Blog for parenting issues and techniques

Podcast 14 - Chores - Why and How

6/24/2020

THE AUDIO PODCAST IS AVAILABLE HERE: LISTEN

I’ve had quite a few people asking me about chores – how to set them up, do you pay for them, how much do you pay, is allowance tied to chores, do I need chore charts with rewards, what do I do if my kid won’t do their chores. In this podcast I want to address all those issues and more. Chores let your kids develop life skills that, if taught well, will launch them into a good place in life. I’ll start with the research behind why chores are important and then I’ll get into the nitty-gritty of how to implement chores with kids of various ages.

First, the research…

Research shows that kids who do chores grow into happier, healthier, far more successful adults, and the sooner parents start them on them, the better off they are. There have been two ground-breaking studies looking at success and correlations with behavior and upbringing. One is the Harvard Grant Study which gathered data on individuals over 75 years and the other is a University of Minnesota study looking at individuals over 20 years. Both published a ton of results in 2015. Here are some brief observations I want to highlight for you:

It starts young: The best predictor of success in young adulthood, on measures related to education completion, career path, and personal relationships, was whether they had begun doing chores at an early age — as young as 3 or 4.
Professional success – doing chores was significantly correlated with academic and career success but there are even indications that early chores were linked to higher IQs.
Relationship skills - “A kid who learns early to do chores will be a more generous and cooperative partner. It’s easier to live and work with a person who has learned to take care of his or her own stuff and to be responsible for some of the boring work that adult and family life requires.” Chores teach kids vital relationship skills like cooperation, teamwork, and respect for others. I bet we all know someone in college who was the biggest slob and thoughtless roommate ever - never picked up after themselves, didn’t do the dishes, left the counter dirty and disgusting after cooking. Yuck.
Mental Heath - researchers found that participation in chores as children was a better predictor for mental health in adulthood than social class and family conflict.
Organization, Time Management and delayed gratification - Kids who do chores learn to organize their time and to delay gratification. Both of those are vital skills for later success. If you have to do the dishes before playing video games and your friends are playing at 7pm then you’d better get those dishes done before then. Having to fit in chores forces kids learn to manage their time. Julie Lythcott-Haims who wrote the book How to Raise an Adult said, “While it can be tempting to give kids a pass on busy homework nights real life is going to require them to do all of these things. When they're at a job, there might be times that they have to work late, but they'll still have to go grocery shopping and do the dishes."

Taking Time for Chores

In the Harvard Grant Study, researchers identified two things that people need in order to be happy and successful: The first? Love. The second? Work ethic.

What's the best way to develop work ethic in young people? Based on high-achievers who were part of the study there's a consensus of what gave them a good work ethic - A "pitch-in" mindset. This is a mindset that says, there's some unpleasant work, someone's got to do it, it might as well be me ... that's what gets you ahead in the workplace.

The drawback we have as parents, however, is that having our kids do chores doesn't necessarily wind up being less work for us, does it? It takes more time to teach our kids to do chores and to do them well instead of just doing the chores ourselves. How many of us look forward to nagging our kids and reminding them day after day to do their chores away? Now that we know the benefits of doing chores for the long-term, let’s take a close look at the practical side of what we can do to help us arrange for chores in our households.

PRACTICAL SIDE OF CHORES

To Pay or Not to Pay For Chores

I want to start by addressing one major issue - should we pay for chores. I firmly believe we shouldn’t. A family is a unit of people who need each other and love each other. It takes work to take care of a family and there’s no reason why kids can’t learn at an early age that pitching in is just something they need to do. Remember that life skill we learned about earlier? The “pitching in” skill? We do need to set up chores with love and encouragement though instead of nagging and threats.

When we pay our kids for chores, they start to think that if they don’t get paid then they don’t have to work. Or, if they don’t need the money, then they don’t need to do the chores either. They become workers for hire and not contributing family members. We threaten to withhold money when they aren’t done and this shouldn’t be about money, it should be about pitching in.

I do want to say that I believe in giving kids an allowance as a means to learn about handling money but it should be separate from chores. Teaching kids about money is so important actually that I’ll do separate podcast soon on it so stay tuned for that.

By Age

To help you on the practical side of things, I’m going to go over my recommendations for chores by age. I’m going to give you some basic examples but after you’re done listening feel free to visit my PARENTING DECODED Pinterest board on Kids Chores.

For kids 2-3 years
You want to start young. Yep, really young. I’d start as early as two. Richard Bromfield who wrote the book How to Unspoil Your Child Fast put it nicely, “When kids are really young, they want to help you rake leaves or prepare dinner. Take those opportunities to let kids help. Those moments are infused with love and connection. By the time they're older and really able to do [those tasks] competently, they've lost interest." Cape diem! Seize the day! A 2 or 3-year-old helping to sweep the back porch, dust the book shelves, or make a snack in the kitchen with a parent is a happy kid. When they grow up and inevitably have to accomplish these things, they’re less likely to rail against them if you started early and naturally.

What can a 2 or 3-year-old do?

Pick up toys
Wipe up spills
Dust
Clear places at meal times
Help put away groceries
Sort recycling
Put dirty clothes in laundry

For 4-6 year-olds you start to move into chores that are more helpful and they can learn to do these without you but still aren’t too hard.

