Harper’s Parenting Tips – From Infant To Toddler www.bow-tiger.com

00:20 - Composure
00:47 - How though do we maintain our composure as parents?
03:29 - Consistency
03:44 - What we say should be very firm
04:50 - Compassion
05:00 - Hold them and make them feel safe
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Hey everybody, Harper Jones here with Bow-Tiger and you're watching Saturdays with Harper. Today we're going to talk about the 3 Cs of good parenting. The 3 Cs of good parenting are; composure, consistency and compassion. So the first one, composure, this is not for your child. Because as we all know toddlers cannot keep their composure all the time. They're in fact toddlers, their brains are developing and as toddlers they're allowed to have what we call toddler tantrums. It's going to happen, it's bound to happen. They're trying to understand who they are, what they are, etc., in the world. So we have to allow tantrums with our kids. That's not to say that we allow extravagant tantrums, but the frustration in little children, that is pretty normal.

How though do we maintain our composure as parents? Because most of the time I feel like we're more frustrated than the children actually are, yet we have to be the ones who are consistent in what we do and what we say, etc. and aren't the ones who freak out in a situation. The reason we want to do that first of all is because our children really reflect off of us. If we're angry they're likely to be angry, if we're sad they're likely to be sad. Their emotions kind of play off how we're feeling and how we're responding to things. So make sure that you, as best as you can maintain composure. I am the first to say that a lot of the time, maybe not a lot of the time. We'll say 50-50.

I'm not able to maintain my composure all by myself and everything's just hunky-dory, because I have a daughter who likes to test the limits and test me a little bit. So I have to find ways to kind of help myself out with this maintaining composure. The first thing that I do is I use the breathing technique, I'm a big fan of yoga. Of course in the morning and at night, to help me out throughout my day. But I really utilize the breathing technique of deep breaths. It has to be at least four seconds in, four seconds out. Doing about 10 of those deep breaths if I'm in a really stressful situation. Even if my daughter is in the room and she's trying to drive me up the wall.

If I can just close my eyes and take those deep breaths, it really helps me gain my composure back and figure out how to deal with the situation and how to help my daughter deal with the situation. There are times when she has driven me almost so crazy will say, over complaining or frustrating or maybe she's crying or she's throwing a big tantrum. What do we do at that point? Because it's very, very difficult. Especially for you moms or dads who are stay at home parents. I really applaud you, because you deal with this day in day out. Just all throughout the day and you never know when it's going to happen. It doesn't really matter the emotions you're having at the time, the only thing that matters is how can you better control the situation?

If you're so frustrated to the point of feeling angry, which we've talked about in another video. Go ahead and step out of the room. Make sure your child is in a safe area, like their bedroom. Just not anywhere like the kitchen or the bathroom where they can get into things. Make sure they're in a safe area, shut the door and maybe walk a little ways away from them. Whether it's just going outside in the backyard for a minute,

01:35 - Let them sort out their senses
02:00 - Start to help them understand where different places are in the world
02:35 - It helps children understand measurement and just basic elementary math
03:15 - It helps the mind in understanding how to follow instruction
03:55 - Cooking teaches children patience
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Hi everybody, Harper Jones here with Bow Tiger and you're watching Saturdays with Harper. And today we are going to talk a bit about cooking with our children, with our toddlers. What are the benefits to having our kids in the kitchen? It sounds not fun. It doesn't sound fun at all. But it actually can be a really fun experience. It helps you out, it helps your toddler out. Makes them feel like a part of a task that you're doing, and it also can be really stimulating and educational for them as well. So I'm just going to go over some of the key benefits today. Of course I'm sure you viewers, you guys have some other suggestions or comments. If you do have any comments please be sure to leave these comments on the videos. You can leave them on any of our social media pages and we'll make sure to mention it on one of our next videos as well.

