Fostering Loving Sibling Relationships Part 3

by BooParry | Jul 9, 2014 | #Siblings, Key, Parenting, Series

Continued from Part 1 and Part 2…

I just have a couple of more things I’d like to address on this topic.

I’d like to go back to the General Principle #4 from Part 1.

Balance their time together and time apart.

As I stated on my last post, I think it’s important as parents to monitor if our children have too much time to spend together or not enough. I believe either of those extremes can cause more conflicts between siblings. Case in point. Last week, my two older girls participated in a drama camp at my oldest’s school. They had a lot of fun, but they were with each other (without the youngest sibling or their parents) for 6 hours everyday for a whole week. When they came home each day, I noticed that they were bickering at each other often. During that week, I separated them and had them play on their own for a while (usually in their rooms) after they came home. This week, the same older two girls attended Vacation Bible School. The hours were much shorter (3 hours a day), and each was assigned to a different group at VBS. They hardly saw each other at all. I noticed this made a huge difference in how well they got along after they came home. I hardly heard any bickering at all. This confirmed my belief that too much time spent together can lead to more conflicts.

Here are some specific ways I try to structure how much time they spend together:

Blanket/Room Time
This is another concept I learned from Growing Kids God’s Way by Gary & Anne Marie Ezzo. I think this is especially useful for homeschooling moms whose children are home all day. Simply put, it’s structuring time for them to play/read on their own…either on a blanket (for toddlers) or in their room (for older kids). I do this regularly with my three children, and it’s become a normal routine for them. It usually lasts about 45 minutes (I set the timer on). During that time, the house is pretty much silent. Each child is playing by herself with her set of toys (for my youngest, I place a few toys on her blanket). Sometimes my older ones go in their rooms with books to read. This teaches them how to keep themselves entertained, and it also helps them to be more focused and be creative. The additional benefit I found is that this time apart from one another helps them to appreciate the time they do get to spend together. Usually, once they reunite and start playing after their blanket/room time, they are able to play nicely together and enjoy their time together without conflicts.

“Settle down” time after school
This goes along with the above concept, but it’s specifically for the time after school pick-up. I believe many children need a little time to “unwind” from all the social activities of the day. When my oldest began attending school, my second daughter would be so excited for her to get out of school and play with her, only to find herself being snubbed by her older sister. I realized that many times my oldest was not ready to jump right into playing with her sister after being with her friends all day. What helped was to give my oldest some time to “settle down” (either by having a little alone time or watching a short show), before she dived into playing with her sisters.

Different extracurricular activities (as your situation allows)
My oldest definitely has the most dominant personality out of my three children. My second child is drama, but she’s also very much a follower. She’s perfectly content following the lead of my oldest (for the most part). I began to realize that this dynamic in their relationship caused my second child to become socially dependent on my oldest. My second child would often be too afraid or shy to play with other kids, unless my oldest was with her. What helped for us in this situation was to force my second child to become more involved with other children without her sister. For example, she began attending preschool. She also began participating in dance class, instead of participating in gymnastics like her sister. I understand that finding a different extracurricular activity for each child may be difficult for most families. But if at all possible, I think different hobbies/interests will help to develop each child’s individuality.

Ways to create MORE time together
So far I’ve discussed ways to structure their time apart. Sometimes, though, conflicts and rivalry can result from siblings having too much time apart. This may be common for children who attend traditional school system, five days a week. If they have extracurricular activities also, there’s hardly any time left in the day to spend with their siblings. I believe this is where parents must strategize and work hard to protect their “family time,” by not involving their children in too many activities or birthday parties and maximizing the time they have together. For example, if there are chores to be done after school or on weekends, have the siblings work on them together. Set a “family time” after dinner where no electronics are allowed; it’s a time specifically set aside to enjoy being together (by playing board games, going on a walk, reading stories, etc.). I also think it’s important to set some time during the week for siblings to spend time one-on-one with another sibling. The first hour of my youngest’s nap time is a time set aside for my two older kids to play together by themselves. Another way to accomplish this is for one sibling to help mom with chores or read with mom while the other two plays, and take turns. I think the one-on-one time together is crucial in building a strong friendship.