Make their bed
Sort laundry and put away clothes
Feed pet
Set the table
Make a small snack or help with dinner
Pull weeds
Water plants
Vacuum
Sweep porch

For 7-9 years there is LOTS they can do.

Get themselves out of bed in the morning
Make lunch for school
Do their laundry or at least fold it
Cook a simple meal
Load/unload dishwasher
Clean up after the dog
Clean the bathroom
Take out the trash

For 10-18 and beyond

Do all of their own laundry
Mow the lawn
Cook a complete meal
Wash the car
Mop the floors
Babysit
Help with younger children
Basic home repairs (light bulbs, dust a fan using a ladder, tighten loose screws)

Older kids Starting Chores Ideas

I want to talk now to families with older kids who haven’t been doing chores or almost no chores yet. I’m mostly talking about families with teens or tweens but if you have elementary kids who aren’t doing chores this can be helpful to you as well.

If you have kids in this category, it will be a huge adjustment for them, that’s for sure. Our society has transitioned to valuing homework more than teamwork so we’ve given our kids a “pass” when it comes to contributing and they’re likely to resist your efforts to get them to contribute.

For starters, I am going to give you the number one chore you need to have your teen or tween start doing right now. It only involves them. If they don’t do this chore, it only hurts them – not you, not the rest of the family, not even the family dog or cat. What is it? LAUNDRY.

Set up a Family Meeting and announce that starting in one week you’ll allow your children to do their own laundry whenever they’d like as long as you’re not using the machines yourself. You allow them to choose when to have a lesson on how to use the washer and dryer. You also let them know that once they are trained, they are responsible for using the appliances appropriately or paying for the repairs. Lovingly let them know that you will always provide soap and answer specialty questions that arise but their laundry will now be their laundry.

Then, you implement this. Things might get stinky in their rooms. Just shut the door. They need to take care of themselves and this is the perfect life skill and chore for them to own. Some parents think they’ll waste water but that is much less likely than them not cleaning their clothes often enough.

Here’s what else you need to do: no yelling, no reminding or nagging. If you have an athlete, all the more reason to get them in the groove early. They might come to realize they need more underwear to stretch out washings to once a week or once every two weeks. Great! Let them buy more underwear! They can use their own money. If they dye a load of laundry pink because they didn’t separate their colors correctly, let them wear pink or replace things with their own money. If your child won’t fold their laundry, won’t put it away? Don’t lift a finger. Let them wear wrinkled clothes. Let them figure out what is clean and what is dirty. Just stay away. Assist them by answering questions by all means, just don’t do their laundry.

Ok, feeling better? Do you think you can get that one implemented at your house? Good! This laundry chore will get you on a path toward where you really want to be, getting them more involved in chores around the house. So, what’s next?

Here’s what I did with my boys when they hit middle school. This process I’m going to describe takes a bit of time to implement but I really think it is worth the effort. It absolutely was for me.

Start by taking a piece of binder paper and taping it to the fridge in your kitchen. Every day, many times a day, write the chores that everyone in the family does on the list. Take about two weeks to write all the chores so that you get a really good cross section of things that need getting done. Add pages as they get full. I told my boys about the list and encouraged them to write down their chores if they didn’t see them on the list but it was a list of all our chores, not just theirs.

What was on the list? Grocery shopping, driving kids to school, making breakfast, lunch and dinner, paying bills, earning the money to pay the bills, vacuuming, planting the garden, making beds, cleaning the dishes, setting the table, etc. Our list was about three pages long in the end.

Next, organize the list into categories – daily (making beds, setting the table), weekly (taking garbage bins to the street, combing the cat), monthly (clean their bathroom) and random (changing light bulbs, refilling TP, washing the car). I happen to put all mine into a spreadsheet so I could more easily manipulate them and add columns for who will do each chore but do whatever works for you.

Last step, have a Family Meeting and brainstorm who does what. True confession, the first time I did this I hadn’t categorized by daily/weekly/monthly and it was a disaster. I had to re-think my process and hold another Family Meeting a few days later which is what I’m describing now. Haha… you can learn from my mistakes!

My kids had already had chores but this magic list showed them that mom happened to be doing LOTS of the chores with dad in second place. I was a stay-at-home mom at the time so it wasn’t all that surprising.
For their daily chores I just asked before school for two simple things in their rooms –straighten up their beds and open their blinds. I love light in my house and I really wanted that help. They agreed it seemed reasonable. They had other daily chores but those were my wins by doing this.

For their weekly chores, they got to decide when they did them – which days worked best in their busy schedules. This is where using choices was key. I wanted them done, they could say when! They also chose that some chores they would own and others would rotate. It seemed that neither wanted to clean the litter boxes for our cats so they rotated that one with taking the garbage bins to the street. I was flexible! It didn’t matter to me when, just that they helped.

I also had commitment from my husband and boys that if I cooked, they’d clean the dinner dishes. We would all take our plates over to the counter but then one boy would help dad wash the pots and load the dishwasher and the other one was responsible for cleaning up the leftovers and counters. Again, choices! I could chill while they happily picked their after-dinner music and cleaned up. It never took more than 15 minutes. This again was a chore I used to pretty much do all by myself and not always happily. Another win!