Okay so we'll dive right into it, what's the first benefit to having your child help you out in the kitchen. Food, food is very different. Vegetable to vegetable, none are really the same, fruit to fruit etc., nothing's really the same. Everything has different consistency, different feels, different looks, different shapes, different colors, etc. Looks shapes, colors, all these things that I'm talking about consistency, these are part of the elementary things that we need to teach our children. Now in addition that, food has different smells, different tastes, different textures. These are all senses. This is something, this is what our children, our toddlers really use to start to understand or explore the world at all. So why not make that available to them in a task that we already have to do for the day which is cooking for our family. Involve them in the task and let them sort of use those senses, let their brain develop even faster while we're going through some of our daily chores at home.

Another thing that we can do is, food comes from different places whether it's grown in the ground, or in a tree, in a tropical environment or in a colder environment, the places that food grows geographically, this is something that we can start teaching our kids too. Start to help them understand where different places are in the world and maybe even take out a globe so you can show them where your cherries are from, maybe in North America, where some of your fruits come from, maybe down south. All these different things can help your child start to understand geographically what they're eating and where they're looking at on a map. Very, very helpful when they get to the school age, they'll have kind of a one up on everybody if you've been doing these kinds of tasks with them and activities with them at home.

Another thing that cooking does is it helps children understand measurement and just basic elementary math. If your child can start to understand at a young age what a full cup is, what half a cup looks like, a quarter cup, things like this you'd be amazed at how helpful that will be in their next few years and when they start to jump into school. Another thing and this is, there are two more things that I did want to mention. Providing or getting our children and our toddlers to follow instruction is sometimes the most difficult tas...

01:18 - Maybe a reward system
02:18 - Alecia's idea is not an extravagant reward system
03:05 - She gets to pick an extra snack
03:29 - Picking out dinner
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Hey, everybody. Harper Jones with Bow-Tiger, and you are watching our Ask Harper segment. Now last month, I switched it up a little bit. As you guys may or may not know, once a month I do an Ask Harper segment where I take your questions and I try to answer them on air. The answers that I provide you guys are from personal experience and also personal research. As being a mom, I do a lot of research on children's topics. And then, of course, being part of the Bow-Tiger family, research is really the name of the game for me or for my position.

Okay, so last month, we will get back to last month. Last month, I switched it up, and instead of answering your questions, I actually had a question for my viewers because I was having an issue with my daughter in regards to getting her to clean up any mess whatsoever. She basically refused, so I wanted to get a little bit of insight from you guys to see maybe different things that you've tried or ideas that you came up with to fight this little battle that I know a lot of us must go through with our kids.

So I did get a response, and this was probably my favorite response, and it's gonna sound a little funny to be my favorite response as I'm not normally prone to any reward system, but we will explain that in a minute. Now the response was from Alecia. And Alecia mentioned, "Maybe a reward system. Every day she helps clean, she gets a star," that's cool, "And if she gets a full week of stars, then she gets a small price from say a price shirt. She gets to pick an extra snack like ice cream or she gets to select or choose what everybody's having for dinner."

Okay, now, normally, I am not big on the reward system, and why am I not big on the reward system because I feel that a reward system sort of initiates the handout problem. Immediately, when a child thinks that they've done something good, they're doing that because they expect to get something in return. Now, does the real world work like that? Absolutely not. You have to do things because you know that they need to get done. You do not always do things and expect something in return. We know that, whether it's from work, whether it's from people, friends, family, etc., a lot of the times you're just doing things because you know it's the right thing to do, not necessarily because you're getting anything back.

And that will be why I don't like reward systems, but what I did like about Alecia's idea is that it's not an extravagant reward system. It actually...it's sort of on small scale. So this isn't necessarily something that's going to, you know, dent our children or give them the idea that they always need to expect something for doing something. The small price to her, I feel that I've... This is what I've started on actually, small price to her, I did stickers, did some little erasers. I did do some sugar-free candies, just different little things in there, but nothing that's super pricey or super extravagant.

