As a parent, I sometimes think that maybe I share too much with my kids. I teach them at home and we spend a ton of time together. We talk about everything. I generally love it, although I do have moments where I want to run away screaming…we’ve all been there.
Mostly though, I enjoy hearing what my kids have to say. I am biased, but I think my kids are pretty cool people. I love hearing the conclusions they come to. I especially love remembering the conversations we had when they were little and their language skills were emerging. The speech impediments that I hoped would never go away. My son made up a definition for the word electricity once based on a trip to Toronto we made one night. We were on our way to the airport to pick up my brother who was visiting for Christmas, and as we got closer to the city, the lights became intense and very beautiful. I called the kids’ attention to it as they were kind of dozing in the back seat. In response, after a little bit of thinking, I heard, “Mommy – that’s why the city has so many lights! Because it is an electric-city!” I thought to myself, “That is so brilliant, I am not even going to correct him.”
So, we talk a lot. And I always took for granted that all parents talk to their kids pretty regularly until the tween and teen years strike and there is a general sort of break down in communication. But in my experiences as a bookseller and now as a promoter of all things literacy, I realize that conversing with children is rapidly becoming a lost art. Conversations then lead to stories, which in turn lead to a natural progression in literacy skills. We are missing the boat in a key port here. The norm now is that our children stare at screens and give us one word answers until we become discouraged and give up the fight. Sound familiar? You are not alone.
A few weeks ago, I had a lovely conversation with my young cousin, aged 7. She had come downstairs to the kitchen and she started complaining to her sister. She said, “Why did you take the small apple? That’s the one I wanted!” And she was really upset. I couldn’t imagine why. There were 4 other beautiful apples on the counter. But she very specifically wanted the one that was the smallest. Her sister wasn’t giving it up.
I had to know more. So I jumped in. I asked, “Why is it that this is the only apple you want, sweetie?” “I told you, I only like to eat small and round apples, not big, fat, juicy ones,” she answered in a very exasperated tone. Like, duh – of course a person would only want to eat the smallest apple! This was getting more interesting. I went on. “But do you know that the big, fat, juicy apples are the sweetest? Why don’t you let me just cut some pieces from the big one and we can save the rest?” She shook her head and continued begging her sister for the other apple. She was not getting anywhere with either of us.
At this point she really started to seem like she was on the verge of melting down. I decided to try humor. I asked, “Can you imagine if the whole world was filled with small and dry apples instead of big and juicy ones? What would the apple trees look like? Wouldn’t that be strange? I think people might get upset!” She looked up at the ceiling and put her index finger on her mouth with a priceless expression of pondering – not so much of the questions I was asking, but more so about how she was going to get through to me.
This beautiful child knew exactly why the smallest apple was the best…
Finally she had enough. She wheeled around on her counter stool and explained, “I only want the small apple because that’s the one I can finish! If I don’t finish it, then it turns brown and I cannot eat it anymore!!” Ah. Now I understood. An extremely logical point, which came from something that seemed completely counterintuitive to me. I said to myself, “I don’t think I will ever forget this conversation.”
There are so many like these just waiting to be had with our children!
I want to share with you how, like so many facets of literacy development that I touch on with parents, starting early with conversation is so very important to their overall interest, engagement, and confidence as future readers. Being heard and understood is the very foundation of why we communicate. So every time you respond in an interested way to your child, you are encouraging them to continue, thereby increasing vocabulary, narrative skill, and self-esteem. Every time you respond with an, “Uh-huh,” you are doing a bit of the opposite. It’s very true that with all the time constraints and commitments we face as parents in this day and age, we can’t always be 100% tuned in. I totally get that. But, just take a minute and think about the gems that have come from conversations you had with your kids as toddlers. Think about how humorous, shockingly honest, or embarrassing something was that came about from an innocent question. Or what about the first time your child had an “adult” observation about a situation that signaled a new phase of maturity? Touchstone moments…usually born of conversation. Don’t miss these precious opportunities!
Let’s all cultivate the art of conversation with our children!