However, my real coupe, if you ask me, came when I showed them the “random” list of jobs, the ones that don’t have a schedule. It had about 40 jobs on it. I was pretty much doing most of the 40 jobs and they all could see that now. Before we created this list, they had no idea how long it was. I asked them to each pick 4 jobs from the list. I didn’t care which ones, just pick and be responsible. Their eyes lit up. Only four! Wow! That’s a steal! They were expecting 15 or something. While that doesn’t seem quite fair in some ways to me, I was thrilled to have one son now be the permanent light-bulb-changer and the other the toilet-paper-refiller and foaming-soap-refiller.

I can’t even remember the other ones but it was awesome. Just the week before we did this list I had asked one of my sons to replace a lightbulb. They had no interest whatsoever especially since we had high ceilings and a lot of them needed a ladder to get to. Well, the very next week after the new jobs were selected, I got 4 light bulbs changed from a happy teen. Yep! He smiled and just went off to change them.

I encourage you all to make your list and get buy-in for some assistance. Chores are good for your kids even if they won’t admit it.

Chore Charts, Chore Jars and Chore Events

Next, I’m going to talk about how you might track and set up the chores. There are quite a few clever ways I’ve been researching that parents accomplish getting their kids to know what chores to do - chore charts, chore jars and chore days or mornings.

Chore Charts – a simple chart that has chores listed and maybe the days of the week. You can use a marker or stickers that the child can show they are done with a chore. Simple. Some families collect stars and give a reward but since rewards are kinda like paying for chores I’m not all that keen on rewards, just charts for tracking what’s to be done. If your child can’t read, by all means use pictures. If your child is older, have Family Meetings to discuss what chores will be done by whom and when. The more choices you can give your kids over chores, the more ownership they will have in completing them.

Chore jars - I love some of the Pinterest ideas where you take popsicle sticks and write all the chores on them and put them in a jar. Each person in the family can then pick a stick, do the job and then put it in the “completed” jar when they’re done. Have different jars for different ages if you need to. Be creative!

Chore days or mornings - Some families pick one day on the weekend, maybe Saturday morning, where they all do chores together. A list is posted that morning of what needs to be done and everyone pitches in until they are all completed.

Consequences for Not Doing Chores

Let’s move on. We might agree on the concept of chores but what if our kids won’t do them without lots of nagging and threats? We need to stop nagging and threatening. I need you to go back and listen to Podcast #10 on how to set up good consequences. Using the Love and Logic® technique called Energy Drain that those of you who came to a class learned, as well as setting some good limits as to what will happen if chores aren’t done, is the direction you need to head in. If you don’t know the Energy Drain technique I’ll put a link to the audio you can download it from Love and Logic®.

When kids are younger a simple limit stated positively like: “Anyone who has finished their chores is welcome to sit down at the dinner table.” Or “I read books to kids who have put their clothes in their hamper.” These work really well for little ones. For snarky teens and tweens you might need something more like, “Gee, it really drains my energy to see all those dishes sitting in the sink. What are you going to do to put my energy back?” If they refuse, just like I describe in Podcast #10, the next day might look like: “I drive kids to school or soccer practice who have put my energy back.” Or, “I allow kids to use electronics who’ve put my energy back.” You need to keep calm and you need to not nag or yell. I know it can be hard but, believe me, if you’re consistent, your kids will trust that you mean what you say.

I do want to cover one more advanced concept that worked great for my own boys. I never yelled or nagged about doing chores. I let it be known that I’d be happy to do any chore for them and I posted a list of charges on my kitchen bulletin board. It was only $20 for me to take the garbage bins to the street, $5 to refill TP and $10 to comb the cat. Everything had a price. I collected my charges once a month from the pink note cards that went on the bulletin board to track when I did a job for them. It allowed me to be a happy mom and they got to be responsible since they didn’t like giving me their money. This whole setup I’ll explain in a future podcast on how to teach kids about money but for now put prices on things. I also bargained to take down a pink card if they did one of my jobs. I was flexible! I’d even tell you to feel free to post what you’ll pay kids to do your chores if they want to earn money as well.

Did I give you enough practical ideas on how to get some chores done at your house? I hope I haven’t overwhelmed you. Realizing that our kids need chores is what I hope I’ve accomplished here. Let your kids grow and experience real life, get them out of the academic and performance-oriented bubble our society has been forcing them in to. Help create humans who care to pitch in and understand that life isn’t all about them; it’s about creating a loving environment where we can work to solve problems together.

I loved how Julie Lycott-Haims wrote in her book, How to Raise an Adult, “By making them do chores -- taking out the garbage, doing their own laundry -- they realize I have to do the work of life in order to be part of life. It's not just about me and what I need in this moment."

Here's the link to PINTEREST KIDS CHORE BOARD

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Podcast 13 - Anger Managment for Parents

6/7/2020

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THE AUDIO PODCAST IS AVAILABLE HERE:   LISTEN

Wow. What a week. Writing this podcast has sure been a journey in tough times. First, COVID-19 hits in March. I’ve been blessed to have ventured into podcasting so that there’s a way I can still come into your lives. Now, in June, with #blacklivesmatter, our nation is being rocked by anger and fear. It’s overwhelming. In this episode I’m going to talk about the anger in our own homes that we have that gets directed at our children and some ideas for how we can get it under control.