And then the second two ideas that she provided, I haven't tried these out, but I really like this. One, if she didn't say pick an extra snack like going out for ice cream because then it's like a trip that the child gets to taste. You go out for ice cream and you get the big ice cream that cost you, you know, bookoos of dollars, with sprinkles and everything else. Well, no,

01:05 - Help them understand the emotion
01:47 - Let them get out the emotion and express it
02:20 - Talk about anger itself
02:36 - Explain the good things
03:34 - Let them understand the mean and the malicious things
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Hi everybody, Harper Jones with Bow-Tiger here, and you are watching Saturdays with Harper. Do any of you guys out there deal with an angry toddler or angry child? This isn't something that we maybe want to discuss in our parent groups or with friends, because you may feel that you are a little embarrassed if your toddler is maybe more frustrated than other toddlers, or gets more frustrated over certain situations. Of course, there are a lot of things that come into play with toddlers and the emotion of anger. So, you want to make sure at first you do go to your doctor and get everything checked out, just to make sure there isn't any underlying medical issue that's causing this frustration with your toddler.

Now, with that said, if all of that is clear, you need to figure out how to help your toddler through their emotions and how to help them deal with anger. Now, the best way to be able to deal with an emotion and help a child deal with an emotion, is to first help them understand that emotion. With toddlers we really have to get down to the simple basics of things, and anger to them is something that they feel, something that they can see. So, that's the first thing you want to do with your toddler. You want ask them, have them express to you how they think anger looks like. If somebody is really red in the face, they’re squinting their eyes, maybe they pull up their fists or maybe they’re crying. Maybe they've run away, maybe they don't want talk to people. That's what anger looks like. But have your toddler express to you what they think anger looks like.

The next thing you want to say, "Well, how does anger make you feel?" Let them kind of get out the emotion and express it, "It makes me feel sad, or it makes me feel scared." There are a lot of different emotions that play into anger in different ways that can make our children feel. And allowing them to express that kind of give them sort of a safe feeling, or more of an understanding of how they are feeling, and maybe we can help them walk through some of these frustrations.

Now once you've done that, once you know and your toddler knows that they have good understanding of what being angry, what that emotion really is, you want to talk about anger itself. Anger has been known -- and although this is probably not the most popular way to state anger -- but anger has been known to do a lot of good in the world.

Now has anger been good for the world? You can explain to your toddler the good things that people have decided to do because they were angry about something. Not the malicious things or the mean things that people decided to do because they were angry, but the stance it made them decide to take. Maybe they decided to stand up for something or somebody, because the way a person or something was being treated, really made them angry. So, it made them take a stance. You can of course lessen it down on a level so we're down on a toddler level, but ideas like that to let your toddler know that being angry isn't necessarily bad, they just have to understand and figure out how to sort of harness that frustration and that power to turn it into something good. And if we can teach our kids…I say this all the time, if we can teach our kids though at the toddler age, the toddler level,

00:35 - Prepping them at home
00:57 - Eye contact
01:35 - Staring contest
02:11 - We greet them
02:20 - How to properly say hello with a good handshake
03:31 - The last thing is the conversation itself
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Hi, everybody. Harper Jones here with Bow-Tiger, and you are watching Saturdays with Harper. And we're gonna talk a little bit about conversation with your toddler today, how to really prep them for conversation, whether it be with kids on the playground, teachers at school. There's a few things that you want to teach your child, and you can do at home, to kind of prep them for this sometimes very, very scary thing that they have to do. A lot of toddlers are really shy and somehow difficulty chatting or speaking with people. So prepping them as best as you can at home really, really will help them when they get into social situations. As I said, whether at the playground, at school, out with mommy and daddy, at a birthday party, whatever it may be, these little tips should definitely help your little ones when they're out and about.

Okay, so the first thing that I want you guys to work with your toddlers on is eye contact. Eye contact means you're engaging in the conversation. If you are having a conversation with somebody, but you're looking down at the ground, or you're looking all around, you're not really engaging that person. You're not really having the conversation with the person. You're having the conversation around the person. But it makes what you're speaking about, or what you're toddler is speaking about, and what the other person is saying less important or seem like less important, because you're not able to look them in the eye.

