Teach Your Kids to Fight
Like we all do, I regularly try to reinforce strength in my kids where I have weaknesses of my own to ensure they don’t come up short there too.
If I had to pick one of my own most crippling weaknesses (there are plenty to choose from), it’s I am a wuss when it comes to fighting. I can’t fight verbally or defend myself publicly. I will almost never confront someone and when someone confronts me, I usually retreat to my corner.
Upon further introspection, I have come to realize that I am more concerned with publicly embarrassing someone else, coming off unprofessionally and afraid of being disrespectful, especially in front of others. Mostly, I am not clever or quick-witted enough to come up with something appropriate non-offsensive to come back with.
Of course, I always have just the right thing to say about 20 minutes after the encounter.
This is a terrible trait. And one that I don’t want my kids to have. So, I encourage some verbal fighting. I think it’s a healthy exercise. There are of course, some ground rules:
1. No curse words. They have access to a whole language of words they can use- in fact, two languages: hebrew and english. It doesn’t matter what language they fight in. But they need to be able to express themselves without cursing and name calling.
2. They can yell and scream, but they have to verbalize their expression. No whining, no sulking. If they want to be heard, they need to use words and create an argument describing why they are angry. They must tell their sibling what they wanted him/her to do differently. How behaving differently could have changed the outcome.
3. They need to give their side and then listen to their brother/sister, giving time for a rebuttal, without interruption. They don’t always have to agree with what the other is saying, but they do need to listen.
4. They always need to find a solution to make up at the end. Of course, every argument has to end with a hug to show your sibling you really mean it.
Siblings are meant to fight. If you utilize the built in scenario you have in front of you with younger children fighting all the time, you may actually be preparing them for real life arguments, in which they’ll have a leg to stand on.
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