I know anger isn’t helpful, caring and thoughtful action is helpful. Being cool, calm-headed, and working together is what can move us forward as a nation but also as families. Today I’m going to start in your home and deal with the anger your precious, adorable children bring out in you when they don’t obey, won’t listen, when they argue with you or when they fight with each other. Your kids manage to push your buttons so easily when you’re tired or in a rush, right? Some days you’re the epitome of amazing parenting and then the next day you’re on your knees with anger and frustration at your kids and yourself. It’s exhausting.

ANGER - COMPLICATIONS
I want to talk about how anger and threats create certain complications in our homes that we might not be expecting - an atmosphere of fear and children who become followers or rebels.

1 – Fear
First, when we use anger and threats with our kids, I’m mostly talking about yelling but some parents don’t yell but they certainly still get angry, they just don’t yell. We might grit our teeth and say “Do that right now”. It’s still intimidating even if it’s not loud. When talking about parenting types the Helicopter is the nagger but the Drill Sergeant is the yeller/teller type. They tell their kids what to do and expect immediate obedience; if there isn’t, then there are consequences mostly using fear and intimidation. Don’t get me wrong, I firmly believe in consequences but they need to be delivered in a fashion that will be impactful for the long term. Listen to Podcast #10 for more on that if you haven’t yet.

2 – Followers
But, you do it because anger works! Certainly, it does. Intimidation and being more powerful than your child works in your favor especially in the early years when you are physically bigger than they are and they are completely dependent on you. But, how do you feel when someone yells at you? Ever had a boss yell at you? Did it make you feel good? Did it make you want to be around that person?

When I was working in hi-tech myself and some of my staff were in a meeting with a top VP who totally blasted one of his direct reports in front of 15 other people. It made me cringe. I was shocked and appalled. If this happened to you, most likely, you felt small and stupid. It might have made you want to hide. I know when my dad would yell, we would all want to scram as fast as we could. He wouldn’t listen to us even if we had a defense. He shut down our feelings and minds just like that VP did.

Some of us fall into Drill Sergeant mode when we get angry and frustrated. This is when we want to yell and tell our kids what to do and we will yell louder and longer if our message isn’t being heard. When I talk to live audiences about Drill Sergeants, I ask them who wants to raise a child who is a follower. How about you? Are you wanting to raise a follower? Of course not, our society is always telling us to raise leaders. We need leaders. We need GOOD leaders. And here you are, you might be raising a follower without even realizing it.
As you yell or firmly tell your child what to do and how to do it, you shut down communication and their brains. They aren’t encouraged to think for themselves, just to obey you. They will FOLLOW you out of fear. That’s not what we want. We want them to THINK with their brains and know how to use their brains to fix things when stuff happens that isn’t right. We need to communicate with them and allow them to problem solve and brainstorm with us, not go sit in a corner pouting or crying by themselves because we’re mean and yelled at them. If you want to raise a leader let’s take anger out of the equation for raising your kids.

NO THINKING
I’ve talked about brain science in a few of my other podcasts #2 probably has the most details.   When we are angry, our brain is in “fight and flight” mode. This is true for our kids’ brains but also for your own brain. If we need to guide our families, we need to use the thinking part of our brains, our prefrontal cortex. I want to talk about ways to keep out of fight-and-flight and what to do if you do get there.

ANGER RELIEF
Assuming you recognize that you sometimes lose your temper, here are a few ways you can stem the tide.
First, acknowledge you’re angry. When you feel your body start to tense up and you start to go up what my good friend who is an MFT calls “anger mountain”, you need to embrace that feeling as it goes up your spine or face. Once you can feel that feeling coming on, get some help to diffuse it. I’m going to give you a few ideas of help you can use in your own home but if you have a major issue with anger, please get professional help or email me and I’ll be happy to connect you with appropriate resources.

1 – Enlist your spouse or significant other, if you have one

This can work two ways – giving your spouse a signal or your spouse giving you a signal.
When things are calm, set aside time with your spouse to work out a signally system. If one of you sees or hears the other getting angry or yelling, use the agreed upon signal to help them recognize they are losing it. I want to encourage a signal that doesn’t sound like “Hey, quit yelling. You’re upset, go outside and cool off.” While that may sound helpful even if it’s in a nice tone of voice, I want to suggest just using a phrase that signals “Hey, honey, I can tell your getting upset. I’ll take over. You go calm down.” Without saying all those words. In my house we tried something verbal for a while like “Gee, honey, I think the cat’s water dish needs new water.” Or it could be where you physically signal by pulling on your ear or patting your head. The point your signal will convey the message without further irritating the situation.

I love signals like this. My husband and I developed one many years ago to help deal with my I getting really nervous when my husband would tailgate, especially at high speed. Now, he’s a good driver, and it doesn’t happen that often but when he used to do it I would verbally say “Honey, slow down! You’re not using the 3 second rule.” “Or, it’s not a 1 second rule, it’s a 3 second rule.” And he’d snap back getting irritated with me nagging him again, wanting me to chill out. Both of us would be angry and annoyed, not understanding each other’s point of view. Not a win-win situation at all and we didn’t even have kids creating this tension.

Well, we had a heart-to-heart one day while not in the car when both of our brains were calm. I explained my point of view and how it really scared me and he explained how it kept sounding like he was a bad driver. We both agreed to use a signal and no words in the future. I gently tap him on the knee when I feel uncomfortable, he knows I love him and I’m scared and he has time to react without getting defensive. It’s been amazing. I know it’s not a parenting situation but I think you get the drift; communication can lead to real progress in relationships.