So how do we teach shy toddlers to look everybody in the eye? I mean, I used to have a very difficult time even getting my daughter to look at me in the eye, but I found one thing that really, really helped was having staring contest. I would have staring contest with her all the time. My other family members would have staring contest, friends, other kids would say, "Okay, it's a staring contest. You have to stare for 12 seconds, 15 seconds, as long as you can stare." Doing this and making it kind of a game initially made her really more confident in looking at somebody. She didn't have this issue wherein she had to kind of look around. She was very happy staring straight at somebody's face, looking right at them while she was having a conversation.

What's another thing that we normally do when we say hello to somebody or we meet somebody? We greet them. Well, we've already got the eye thing done. If your toddler is looking somebody in the eyes down and they can do that, the next thing they need to know how to do is how to properly say hello with a good handshake. A handshake is a nice way to, one, greet somebody, and also to let them know that they are important, and also to let your toddlers know the importance of their handshake. You wanna teach them a nice, firm handshake, a nice welcomed greeting, a warm greeting to whomever they're greeting. And the way I did this is just teaching it with a little web game.

I taught my daughter that with the web of my hand and the web of her hand, the proper handshake was done if those two webs touch. So she practiced. She actually would sit there and practice shaking her own hand, but she also practiced shaking my hand. And then I noticed when we’d go out, and I’d introduce her to somebody, and I'd say, "Honey, can you shake their hand? Can you say hello?

01:45 - I'm hoping maybe you guys, the viewers, can help me out
01:52 - My daughter doesn't want to clean up anything
03:01 - We have tried all sorts of things with her
03:18 - Let me know if you have any tips for me
03:24 - I’d like to try out the tips you give me and let you know which ones work
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Hey everybody, Harper Jones with Bow Tiger, and this is my monthly "Ask Harper" segment. Now as always at the beginning, I kind of explain to you guys what the segment's about, and how you can participate. Each month I do an "Ask Harper" segment where I answer questions that you guys send in, questions, comments, questions for me, questions about your kids, what can we do about this, that, and whatever, and I try to just give you guys my advice.

Of course, I'm only an expert by personal research and also experience, which I have a lot of, having raised my daughter. I'm still in the process. I'm learning with all of you guys, so I'd love to hear comments back from you guys. And if you have any tips for the other readers… or excuse me, viewers of Bow Tiger that would be great as well. We can really make this a collaborative effort as parents, and get through the toddler years together, and just make it a learning experience. Of course, it's a learning experience for everybody.

But it also can be a teaching experience. You guys can use some of the knowledge that you've gained while raising your kids, and help out the rest of our little community as well. So, feel free to leave any comments that you choose, or questions.

Now, for today I'm actually switching it up a little bit. This is normally an "Ask Harper" segment. Well, instead of asking me, or me answering questions from different viewers, I wanted to switch it up, and I'm going ask you guys. I'm actually in a little bit of a pickle with my daughter. Now, I've gone over an entire segment on how you can teach your children to clean up, and my daughter seems to have just hit a wall. And I'm hoping maybe you guys, the viewers, can help me out and let me know if you have any ideas on what we can do.

She doesn't want to clean up anything. It's not really more of a direct "No" that she gives you when you ask her to clean up, she certainly doesn't do that. But she really works her way around it, like "Oh, yes, yes, I’m going to do that," and she kind of veers away as you're veering away doing something else. And all of a sudden you realize, okay, she never picked up the blocks. Now she's on to coloring with her crayons. And then from there she goes from coloring with her crayons to trying to build a tent, or playing with her teddy bears or the dollies, or whatever. But she doesn't clean up, and I have tried quite a few things.

I have tried the cleanup song which she used to love, well that doesn't actually faze her any more. I have told her I’ll reprimand for not cleaning, so she’s gotten time out for not cleaning. I’ve tried to assist her and help her, and make it look like it's fun. We kind of like talk, she's got one of those net baskets that hang in the corner of the rooms, so you toss the teddy bear, or something. It's kind of like a basketball game. Most of the time it just makes the whole process of cleaning up the teddy bears a lot longer, but it is still fine. We have tried all sorts of things with her, and she just doesn't want to clean up her toys anymore.

I'm not sure where this new found laziness has come from, but it's certainly being experienced right now in our household. So you guys, as my viewers,