I think one of the biggest lessons and challenges of childhood at just about all the stages and phases is learning about cause and effect. Whether it is learning that dropping a toy makes a loud crash and could possible break the toy, or learning that gossiping and being mean to a friend can cause them to leave us—the lessons of cause and effect are ongoing in childhood and we parents tend to learn a few ourselves…
Within reason, I think as parents we should NOT interfere with these many cause and effect lessons. If we catch the toy before it crashes or keep those training wheels on the bike too long—the lessons take longer to learn and can be even more painful or embarrassing. Often, I think our role as parents is not so much to preach and intervene, but to be on hand to add some narration and wisdom to our children’s experiences—and encourage and support them unconditionally as they struggle along with all the cause and effect lessons to be learned.
What happens when they stay up late watching television instead of doing homework? What happens if they misbehave in class? What happens if they sleep in and don’t get up to get the papers out in time? If mom or dad steps in and does the homework, covers up for the misbehavior, or delivers those papers instead—what lessons does the child learn? We certainly cannot postpone life’s important lessons indefinitely and why on earth would we want to?
As parents too, we learn about cause and effect—too much attention for negative behaviors tends to exacerbate the situation while an over-reliance on rewards and time outs may not make things better either. We learn as we go and we learn how our parenting choices affect our child and our families—not to mention our own peace of mind!
Also: Stay Open to New Insight
Paying for Inappropriate Behavior