You and your spouse need to come up with something like a knee tap. I really think a “no word” option is better than even the cat water bowl words. I’d suggest maybe even having a teddy bear or a blue card or a pack of gum that you just hand each other that says all those words without saying anything verbally, an “I got your back” secret signal.

2 – Enlist your kids

This next idea is to recruit your entire family to help get yelling and anger under control. Have a way that ANYONE in the family can signal “warning, anger erupting!” without using words. Some families might use a card – red, blue, one with a bird or a dog on it. Other families might have teddy bear, doesn’t matter as long as everyone knows and agrees on what the signal means. The person who receives it needs to have some calm down time. It’s not a punishment but a loving encouragement.

In order to enlist your kids in helping get your temper under control, you’d have to have a family meeting to brainstorm how to make it happen. You have the meeting at a time when everyone is calm, maybe a Sunday afternoon or Friday night before a movie. Talk about why you need help and how you need love and support to make it happen. This type of family support can show that everyone needs help in life, even parents, in dealing with emotions. I’d have an option that mom and dad can also hand the calm down signal to a child so that everyone can have the same love and support to improve emotional skills. If it doesn’t work at first, have more family meetings until everyone can get on the same page with empathy and love.

3 – Use reminders

Some people find reminders a really useful way to help break bad habits. Anger can certainly be a bad habit so try some to see if it will help you. One parent I work with has trouble with anger but a lot of that is caused by having a lack of empathy for what her kids are going through. We brainstormed a bit and she decided to place yellow stickies all around her house with “empathy” on them. It did work for a while. Another mom just put stickies with an “E” on them around. Some of you are tech-savvy and might create automatic texts, calendar entries or emails with nudges for you to be more empathetic or ask yourself to rate your anger for the day on a scale of 1 to 10. Use anything but try something!

BAD FEELING RECOVERY

Now that we’ve talked about some ideas on how to try to stop yelling, I want you to think about ideas for what we can do to counteract the feelings incompetence and self-esteem that we often damage in our children when our anger lashes out at them.

Our kids are fragile and words can break them. Often times, those words spoken by us in anger stay with them for a life time. When we say “You’re so stupid!” often enough, they start believing it. When we tell them they are clumsy, they stop taking risks. When we get angry at them for breaking something or falling or missing a ball at a soccer match, they absorb that anger. They start internalizing that they really aren’t good enough. They might try harder in an attempt to win your love but it comes out of fear and hurt.

Sometimes the hurt becomes so great that they stop trying harder or they withdraw from you. That’s often what happens when teens start rejecting everything their parents say to them. The parents have brushed off every possible opinion their child had when they were young so the teen learns that their parent could care less what they think. They close down and rely on their friends for ideas and exchanges. Super sad. Let’s figure out how to be a parent who understands that parents are human and make mistakes and is willing to take time to repair damage before it becomes permanent.

There is a lot of psychology around how impactful negative comments are. The research says that it takes 5 positive interactions to negate just one negative one. Ouch. That’s a crazy imbalance, isn’t it? We really need some creative ways to balance those negative interactions out.

I came across a fun solution last week while on Pinterest. There’s a therapist who has a website called idealistmom.com. She has some great resources if you like this podcast and want to learn more. The thing that she had that caught my eye was what she called the “Five Hair Ties” solution to getting this negative/positive imbalance back in line. She says to put five hair bands on your wrist in the morning when your kids wake up. If you have a bad interaction, you lose one hair tie to the other wrist. You then have to spend the day trying to earn it back to the original wrist. If you have more negatives you’ll lose more ties and have more work to do, so you’re motivated to even the score as soon as possible. It’s a gentle, physical reminder that there’s more love needed.

What types of things can you use to recover? Simple! Things as easy as a hug (she says a 6 second hug is best), sitting and reading extra, putting a note somewhere they can find it with something nice on it, go outside together, play a game, give them an extra smile, tell a joke, have a dance party in the kitchen, there are lots of ways! I’m going to put a link in my podcast notes on how to sign up for a really cool printable chart with 25 of her ideas you can post on your fridge. It’s super worth clicking on! I love her SAY-PLAY-DO-SURPRISE quadrants. You have to sign up for her newsletter to get it but it’s totally worth it and you can always unsubscribe after!

BRAINSTORMING

I want to talk about one more thing I think can help families a great deal with trying to overcome anger issues, Family Brainstorming sessions. I mentioned it a bit when suggesting you enlist your children in helping you recognize when you’re getting angry. I really think it’s an amazing tool that should be used all the time. Setting up open and honest discussions with your whole family about issues that are upsetting family harmony is super healthy for establishing family bonding and love.

Your children deserve to hear from you when things are calm in your brain as to what gets you upset and then you all work together to understand how to overcome the issues. If you’re getting upset at everyone for leaving their shoes all over the house and you yell about it every day and no one does anything, having a place to air grievances like this in a kind, calm manner can be helpful and harmonious.

Your kids should understand why it upsets you and maybe you all decide to create a new shoe area in your house together. Or maybe shoes stay in the garage or on the porch on a new shoe bench that you all create and paint together. Showing your kids how problems can be solved with words and creativity is the best lesson you can give them in life. Anger solves nothing but if anger isn’t addressed it explodes as we can see now. Address the anger in your life so that your kids can have a good role model for solving issues.

