Taming the Lecture Bug - A New TOS Review!!

You know the day you wake up and have one of those feelings? Or when you wake up and have a splitting headache or migraine? Or when you are just so tired? And then you start the day and before you know it, you are giving those all out lectures to each and every child in earshot. That's why I was so ready to learn some new strategies from reviewing the book Taming the Lecture Bug. Joey and Carla Link, of Parenting Made Practical, have put some really great practical steps to help you stop lecturing and help empower your children to think on their own and change their behavior while taking up their responsibilities.

The main goal or motto of Parenting Made Practical is to encourage and equip parents to raise obedient, respectful and responsible children in today's world. Isn't that what we really all want? I know I do. I was also thankful that for this review I received the 53 minute DVD called Taming the Lecture Bug and Getting Your Kids to Think so that my husband could hear the gist of the book since I knew he would not have time to read the book (he does want to read it, but this review is in his busy season at work.)

Both the book and video are a part of a series called Parent's Night Out.  The book has 12 chapters, 2 Appendices and then some additional resources recommended by the authors. As I mentioned the video is 53 minutes long and also comes with a worksheet that you can print out and follow along as they go through the talking points. The video was more like being in a comfortable room with the Links and asking questions as they talked in a very familiar tone with us and then even showed examples of WHAT we should be doing and HOW.

One of the things I pulled out of the video what was just in my face was to be ASKING the RIGHT questions. Sometimes we just want to tell our children when they have been reminding for the upteenth time the what for ... but we really need to be asking our children WHY they did such and such and whether they knew that was the right or wrong thing to do. Carla, in the video, also pointed out that sometimes we think a child has been taught the way to do something (like putting their clothes away after laundry or how to clean a certain area or do a specific chore) when in reality we didn't teach THEM ... we taught an older sibling. I knew when I heard this that I was certainly a bit guilty of this.

Some other things that struck me were that I need to have thought of the questions before I'm in the heat of the moment.  We also need to refrain from "laying in to our children where we lose our cool by 'sucking into our feelings' and then we lose the argument/situation." We need to dialogue with our children to get comprehensive answers for our questions. We need to help our children to go through the repentance, forgiveness, and restoration process to have a real change of heart.

Hubby thought the examples where you were able to see them interact in little vignettes were very helpful. And then they came back and did it a second time with the 'correct' way of interacting by asking questions. It seemed unrehearsed and was great to see it worked out instead of being left with trying to figure out what it looks like. My big takeaway from the video -- Ask questions to really understand what your children are thinking and the motivations behind what they are doing.

The book goes into much greater detail and descriptions then the video, as you would expect. At the end of each chapter there is a scenario of a real life situations of families that the Link's had either helped one on one or just through the books practical tips or from a seminar. Those were very helpful to me and allowed me just how I need to approach different areas. They gave specific and direct tools  to help change the behavior of our children by changing their heart at the root. They laid out guidelines for a foundation of what we needed to do first and then filled in the structure throughout the remainder of the book ... even taking time to specifically deal with 'teenage' issues or starting this process when you have 'older' kids.

The scenario expressed in chapter 3 with Jake and his mom and the teaching of responsibility through one simple (yet very hard for a parent) task was eye opening. How many times had I done a similar response to a problem? Many times. And the lecturing in our house is out of control. I know that ... and have for a while. One of the other things I learned in this chapter was that it will take time and that both spouses have to be on the same page. There are steps to training your child to be responsible and then we have to be observant and learn our children so we know where they need to be trained.

I call these the "Little Gems" that the Links pull out for us to really catch.

So true! Stay calm!!

There was another chapter that also stuck out to me where it told me to take a few days to watch how many times me or my husband had to repeat instructions to a child. Every one of those things takes time to break those areas and then it will take time to train the child the right way for each of those areas. This is not an overnight answer. It will take time on both the part of the parents and then also the child. The Links tell you to work on only one at a time and once it gets to about 3/4 of the way complete you can add the next item on your priority list. We can't get discouraged and we need to be consistent!

We will be working on the areas that I feel are "sore thumbs" for each of my children. But, there were a few other offerings from Parenting Made Practical that I will be sure to check out including Why Can't I Get my Kids to Behave and then the videos Dating, Courting, & Choosing a Mate ... What Works? as well as Navigating the Rapids of Parenting sound very interesting. You can view these and other reviews the Crew did by clicking the link below. You can also find them on Facebook.