Why Your Kids Aren’t Listening to You
Honestly, you’re talking too much.
Before I start working with a parent, there is often a lot of mystery to what the work will look like. What is the parent going to be asked to do? Will it be hard to remember? Will it feel completely foreign?
I’m met with surprise when my clients learn that I’m actually advising them to do less. Say less. Repeat less. Move less.
As adults, we looove to use our big fancy brain. After all, it took years for our prefrontal cortex to develop. Now that we have this sucker, let’s put her to work!
Note: The prefrontal cortex is responsible for a lot of grown-up stuff like planning ahead and problem solving.
So when we’re faced with some “irrational” meltdown, emotional outburst, or kids just aren’t responding to our directions, we start yapping. We might try to get them to see things differently, distract them, or repeat ourselves to death.
When these things don’t “work” we escalate - using more words, a louder volume, and sometimes threats or punishments. With this approach our kids don’t hear us - not with their brains or their hearts.
But why not? Their ears work don’t they? They must be choosing noncompliance or their outburst. Right? No - completely wrong. Years of child development research and brain science says otherwise.
Let’s look at what’s really going on and what we can do to be the most effective in our communication:
A big ‘ol meltdown:
When kids (and adults) experience a high degree of stress, a few things “turn off” for them - parts of their brain and to some degree their ears too! By now, many of us have learned that thinking clearly and rationally (using our “front brain”) is really hard or even impossible when we’re in a distressed state. But what about our ears? Under stressful conditions, we also experience “auditory exclusion.” When this happens, our brain filters out noises, words, and conversations.
How to respond:
Your kids can’t “hear” you. So stop talking. I wish more parents understood that in the vast majority of interactions with our kids, our presence is enough. But presence doesn’t mean just being in the same room with them. It means being available with our body, mind, and heart. And you can hold that space and availability without saying anything. It’s one of my favorite things to teach my coaching clients.
“Refusing” to listen:
Nothing can be more frustrating to us parents than when we tell our kids it’s time to go, turn off the tv, or otherwise just move it along and they don’t do it. So what’s going on here? They aren’t in distress. They have perfectly functioning ears. Why aren’t they doing it? Again - auditory processing. Let’s think about the steps it takes to actually transition from one activity to the next:
Hear the request
Register it in their brain
Make a plan to move
Actually move
Doing this seamlessly takes time to develop. In fact, auditory processing won’t be fully developed until a child’s teen years!
How to respond:
Let’s first cover how not to respond - with punishments when our kids don’t “listen the first time.” Since we know that auditory processing is underdeveloped, we need to accommodate for this. Not force it with the use of fear tactics (yelling, threats, punishment)
Here’s how:
Proximity: Don’t shout from the next room. Walk up to your child. Be at eye level when you communicate the plan.
Connection: This can be a physical connection like a hand on their shoulder. But what’s even more effective is to participate in whatever activity your child is engaged in before you ask them to stop the activity. It doesn’t have to be long either.
Play: Use playfulness to get things moving. Kids are very present creatures. So if they are having a good time in an activity, just to transition to something not so fun, playfulness will go a long way.
Boundaries/Natural consequences: Don’t keep repeating yourself. If you’ve done everything above and you still aren’t getting cooperation, you may have to make some moves (turn the tv off, pick up your child, etc.) But these things should really be the last resort - using our intrinsic power and strength will get increasingly more difficult as they age. So let’s set a foundation for cooperation. Picking up a 3year old at the park is a lot different than picking up a 7 year old.
If at any point you’ve thought, “Well I always listened to my parents right away. I would never get away with the things my kids do” please take some time to reflect on how it was different for you. What would the response have been to you? Is that what you needed? If not, what did you need or wish you had in that moment instead?
Gaining cooperation isn’t always easy. But how we get it is a choice. It can happen from fear or it can happen from relationship.