I hope some of these suggestions were helpful in giving you some ideas on how to cultivate loving sibling relationships. Again, if there’s something specific that has worked for your family, please share by commenting on this post.

Last but not least, I can’t emphasize the power of prayer enough. Ultimately, God is the One who formed and knows their hearts. He also desires your children to develop long-lasting friendships with one another. Entrust your parenting journey under His care and guidance, and you can’t go wrong.

Fostering Loving Sibling Relationships Part 2

by BooParry | Jun 9, 2014 | #Siblings, Key, Parenting, Series

I’d like to dissect further the general principle #3 from my previous post:

Supervise their interactions and address their heart issue.

What does this look like on a day-to-day basis?

Don’t ignore the small stuff
Like I mentioned, I started in very small ways, such as teaching them to ask their sibling politely versus telling them what to do. If I hear Peanut say to LittleBit, “Hand me that toy,” I would instruct her to rephrase it as a question: “Would you please hand me that toy?” Or one may say, “Go over there,” and I would redirect her to say, “Can you please go over there?” I wanted to ingrain this truth in my children: show respect and kindness over being rude, mean, or bossy. I not only paid attention to what they said but how they said it. I paid attention to small sly remarks one would make at another. For example, one may quietly blurt out, “I finished first” or “I have more than you.” I would remind her that it’s not a race/competition and to refrain from making those comments that are only meant to make the other person feel sad.

Teach them to respect each other’s properties
In our house there are “community toys” that are open for all and there are other toys that specifically belong to each child. All the smaller individual toys are kept in each child’s special “box.” Each child must ask permission from its owner before she is allowed to use the toy. Even our youngest, MiniLu, has learned to ask, “Sissy, me please?” as she points to a particular toy that belongs to her sister. This has significantly decreased the time they spend fighting over toys.

Address the heart issue
From my experience, this is key. If I am just correcting their behavior and not reaching their heart, it’s pointless. Whenever I correct them on what they say/do to their sibling, I always direct them to examine their heart. Lately, whenever my middle child doesn’t want to do what my oldest suggests, my oldest will try to make her feel “left out” by saying she will then play with MiniLu (youngest). I address her heart immediately. “Do you think you said that out of a good heart or a bad heart?” “Do you think what you said gave your sister a happy heart or a sad heart?” I constantly try to reinforce this principle: if something was said with the intention of making the other person feel sad/bad, then it was not said out of love. This leads me to the all too common issue of tattling.

Tattling. One truth I learned about tattling is that the more I respond to the tattling, the more likely they will come back to tattle again. My first strategy with tattling is to not respond with any sense of emergency (unless it is an emergency, of course, such as physical violence). I again address the heart. “Did you ask your sister to please stop doing that? Did you express to her how that makes you feel?” Basically I’m asking, “Did you give your sister the opportunity to correct herself and do good?” If the answer is no, I immediately have her go back to her sister. I encourage her to ask her sister nicely, “Could you please stop coloring on my page, I don’t like it?” or “Remember Mommy does not want you to jump on the couch. Could you please stop?”

Other times, I may just say, “You two work it out together nicely. If you can’t, you need to clean up and spend some time apart.”

With these methods in place, we don’t seem to experience much tattling around the house anymore (knock on wood!).

Teach them to ask for forgiveness
I think this one still relates to the heart issue. We’ve learned from some wise parenting resources that just saying “sorry” often does not reach a child’s heart. I recently heard my oldest explain our house rule to another adult: “If something was an accident, we say ‘Sorry,’ but if something was done on purpose, we say ‘Will you forgive me?’”

