperative attitude in the store and, if you cooperate with me for the whole shopping trip, I will clap for you when we get back into the car.” You will be amazed at how your children will rise to the occasion to hear you say, “Well done…I’m proud of you…thank you for helping me.” (You can even have them help you cross items off of your shopping list or find things to take off of the shelves to place in the cart.)

Enlisting your child’s “help” in this way also communicates “we’re in this family-thing together.” Asking your child to help you builds their confidence and gives them a sense of value in the family. Another way to increase your children’s sense of value in the family is to entrust them with more chores as they grow. Young children of three or four years old are capable of unloading the silverware from the dishwasher or setting the table for a meal. If children have a sense of belonging firmly established at home, they will be less likely to go looking for it in other places – like the “in” crowd – when they are older.

Additionally, young children often feel powerless over themselves or their environment which leads to frustration and misbehavior. One way to prevent some of this frustration is to give them choices in some of the decisions in their life. One easy example is to lay out two outfits for them to wear and allow them to choose one. Another is to give them two choices of what to eat for breakfast or for lunch. While these may seem like simplistic scenarios, over time the skill of making wise choices is gradually built by expanding the options in number or weightiness as our children grow and mature. If we never teach our children to make responsible choices throughout childhood, why would we expect them to all of a sudden make responsible choices as teens?

Finally, chose to begin speaking with your children at a young age about how much you are looking forward to their teen years. For example, saying, “We know that we’re going to have a great time together as a family as you grow and become teenagers” is a great place to start. Setting positive expectations early in life will make all the difference in how your family functions when hormones rage and attitudes strike. Next time we’ll look at principles for the pre-teen years that will build on this foundation of great expectations