As a single parent, you will be providing your children with all types of building blocks to help that child grow into a strong and independent adult. The steps along the way are exciting, trying, sad, difficult, rewarding, and a number of emotions. One of the most important building blocks you will give to your children is that of honesty and trust. Unfortunately, we live in a world that has created a sense of dishonest and distrust so your job is to show your child that some people can be accepted.
By providing your child with elaborate praise, you will help encourage trust. In addition, remember that children, especially young children, will watch and listen to everything you do and say. Therefore, your actions will help instill honesty and trust in your children as well. For instance, if you saw someone in the grocery store line drop $5 but you pick it up and put it in your purse instead of handing it back, your child is watching. However, if you pick the money up and notify the person ahead of you, your child has just witnessed something spectacular, something that will forever be engrained.
Use the time with your smaller children for teaching them about both honesty and trust such as a demonstration game. In this case, you could provide your child with different scenarios, asking him or her if what you are saying is true or not true. Make this game time fun. You might say, “An elephant is smaller than an ant – is this true or not true?” Perhaps you could point to your head and tell your child, “This is my arm – is this true or not true?”
At first, you would keep things like and fun but as the child grows older, you can begin to incorporate life lessons about bad touching, lying, stealing, bullying, and so on. Another great way for the single parent to provide a child with building blocks of trust and honesty is by teaching the child about long-term consequences associated with being dishonest or from lying. In this case, you might explain that when someone cheats on a test in school, the teacher would find out and the child would fail the test.
Obviously, the things you teach and the way in which you teach it will vary depending on the child’s age but the outcome will be the same. Trying to do it all on your own is tough sometimes but by taking the time to instill the important things of life into your child will mean you end up with a responsible and respectful child.
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