This is our usual procedure. If one of them did some kind of harm to her sibling with bad intention, I direct her to think it over in her room. I often go in to talk to her about the “heart issue.” Afterwards, when things are much calmer, I direct her to ask for her sibling’s forgiveness. If she just says, “Will you forgive me?” I encourage her to go further by admitting to what she did wrong. “Will you forgive me for ________ ?” Always, 100% of the time, the other sibling responds with “Yes, I will.” I believe this provides opportunities for a much more genuine restoration than the offender just blurting out, “Sorry.”

If things are already escalated, give them a time-out
Once in a while, things still get out of hand and escalate into a full blowout. If I was already in the middle of something, it’s easy for me to get frustrated and join in on the blowout by being angry at them, adding fuel to fire. These are times when we all, including Mommy, need a time-out. I ask each of them to go to their room until they are calm. This gives me time for me to diffuse as well. I then go talk to each child individually to hear each side of the story.

Exaggerate the positive, Provide opportunities for them to show love
As closely as I pay attention to the smallest incidents that need correction, I also try to pay just as much (if not more) attention to the smallest incidents that can be praised. “Wow, you just helped your sister. Great job.” “Thank you for sharing your toy, that makes your sister so happy.” Sometimes I hear one of them praise the other for her artwork. I immediately say, “Wow, that was so kind of you to encourage your sister like that.”

I also help them discover different ways they can serve or give to one another. I ask one to get the shoes for their siblings, to open the door for them, etc. At church my oldest receives a fake $1 prize money for completing a week’s worth of Bible verses. She can exchange each $1 for a small prize. I encouraged her to save the $’s until she has enough for her and her two sisters to receive a prize. Since then, that’s what she has wanted to do every time. We always remind the other siblings to thank her. In return, every time my middle child receives a treat at preschool for special occasions, she immediately asks me, “Can I share this with my sisters during snack time?” (many times it’s something so small like one cookie but she still wants me to split it three ways).

Again, I go back to my previous post on maintaining a loving atmosphere in the home. This has become so “normal” to them. It really hit me one time, during my oldest child’s first week in kindergarten. When she receives three 5’s in a row at school, she is allowed to pick a prize from the treasure chest. Well, it blew my mind away when she came home with a bracelet that I assumed was for her. She walked through the door and immediately asked for LittleBit (middle child). I asked her surprisingly, “You picked that for LittleBit?” She said, “Yes, because she lost her other bracelet.” What made this even more amazing was that this was her very first time going to the treasure chest, after being back in school….in her new class, where there were many prizes she had not seen before. In that moment, she chose to pick something for her sister rather than herself. I was so touched and in awe.

Believe me, I know, implementing these principles and methods can be (WILL be) time-consuming, tedious, and full of sweat and hard work. But believe me also that the fruit they will produce in your children will be far sweeter than you can imagine.

I’d like to give credit to where credit it due. A lot of the methods mentioned on this post was taken from the parenting resources I have depended on the most since I began my journey as a parent: Growing Kids God’s Way and other works by Gary and Anne Marie Ezzo.

Fostering Loving Sibling Relationships Part 1

by BooParry | May 27, 2014 | #Siblings, Key, Parenting, Series

Here is my new series. My current plan is to follow a series that’s more personal/conceptual/philosophical with a series that’s more concrete/practical (so this is my attempt at practical).

I have three daughters close in age (currently 6, 4, and 2). I was an only child. I knew from early on that when I had children, I wanted them to have siblings, and I wanted them to be best friends. My girls definitely have moments when they don’t like each other and get into arguments/competition about little things. But I can honestly say, they genuinely love one another…a lot. They sincerely care for one another and enjoy being together.

I will say this again and again on my blog: I am not a parenting expert. My oldest is six and my youngest is still in my belly, so in a way I am still at the beginning. But even within the six short years of parenting, I’m convinced that I learned some valuable lessons on how to cultivate loving sibling relationships, and I’m seeing some of the fruit of putting these lessons into practice.

I will go over some specific examples in my later posts, but for now I want to share some general principles that I believe will help in developing loving sibling relationships.

