Four Brief Examples of Teaching Children Responsibility

By Crystal Owens, BA, CPC

We all want our kids to be responsible – that is, to do good independently. We all know adults who are irresponsible, and we see how it negatively affects their lives, and we want our kids to do better!

But how do we teach responsibility? Here are 4 short examples that may help you:

 

—A lady had 2 kids in early elementary, and they could never seem to remember to turn off their bedroom lights. The husband would get home from work and would see the lights on even though the kids were in the den watching tv; he would turn the lights off, then walk to the den and angrily tell the kids, “I JUST TURNED YOUR BEDROOM LIGHTS OFF AGAIN.” The kids always felt terrible, but this didn’t help them remember.

The mom decided to try another tactic. Whenever she saw a bedroom light on, she would go to the child and say pleasantly, “You forgot to turn your light off! Please go do it!” And the child would jump up and do it.

In about a week the children were turning their lights off without being told. So here’s the question: why did the mom’s way work?

There are 2 reasons.

Because the dad always spoke angrily about the issue, the kids’ focus was on his ANGER, not on the wasted electricity. When the mom spoke pleasantly, the focus remained where it should be.

Second, the kids had to turn off the lights themselves.

 

—Here’s a common one: your children have laundry hampers in their bedrooms, but throw their dirty clothes on the floor. You’ve tried what was done in the first example – nicely sending them back to put it in the hamper – but they still aren’t learning to do it independently. The problem is, they just need more practice [said tongue in cheek]. So, the next time a child blithely tosses his dirty clothes on the floor, take the child up to his room, explaining in a pleasant way that he needs more practice picking up his dirty clothes so that he can remember to do it by himself.

Have him pick up his dirty clothes and put them in the hamper, and say, “One.” Toss his dirty clothes on the floor and have him pick them up again, and say, “Two.” Do this till he has practiced ten times, then say nicely, “Is that enough practice to help you remember?”

When my son was 7 or 8, we only had to “practice” picking up dirty laundry twice, and he MAGICALLY could remember after that!

 

—Does your child take way too long to finish tasks? Help them to be responsible workers by planning some sort of activity for after they finish. This is how this strategy works: You send your child to sweep the kitchen floor, a task that a child can do in less than 10 minutes. You look in the kitchen in 15 minutes and find the child is less than half done. You say, “Dad is ready to go outside and play catch with you guys! Oh…you’re not ready yet…let me know when you’re done and you can join the others outside.”

 

—And last, one GREAT way to teach responsibility is to let your child experience the consequences of being irresponsible. Now….if you have not laid the groundwork by training your child, then it is cruel of you to throw them to the wolves like this, BUT if you HAVE trained your child appropriately in this area, then it makes perfect sense to not bail them out, to let them experience the consequences.

If your child loses his cell phone, don’t buy him another one. If it is a situation where he HAS to have one for safety reasons, then let him work off the purchase price of the cheapest phone you can find, and let him pay for the minutes.

 

Thank you so much for reading this article! My aim is to help families live happier lives!

 

If you have any comments about this article, send them to Learn2bHappy at yahoo.com. If you need a private session with me you can contact me at the same email, or through my facebook page. I am a certified, experienced life coach, specializing in relationships and family issues.