Sparing a Thought for Others: Empathy

I remembered once I was at KFC witnessing a 4-5yrs old displaying empathy. This boy was misbehaving at his table and overturned a packet of French fries onto the floor. The mum instructed a time-out by getting the boy to face the wall. When the staff who was in her 60s came to clean the mess, the mum asked the boy to turn around and looked at the mess he had created. Most importantly, the mum gently lectured the boy about the inconvenience he had caused, not just upsetting his mum but also troubled the granny to clean up his act. The boy took initiative to apologize to the staff and the mum without reminder. This is definitely a successful case whereby the mother had taught the concept of empathy at such young age.

Teaching empathy is the art of understanding another's feeling or situation. Not easy to teach but can be done.

There was another incident that hit me hard when I was waiting for the doctor; a family of 4 came into the clinic few years ago. The daughter, a P2-3 gal in her school uniform with a tie, was playing with her sister who is around 4-5 years old. The nurse came and distributed 2 stickers to the gals. The older gal received the one with a big golden star while the younger child was given a sticker that was filled with multiple, small iridescent stars. The younger gal was making a big fuss about her sticker coz she didn't like it and insisted in having her older sister's one. Instead of giving in to her request, the older gal taught the younger gal to appreciate her gift. She explained the value of the gift and showed her that her sticker was even more beautiful and attractive as compared to her sticker with only one star. I was really taken aback by what this gal has said... This gal at such young age is displaying a strong sense of appreciation for another while inculcating the same value of being grateful in her younger sister. The parent has obviously done a wonderful job in bringing out the best in their kids by instilling and nurturing strong values in their children at a very young age.

Start by sharing stories to your baby today. Choose those with strong moral content.

For example, if you are sharing the story on Goldilocks and the 3 bears. Pause at points where Goldilocks ate up the baby bear's porriage and broke its chair. Use this as entry points to teach your child how baby bear will feel when he knew what happened to his food and chair. Act it out if you can to show your child the expression that is connected to the mood. The tearing, crying, whining... Babies and children learn through play and stories which are best act out.

Constantly expose your child to stories also help build comprehension skills at young age while sharpening their senses at the same time.

For my son, he enjoys stories with animal illustrations like Chicken Licken coz there will be the sly fox hiding away in the background. For older kids, get them to locate the fox. Take this time to question the motive of the fox in the story. This helps expose your child to develop understanding of another's intention which is also training empathy.

Just drop me a question here if you need any more examples, clarification or recommendations of books.

Taming the Shrewd in Your Child

The yelling, screaming and perhaps rolling on the floor are common sights and sounds of a child who is throwing a tantrum since he cannot get what he wants. My boy in his 3.5 years old now havs undergone the terrible twos period. We never spank him coz we do not want to use the cane as the deterrent to stop the act.

However, he does test our limits all the time. In fact, children should continue to do so even when they react adulthood coz we adults too are guilty of testing the patience and tolerance level of others especially our spouses or coworkers

In such a circumstances, the constant discipline and review of the behaviour is required all the time. Every child needs to know the reason for the disciplining session. For e.g. previously my boy liked to swing around the metal pole and threw tantrum in the mrt train during peak periods. This annoyed many passengers who were tired from work. The first time I told him to stop his act. He stopped but continued his mischief shortly. The second time, I reminded him to stop his act but added the consequence of leaving the train despite not reaching our mrt stop yet. He stopped temporarily and repeated the act again. There was no excuse to repeat the offence. We just alighted from the train. My boy was yelling and crying. However, I told him that he ignored all the reminders and he had to pay for the consequencee. Always reinforce the idea that you do what you preach.

Regardless of whether your child can understand the intention of every explanation, get him to acknowledge his wrong behaviour and never to repeat the mistake again. Then you can further add if the wrong behaviour has caused inconvenience to others (e.g. the passengers on the train are annoyed with him after a tired day, we get to our destination late coz we have to do a disciplinary lesson at place that is not the destination etc)

Teach him to empathize at a young age. This is definitely possible at the age of 2years old.

Furniture and Home Ideas for the Growing Needs

Incorporating the child friendly elements in our adult world is no easy feat. Lots of deliberate consideration has to be taken into account when selecting furniture.

My boy playing with a shape puzzle in his Montessori-
inspired room with lots of shelves!

To kickstart learning, the home environment was laid out like a Montessori-inspired classroom. Shoe racks become temporary 3-tier bookshelves that were laid around the perimeter of the room. Everything in his room was kid-size and even the tables and chairs are bought specially to accommodate his growing years from infant to toddler. Educational toys and play toys are placed in trays and basket to facilitate easy handling for the tiny hands.

Visual stimulation in terms of animal printed wall stickers, inspirational banners, flash cards and educational posters can be found in almost any part of the house except for the master bedroom and toilets.

Big anti-slip play mats are laid minimize running accidents from our hyperactive boy. Such mats act as a clear geographical boundary of his personal space, away from our adult space. Anti-slip stool also functions as stable stand in the bathroom for our little one to wash his hands. Those foam hand wash dispenser makes teaching our son easy to master the art of washing his hands.

Materials including art supplies are always made accessible to our boy and books of different genre and the 2 main languages are placed in baskets that are placed around the house. Some of the props such as fireman hat with rain boots, rock star’s sunglasses for role play are made available for dramatization.

Glass and fragile objects should be out of reach for the inquisitive toddlers. Electrical devices with cables should be carefully kept away from them. As the little one may enjoy pressing all the switches in the home, securing the rarely used switches on.

As your child grows older, some of the furniture like shoe rack shelves can be returned to their original uses. Exercise flexibility and creativity when you are redecorating your house to meet the developmental needs of your child. Also keep in mind of your budget as you will always want to maximize the lifespan of the furniture bought to accommodate the different ages of your children.

I always get much inspiration from IKEA and school’s classroom. It doesn’t have to be your child’s school as it can be all around you if you have childcare centre near your home. Take a peek and you will enjoy the sights and sounds of the classroom scenes. Make your home as welcoming and cosy as possible. When my students and friends come over to my home, they always comment the home looks very cosy and inviting. Some even like the kindergarten classroom concept in my home. Have fun and play around with the different ideas. Who knows, yours might just work!