I hope this has inspired you to think about issues that bring anger into your family. Be creative. If hair ties aren’t your thing, try rubber bands, bracelets or coins in your pocket. Remember your words can wound for a lifetime. I’d love to challenge anyone to try the hair ties for one week and write to me about it. I’ll provide a free phone coaching session to anyone who does it, that’s how important I think this is.

If you found this information useful, please forward this link on to your friends and family. It would be helpful to me but what I really want is for us to work together to help the world take steps to control our anger in a positive, healthy way.

Here's the link to the idealistmom.com website article:
https://happyyouhappyfamily.com/angry-mother/

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POSTCAST 12: Screen Time Issues: Part 2 - Individual Electronics

6/7/2020

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THE AUDIO PODCAST IS AVAILABLE HERE:   LISTEN

Thanks for coming back to read Part 2 of my screen time rules. I hope to build on what you learned in Part 1 so that you can deal with the more complicated issues when your kids are old enough to have their own phones, laptops and computers. It’s a challenging world out there and I want you to be well-equipped.

In Part 1, we talked about “family screens” and how to set limits with obedience, and, if there’s not, how to set up effective consequences.

Now, in Part 2, I’ll cover my final 5 rules dealing with older kids when individual cell-phones, laptops and other electronics come in to play by about middle school. However, with COVID-19 this is happening even earlier. It seems that these rules will apply to lots of elementary school age children who are now doing online school and have access to tablets and laptops that they view as their own.

I do want to mention a few things about how teens and tweens use their devices before I start. Common Sense Media’s 2019 survey of media use in teens and tweens say that by age 11, 53% of kids have their own smart phone, by age 12 it’s 69%. That’s a whole lot of phones in the hands of very young people.

I was also amazed to see that 69% of teens are watching YouTube every day.

Other interesting info in that survey how boys’ and girls’ media tastes vary. While 70% of boys 8-18 say they like playing video games of any sort “a lot”, only 23% of girls say that; 41% play every day while only 9% of girls do. Girls, on the other hand, love listening to music; 73% say they like it “a lot” compared to 59% of boys. 50% of girls say they like using social media “a lot” while only 32% of boys do.

I mention these stats just to give us a common ground to think about how the rules we’re going to discuss fit into the lives of your kids.

With that said, let’s dive in!

RULE 9: Use Contracts
I highly recommend that every family introduce a digital contract whenever personal electronics are about to appear in your kids’ lives. Notice the timing, I said ABOUT. You want to leverage your child’s willingness to listen and negotiate with you while they don’t have a phone or laptop yet. It might seem a little ridiculous to bring in a business type document into your family’s life but, you just have to trust me, you’ll really need this to get through things in the long run. Actually, I take that back, don’t trust me but listen to what happens to families when rules around electronics aren’t defined ahead of time.

Let’s say at 8th grade your child gets their first iPhone. Woohoo! They are so happy and you are the most amazing parent. Your child says they’ll be responsible and since they are so sweet and happy you all rest easily. That is, until they start staying up late watching YouTube videos or you find them texting at all hours of the night. You asked them to charge in the kitchen and they do it for a while. They constantly have their phones in their room when they’re doing their homework and it just never makes it to the charging station at night. Hmm... They need it, they say, to get help from friends. Sure, you say.

However, each time things get a little more out of whack and your child gets annoyed with you bothering them about being on their phone so much. You start taking it away when they are sassy to you or they don’t do their chores. It becomes a weapon in your relationship. All the while your child retreats more and more to their room, closing you out of their lives a little bit more each day. Fighting and yelling escalate, you come to me wondering what you can do. You have no relationship left, you’ve killed it fighting about the phone and you’ve driven your child away from you when they actually need you the most. Frightening, isn’t it?

Well, it happens all the time. Yes, all the time. If you’re a parent in this situation right now and relationships have been badly damaged, then you might need professional help. It’s a super tough place to be. Our pastor at my church called trying to take away a cell phone from a teen and create boundaries after they’ve had unlimited access would be like choosing to start World War 3.

However, if this isn’t you and you still have a relationship with your child that you can build on, then you’re in luck. Start now and things can go well!   I don’t want to be overly pessimistic since it certainly is true that many of us will weather the storm of electronics in our lives, but we just never know which one of us will be hit with a hurricane so we might as well weather-proof as much as possible.

So, let’s get back to the concept of setting up a digital contract. First, when’s the best time to set it up? BEFORE your child has access to individual devices. You will be able to have discussions with kids who are drooling at the prospect of getting their own phone, laptop or tablet. However, if your child’s school has already issued them a device for schoolwork or you’ve purchased one for them to use in this crazy time of COVID, just go ahead and introduce the idea of a contract now. I’d set up a family meeting to do it.

What’s in a contract?
This is going to be a family document and it will need to evolve over time as your kids needs grow and change. It will look different for a 5th grader than what an 8th grader or a high school junior. It needs to evolve and it should be negotiated, not dictated, if you want to up the chance of compliance and be able to have a healthy relationship as you go through the teen years together.

