Are they even listening to me?

Extract from 'Understanding children and teens' (due out November 9th)

On the whole child clients do tend to listen to Practitioners, coaches and teachers so this is more for parents.

Do you find that you are listened to at work but not at home?

I’m guessing the answer to that question is “yes!” because I’ve heard it a thousand times and experienced it myself on a daily basis.

Would you believe me if I told you that you speak differently with your work colleagues than how you speak to the kids?

But can you imagine our colleagues ignoring us as our children do, or answering back or shouting? No of course not. This is because there is respect, a little fear for the consequences and also very little emotional investment. When we speak, we expect them to listen and they know this and do so. They know and accept that if they do not, then there would be consequences.

So how about when we speak to our children and teens. Are there consequences? Yes there are but what usually will happen is that instead of speaking so they listen, we speak expecting them not to …