Wednesday, September 16, 2009

teaching assertiveness

an important life skill for children and adults is knowing how to be assertive, not passive, aggressive or often in my case...passive aggressive :) without developing this skill, we attempt to control behavior through fear, physical aggression or a more subtle control that may be more familiar to you... emotional manipulation. we wonder why we have a society of people who either avoid conflict out of fear or become intoxicated by it. i am learning through life experiences and difficult relationships to be assertive... how to express my feelings, expectations and disappointments in an honest, yet composed way. it feels good. it does good. it may not always have the result that i hope for, but i'm a healthier person because of it.

i desperately need God's grace and wisdom as i attempt to teach our children appropriate assertiveness. it is a learned skill and therefore must be developed through practice. this means giving them the words to say when they feel infringed upon.

would you agree that we are quick to give attention to the "aggressor"?
"why did you do that? you know the rule about hitting!!! go sit in time out."

now i am not arguing against time out in this ramble (maybe another time) but how often do we empower the victim in a given situation and then teach new skills to an aggressor? my encouragement is that we begin doing so. not only will we have children who can learn to set appropriate boundaries, we teach children the necessary behaviors to express their needs or wants. win - win, i'd say!

end of tangent... roll the video.
here is a really funny clip of davis practicing his assertive voice. i have used this clip in my trainings with district employees.

ps..you will have to pause the music on my side bar before playing the video





4 comments:

  1. Teach me more!!! please do more posts like this one. I love the video, cuties...

    I am going to practice this with my kids tomorrow.

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  2. please post more stuff like this. i love reading your insights on parenting!

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  3. wow, this is good stuff!! I thought I was reading an excerpt from a parenting book!!
    This is so eye opening for me...Preston is such an observer in situations so I have a feeling he will need to be taught certain assertiveness. wonder where he got that from?? ;)
    hope y'all are doing well! Miss you!

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  4. so glad it is helpful! i will plan to post more suggestions/ videos for you girls. i have thought about it for a while now but as you can see, i've have neglected the blog all together for lack of time. :) keep posted for more to come!! maybe even later today.

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