The structure of the document will remain the same. It will cover:

Location of devices – during use, when charging. (Remember Rule #1? No devices in the bedroom!)
Use of devices – for homework, for steaming videos, gaming, social media
Time of day devices are used -after homework and chores
Who has access to download apps – for young ones only parents
What passwords are required to tell parents – for young ones always, negotiate as they age
Rules for when parents can monitor – keep random checks a possibility
Define consequences – the most important part of the contract!
- Have your kids help define these, the compliance goes way up when they participate in creating what they think are reasonable consequences
- Have differing levels based on type of offenses
  - Not charging is a day without a phone
  - Using it at 2am on a weekday to watch YouTube might be a week
  - Downloading apps without permission another type of consequence
  - Etc.
- Expand the possibilities of consequences to include things like extra chores or outdoor activities, not just taking away electronics. Keep in mind that when you take away electronics our kids think we’re mean and uncaring. The entire time they don’t have them they focus on how much they are mad at us and not on themselves for the poor choice they made when they chose to break the Digital Contract you all agreed to.

I have a sample contract on my website that I’ll put a link to in the podcast notes. It was written by a family with a 7th grader and freshman in high school. You can even download the file and edit it to work for your family. You can also feel free to surf the internet, there are lots and lots of sample contracts available.

Setting up a contract with consequences can be tricky since kids really don’t want Big Brother breathing down their necks. However, even though kids don’t want to be monitored, you making sure there’s a way to do so that’s part of your family life when they are young will give you some avenues in dealing with things if your child steps over the line and needs to be reeled in later.

A few notes on contracts during COVID:

update them as things change; it’s totally fine to make modifications to the contract at times like these. Many parents are doubling their kids’ screen time limits or using chores or outdoor time as ways to earn more screen time. Be creative and get it in writing how those things are done.
you MUST figure out ways to monitor and use the consequences you’ve set up, rules without consequences prove to our kids that there are no rules which leads to them running their own show and ruins our family relationships and trust

RULE 10: Use Monitoring Software
Monitoring software is something that you can put on your child’s devices that can watch and alert you proactively for certain behaviors you and your family deem unacceptable. Say, for instance, no bulling. Monitoring software is tough to come by and none do 100% of what we might like it to do.

One company called Bark has monitoring software that I think is pretty good. Its motto is: monitor – detect – alert. It doesn’t prevent, that’s what Parental Controls do back in Rule #5. It uses artificial intelligence to “watch” apps your child is using – SnapChat, Instagram, Tik-Tok, whatever – and alerts you if it sees patterns of words that fall into the category of bullying. It doesn’t shut down access but it allows for conversations to take place between yourself and your child about what you’ve been alerted to.

One friend’s son was watching porn in high school. His dad had no idea. Once dad found out they were able to discuss the issue of porn and decided to install Bark. It’s not meant to be invasive but helpful. The thing to know is that the Bark interface needs to be installed on each app on your child’s phone with their consent. If you set up your child’s cell phone correctly with a digital contract in place that specifies that Bark is required for all apps, you’ll be in a good place. It does cost about $10/month or $99/year per family. I think it’s worth it but only if you have a good relationship with your child.

There are a few other tracker types of software but they all have limitations and require cooperation from your kids to use. Which means having a good, trusting relationship with your child is going to be your best bet in protecting against digital issues in the long run.

RULE 11: Talk about Online Safety
Rule 10 is pretty complicated since it implies some of Big Brother that our kids absolutely don’t want in their lives. If you set up ways to have open conversations about online safety starting when they are young and growing in topics and scope as they get older, you’ll have a chance that you can raise digitally aware kids.

In the contract you should be specific about some safety rules like no giving out personal info, no bullying, what to do if bullying occurs and such. All of these topics, however, that are in the contract need to be talked about so that your family is all on the same page. You need to address things like answering the phone when mom or dad calls but also how “ghosting” and “cancelling” friends online is super toxic and hurtful. Have those discussions.
Talk about sexting and how it impacts lives and reputations. Ask your kids if they’ve seen any of these behaviors. Talk about why people might do these bad behaviors. Nearly 40% of children in a Dec 2019 study say they’ve either received or sent a “sext” by the age of 13. Disturbing.

RULE 12: Talk about Social Media and Gaming

Earlier in the podcast I talked about how girls are much more into Social Media – Instagram, SnapChat, Tik-Tok, to name a few. Girls bond by chatting and social media falls right into girlhood social life as well as girlhood drama. Girls are twice as likely as boys to be bullied. There is no longer empathy when a post hurts someone since the person bullying can’t see the hurt on the person’s face anymore. It makes bullying easy with very little consequence. You need to talk to your girls about that.

However, we parents also need to understand the more subtle ways social media is used to bully. If you read a text or see a post that says someone is ugly or stupid, that’s easy. What you can’t see is that an app like SnapChat has a feature where kids can set up what is called a “streak”. Here’s how it works. Let’s say I’m your friend and I send you a Snap today. Well, since we’re good buddies you send one back. That’s a “streak” of one. Tomorrow we so the same thing. Our streak goes to two, the next day three, the next four, etc. Let’s say I have a few other friends besides you and I’ve got 10 streaks going at the same time but you get mad at me. You know what you do because you’re pissed? You break our streak. Yep. Just cut it. We had 251 days of streaking just gone and I am not your friend any more. You didn’t use any words, did you, but all our friends know what you just did to me even if my parents don’t.

