Keep your kids from fighting
Top Ten Ways to Keep Your Kids from Fighting
Fighting among siblings is as natural as the changing of the seasons. And contrary to what many parents believe, sibling rivalry is a sign of mental health in a family. While there may be times when it’s difficult to deal with, there are some simple things you can do to limit fighting and make it tolerable:
1. Ignore their fighting 
Fighting is often a way for kids to get you to notice them. If you ignore their fighting (unless weapons are involved) there will be less incentive for them to do it.
2. Treat your kids the same when it comes to fighting
If you get into who started things, you may be training your kids to be victims and bullies. Put them in the same boat and don’t take sides.
3. Give your kids positive reinforcement when they are cooperating
Let them know that they’re doing a wonderful job when they get along. This one’s easy to forget, but vitally important. Give them attention when they’re behaving the way you want. Continually telling them to stop may actually be creating more fighting!
4. Limit your own fighting and arguing
Your kids will learn how to be peaceful from you. Don’t expect them to do it well if you don’t show them how.
5. Create an environment of cooperation
Do projects together as a family that involve cooperation. Talk about how important it is for the family to cooperate. Avoid games or activities that promote fighting or excessive competition in your kids.
6. Train your kids in peacemaking when they’re away from conflict
Talk to your kids about fighting at a time when they’re relaxed and open. Ask them about what other options they might have taken rather than hitting their sister. Help them to brainstorm better solutions.
7. Avoid punishing your kids in general
Punishing kids usually just creates angry kids who are more likely to fight. While some punishment may be inevitable, do your best to give choices and alternatives. Punishment may bring short-term solutions but will also bring long-term problems.
8. Control how you react to their fighting
When you must intervene, make sure you stay calm. If you’re angry and shaming, you actually make it more likely that fighting will occur again.
9. Limit the number of fighting opportunities you give your kids.
Think about what has the potential to start fights. Don’t buy a red ball and a blue ball as this may easily result in a fight by your kids. Buy two red balls and reduce the opportunity for a fight. Be familiar with the times in which fighting occurs the most – when they’re hungry or tired. Take precautions, like having dinner ready before the “bewitching hour” occurs.
10. Love your kids for all they’re worth
Every day tell them you love them and, more importantly, show them. Kids who feel emotionally connected to their parents are the least likely to fight. This won’t eliminate it, but the alternative isn’t pretty at all.
By Mark Brandenburg
Reprinted courtesy of www.brainy-child.com
Breakfast no time for treats
Too many New Zealand children are fuelling up on sugar before school according to the Heart Foundation.
With the Government’s recent decision to relax food restrictions in schools, the Heart Foundation is urging New Zealanders to cut back on sugary breakfasts.
Registered dietitian and Heart Foundation Tick programme nutrition manager, Mrs Bullock, says a healthy breakfast can encourage better food choices later in the day.
Other dietary changes as simple as opting for trim milk and lower fat margarines or spreads can also reduce breakfast kilojoules and lower a child’s saturated fat intake by more than two kilograms a year, says Mrs Bullock.
Piling sugar on top of cereal should clearly be avoided according to Mrs Bullock, who suggests sweetening with low fat yoghurt, adding a banana or Tick canned fruit as more sensible options.
In fact, she says a few simple changes can improve breakfast nutrition significantly.
The Tick dietitian believes breakfast should provide fibre and essential carbohydrates to top up energy stores, making children less likely to snack on foods high in fat and sugar.
The importance of eating a good breakfast has been shown in many studies, but children’s breakfast cereals commonly contain too much sugar, says Mrs Bullock.
While children may demand their sugary favourites at the breakfast table which can also be high in saturated fat and salt, Mrs Bullock says giving in to pester power may mean children are not getting essential nutrients they need.
We should all be looking at breakfast cereals with less sugar and kilojoules per serve. For example, the Tick tells you at a glance which products meet Heart Foundation nutrition standards, in effect giving you healthier food options.