1. Prayer & Priority – I think they go hand in hand. If this is something that’s very important to you, you will pray about it a lot, as I did (and still do). If you pray about it a lot, it will continue to be one of the top priorities in your parenting journey. Before my second child was even born, this was my prayer and my goal for my children: Lord, please help them to develop a sweet, lifelong friendship.  I’ve noticed that in parenting (as in life), whatever you place as your top priorities tend to naturally come to fruition. The opposite is also true – whatever you don’t place as a priority doesn’t usually happen on its own. In our household, the example of this was my children learning Japanese. I had so many other priorities/goals in mind, that this goal was placed farther away from the top. As a result, my children don’t speak a lick of Japanese.  As most parents know, you can’t place everything in the top priority category. You have to pick and choose. That’s why prayer plays such a major role in determining your priorities and also in asking His blessing to find success in those priorities.

2. Husband/wife as their relationship model – I think this is huge. The atmosphere of the home and the examples the children see everyday greatly influence how they learn to treat other people. I am very blessed in this area. My husband and I have a supportive, loving, respectful friendship. They see us laughing together constantly. They hear us complementing each other and working as a team on practically everything.  They never hear us raise our voices at each other, disrespect/devalue each other, or even be sarcastic to each other. This was the kind of atmosphere they were raised in from birth, so it was pretty natural for them to learn how to treat one another in this way.  When MiniLu (our adopted child) joined our family at age 2, I believe she sensed this atmosphere right away and followed suit naturally. We never had any issue with violence from her. She was very quick to sense and follow the “natural flow” of our home, which is to respect and be kind to one another.

3. Supervise their interactions and address their heart issue. I probably do this a little too often that my kids may be getting sick of it. Many times I don’t wait for their little disagreements to turn into raging, crying fits before I intervene. My ears are constantly open to how they speak to one another – at home, in the car, and pretty much whenever I’m around them.  Even if they are playing by themselves and I only hear them in the background, my ears are always listening. I address little things, such as adding “please” and “thank you.” I address them (well, mainly my oldest) when I hear her starting to sound too bossy.  When one of them is boasting or showing off, I immediately address their heart: “Do you think you said that out of a good heart or a bad heart? Do you think what you just said made your sister happy or sad?” 10 out of 10 times they give me the right answer.  If I hear that their little argument is starting to escalate, I tell them to pause. “You girls are only making each other upset right now, so let’s just stop talking for a while.” I will address tattling more in detail later, but I follow the same principle: I address their heart and encourage them to solve the issue with the other sibling respectfully. This has become my daily habit.  As a result, I noticed that my time of “refereeing blowouts” has decreased significantly in the recent year or so. Most of the time they are able to resolve the issue peacefully among themselves without things getting out of hand.

4. Balance their time together and time apart.  As much as you love your spouse, or a sister/brother, or mother/father, or best friend, isn’t there a time when you just need to be apart after being with them 24-7? If we experience this as adults, how much more do our children experience this?  I believe there’s some truth to the phrase “Absence makes the heart grow fonder.” When my older two girls are apart (because of school or one of them being at grandparents’ house), I can tell that they miss each other and are glad when they are reunited. If a younger sibling is not home when my oldest returns from school, she immediately asks, “Where’s LittleBit?” I will address in my later posts how you can intentionally structure some time for your children to be apart. At the same time, we don’t want to give them too much time apart. After all, it’s through their daily interactions and play time that they develop a lasting friendship.  This becomes harder as the older ones start attending school. We found a perfect system where our school-age children go to school three days a week and are homeschooled two days a week. We found this to be a perfect balance in how much time they spend together and apart.  I imagine it would be a little harder for parents to balance this if the children are homeschooled exclusively or if they go to school five days a week. I will try to include some suggestions for these two situations in my later posts as well…stay tuned!

These are some general principles that have helped our family so far in cultivating loving sibling relationships. Please feel free to comment if you have anything to add that has worked for your family.

Continued on Part 2…