How about Instagram? Super popular. There are “likes” on Instagram. I post a selfie of me (tweens and teen girls love selfies!) and I get 150 likes in a day. I’m popular, right? That must have been an amazing picture, right? Well, you post a selfie and got 3 likes in a day. You are so crushed and hurt you take your selfie down. Another subtle form of bullying that parents and Bark type software will probably never be able to detect. No words used again. Tik-Tok works the same way.

Those are just two forms of subtle bullying that go on that parents miss all the time. You need to keep up on new apps and what they’re about. In a few years, the two I mention here will be so “last year” and there will be new Tik-Toks to replace them that you’ll have to understand. It’s complicated and it will stay that way. Stay in touch with your girls. If you see big mood swings and isolation going on it’s something to worry about. Use websites like Common Sense Media, Axis and StayHipp to keep up to date.

Boys, on the other hand, do participate in social media to a lesser degree but they are more likely to dive deep into gaming. It’s fun and boys connect by doing not by socializing. If you have a son who is a gamer, stay close instead of staying away. Learn what they like about the game they are playing, what they are learning about life as they play.

Many of these games require teamwork to win or concentration and skill. What is your son gaining? Fortnite and Mindcraft are currently super popular games for younger boys, maybe tween and under. Play with them. Watch them play. Ask them about their characters or which friends are playing with them.

Many boys will move on to more aggressive games in middle and high school that require more skill and dedication. My son in high school decided he wanted to be a professional gamer. His game of choice at the time was Counterstrike, a war-time type game. I took a big gulp and went along for the ride for about 5 years. I stayed close. Asked questions about the game. We had gaming nights where his friends all brought their gaming computers and could be in the same room playing instead of separately.

My son learned many important skills that, if I wasn’t looking, I would have missed. He learned that picking the right teammates was hard, not everyone had his dedication. It was frustrating. He learned that a team had to work together to win, no one hot shot could do it all. As he evolved, he became the head of his 5-person team. He had to help resolve issues between teammates when they came up. It was amazing! I could see how really important life skills were being learned.

He was a very good student and was heavily involved in school sports so he had some balance in his life but he still loved gaming. I could have spent years fighting with him to get off his computer and would not have much of a relationship with him today if I’d done that. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not promoting gaming, I’m just saying that if your child is headed that way, find the good as well as making sure there’s a balance.

My son just graduated from college in Computer Science. Whew. He still loves to play games but did find out on his own after approaching the semi-pro level while in college that playing for fun was much more rewarding. He learned it, not me. I was able to love him when it got tough because we still had a relationship.

RULE 13: Talk about Porn
There are many ways parents can use software and hardware to assist us in the never-ending battle for control of screen time. In Rule #5 we talked about Parental Controls. I absolutely want to make sure you’re setting up as much filtering as possible to prevent porn from easily coming into your home and on to devices that travel outside your home.

However, you need to talk about porn. Yes, it’s a really awkward subject but our kids will find porn one way or another. At first, in about late elementary school, it’s accidental. A friend at school with an older sibling shows them on a phone or when they go over to another house for a playdate that doesn’t have good filters. Then curiosity hits and more porn gets into their lives.

When the brain is under development as it is in puberty there are new neurological connections being made every day. Listen to Episode 2 on the teen brain if you haven’t already for more details. These connections on porn can get hardwired so that our kids young minds think that porn is “normal” sex. For some, healthy sexual relations are impacted in the long term which is super sad. There has been a noticeable spike sexual impotence of men in their 20s largely due to porn.

How do you talk to them? If you have younger kids maybe 4-9 there’s a really nice book called Good Pictures, Bad Pictures: Porn-Proofing Today’s Kids. If you google how to talk to teens about porn you’ll get quite a few resources that have some really great suggestions for setting up discussions with your kids. I will put links to some of those in my show notes. I hope you’ll take a look at some and set up ways to talk to your kids. It is going to be awkward and I will pray that it goes well for you but please make the effort.

Well, that’s the end of my Screen Time Rules. You made it!

I hope you’ve got some really practical ideas about dealing with electronics in your homes. Please set up contracts with your kids and have some discussions about hard topics with them. Set yourselves up for success by working with your kids to tackle these issues, don’t be a dictator. If you run into new troubles, stop and take time to address them as a family.

That’s all for now. I would love it if you’re listening if you can forward this podcast on to a friend or two. There just isn’t enough practical help for parents in dealing with screens. I hope you think you’ve gained some good ideas that are worth passing on.

Take care and be safe.

Have a blessed rest of your day.

Helpful Websites for Keeping Up To Date
www.CommonSenseMedia.org
www.Axis.org
www.StayHipp.com

Digital Contract Sample
https://www.parentingwithlogic.com/family-digital-contract.html

Book for Talking to Younger Kids about Porn
https://www.amazon.com/Good-Pictures-Bad-Porn-Proofing-Todays-ebook/dp/B07KQFWR6J/ref=sr_1_1?crid=M3J0KWQJUIJ&dchild=1&keywords=good+pictures+bad+pictures&qid=1590185110&sprefix=good+picture%2Caps%2C218&sr=8-1

Website Resources for Talking to Teens about Porn
https://raisingchildren.net.au/teens/entertainment-technology/pornography-sexting/pornography-talking-with-teens

https://childmind.org/article/how-to-talk-to-teenagers-about-porn/

How to Tell if Social Media is Harming Your Mental Health
www.zocdoc.com/blog/how-to-tell-if-social-media-is-harming-your-mental-health/

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