Just swapping standard blue top milk and cereal for Tick approved cereal with trim milk, choosing wholegrain toast and using margarine or spread with the Tick can help, she adds.
Together these changes can remove more than a teaspoon of saturated fat and about as much salt as found in a packet of potato chips from your child’s breakfast every day, she says.
What Really Matters
My Fondest memories as a child were the times I spent with my parents
and siblings doing the simple things. Baking pikelets with my aunty and
learning to flip them..with the odd one landing on the floor which would
send us all into a fit of giggles.
The summer holidays spent at kiwi campsites with endless hours spent on
the beach swimming and building fortresses in the sand with Dad – these
were always on quite a grand scale as he believed you always needed a
mote surrounding the fortress of at least four or five castles to protect us
from the enemies.
As children we learnt life’s valuable lessons through spending time with
our parents, watching and asking questions.
I fear our own children’s generation are missing out on some of those life
lessons as a consequence of us as parents not being as present in their
day-to-day life. Instead we entrust institutions with the job of raising our
children and teaching them the basics.
I wonder how many parents have laid down on the floor with their toddler
for 10 minutes to join in their play with them or hopped on a bike and
gone for a ride with their teenager?
Of the parents I have questioned about this matter, most say it’s a lack of
time, others say a lack of resource or money. If so, why are we so time
poor? Why are we all rushing from one thing to another without having a
minute to stop for a breath?
Perhaps it is not that we are time poor but that we are commodity driven.
Has what we possess become more important than spending time with
those who are precious to us? One thing hasn’t changed over the years
and that is as parents we still want to give our kids the best start in life
that we can, but perhaps the definition of what that actually is has
changed.
As many of our parents and grand -parents had not the money to buy
expensive toys or resources for expensive holidays and excursions; they
instead spent time with us.
Over the past twenty years as credit has become readily available, our
children are growing up in a world dominated by commodities &
possessions which are acquired with such immediacy that there appears
little or no appreciation for them. This can also be said of us as their
parents as we rack up insurmountable debt in an effort to give our
children the latest gadget, toy, excursion or holiday.
In order to re-pay the debt both parents are required to work resulting in
our inability to spend the much needed time with our children.
Ask any child what they want the most, the answer might surprise you as it did me..
‘Mum can you read me a story’
While the recession we have entered might appear daunting for most, for
many a financial re-adjustment may be our salvation as we all learn to
identify what our real priorities are and what is really important in life.
"Ask your father"
“Dad, can I ride my bike to the shop?” “What did Mum say?” “She said to ask you.”
Do you have these sorts of conversations at your house? “Mum, can I..?” “Ask your father!”
The child is often left wondering who makes the rules in the house. It’s harder still on children whose parents don’t check with each other and simply make arbitrary decisions without consulting the other parent. These children get very confused, especially if they live between the two separated households of their parents.
Bedtime might be up to an hour or more different between the houses. Restrictive diets or television rules might apply in one house and not the other, compounding the confusion and frustration of the child.
Children thrive when they know the boundaries and limits on their behaviour. When the rules are consistently applied across time, households and by both parents, children know where they stand and tend to be more secure and stable.
Consistency is very hard to achieve and requires constant effort and cooperation between parents. Dad may have been raised with stricter rules than Mum so he acts tougher on the children. Mum might make up for his strictness by being softer. Then Dad sees Mum being soft and gets stricter to make up for her softness.
The result is that they polarise each other and become very inconsistent in their approach to family discipline. The children end up in the middle feeling rather bewildered about the rules.
It would be like us driving to work each day with the speed limit signs randomly changing from 40 kph one day to 110 kph the next.
The answer is not for Dad to soften up or for Mum to toughen up. The solution is achieved by both parents negotiating the rules that they can cope with. This requires them to meet in the middle somewhere and consistently apply the agreed upon rules.
Yes, of course it’s very difficult across two households, but when it is achieved the children benefit enormously.
By Dr John Waring
