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#63: Parenting skills are essential

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Raising kids today has its challenges, which is why Parenting Skills are essential. Parenting Skills give parents and kids the tools they need to navigate the world around them successfully.

Parents face different challenges than previous generations. There are more pressures when it comes to school, work, and family, and many parents know that there is needs to be a better way to raise their kids than how they were raised.

Parenting Skills found on Smarter Parenting help families work together to build a strong connection and to solve problems. Parenting Skills help parents teach their children to make better decisions, prevent problems, give praise, and improve communication. 

Parenting skills prepare kids for being adults and work for children of all ages and are adaptable as your children grow. Putting effort in when your children are little, will provide returns as your child grows.

We have a parental responsibility to reach out and to get the help we need. If you need assistance, we invite you to find help. Our Parenting Coaching process will allow you to talk to a coach who can give your family precise information tailored to your family. We also invite you to visit SmarterParenting.com and learn the parenting skills of the Teaching-Family Model.

If you want a better relationship with your child, you have to learn Parenting Skills. They are crucial for establishing trust and building strong bonds. 

For Parenting Skills visit: https://www.smarterparenting.com/lesson/

For a free 15-minute Parenting Coach session, visit: https://club.smarterparenting.com/

Episode Transcript

This is episode 63. In this episode we will discuss Parenting Skills and why they are important. So let’s begin.

Smarter Parenting welcomes you to our podcast series, The Parenting Coach for ADHD. Here to heal and elevate lives is your Parenting Coach, Siope Kinikini.

Hello everyone. I hope everybody’s doing great. I am doing fantastic, and I am actually excited to be talking today about Parenting Skills and why they’re important, specifically now, in our current age and what is happening. Now, I do need to preface this whole podcast and this vlog by telling you this was actually something that transpired in a conversation that I had with a grandparent who’s currently raising three of his grandchildren. His children, his son had these children, and unfortunately, under the circumstances, his son could not raise these children. So, these children were actually allowed to stay with grandpa, and grandpa is raising them.

However, it’s a different ball game for him because everything is so new in the way that he needs to interact and work with this child. And there’s a lot of outside influences as well, interested in the wellbeing of the children. So while I was talking to Bill, we’ll call him Bill. While I was talking to Bill, he was telling me about what it was like for him to grow up. He grew up in a very different time. During his time, the way that he was brought up, he didn’t really communicate a lot with his father and he did communicate with his mother, but even then, things were not really about communication. Things weren’t really about families working together.

It was pretty much where parents said something and children did it. That’s the era that he grew up in, and he raised his children a little less restrictive than his own parents. However, it was pretty similar based on what he had told me. And so, we talked a lot in-depth about this whole idea of why there is such a need these days for parents to reach out and find help, and Parenting Skills to help their children grow.

In our discussion, it was fascinating for me, because I grew up in an era as well that was very different than the environment that we find ourselves in today. One thing I do want to say is that times have changed. Things have changed. The pressures and the demands of life for many families, the economic strain that is involved for many families is very different than previous decades. There was a time when a father could go and work and sustain and support his family.

What I’m finding with a lot of the families that I have worked with in the past, is that a father may have lost his job either to a recession or for some other reason, and mother has stepped in or there is a single parent involved where two people are not raising a child together. And so, the dynamics have changed. The demands of our environment and our culture have changed. The influence of outside sources to our children, those have changed as well.

When I was talking to Bill, we’ll call him Bill, when I was talking to Bill, I asked him about what it was like for him as a child. What did he do? Because we were talking about setting up some structure for playtime for his grandchildren, and he said that he would leave early in the morning to go hang out with friends, he told his parents where he was going, but then he wouldn’t come back until the sun started to come down. There was no cell phone, his parents just trusted he was safe wherever he was and that nothing bad would happen.

And so, I mean, if we think and we put that now into our own day, that is actually a scary thought, that we would not have some type of awareness about where our children are. I mean, most parents are checking in on their children daily. I know a mother who actually checks on her phone, gave her daughter a phone in order to locate where she is whenever she wanted, just to be sure that she was where she needed to be and that she was safe. And so very, very different time periods.

In discussing this with Bill, we talked about the importance of having the concrete Parenting Skills to help his children navigate the world that we live in now. As well as create strength and some support, mental health support for him and his grandchildren. In talking to him, this is what I learned from him, is that he loves his grandchildren. He absolutely loves his grandchildren, almost more than he loves his own kids. And I’m saying that jokingly, but there is a truth to that.

In our discussion, he’s like, “I would do anything for these kids. I love these kids.” I’m not a grandparent myself, but I do know that there is a special relationship between grandparents and grandchildren based on my own relationship with my grandparents. I’m just going to share this really quick personal experience with my own grandparent, in that, I remember when I was a young child, I thought I was going to get in trouble at home, and I didn’t want to go home. And so, I was standing outside my house thinking, “I don’t know, I don’t want to get in trouble.” It was a school issue, and it’s like, “I don’t want to go home because I don’t want to face the music.”

And so, what I did is I just decided to walk around the block. And what happened was, is I ended up walking farther out, out of the block, and then walking around for a bit. And next thing you know, I found myself at the door of my grandparents’ house. And they live a couple of miles away, and when I say a couple of miles, we’re not talking two or three, we’re talking farther than that. And I walked to their house. Grandparents just, obviously, opened the door and let me in. They fed me, they called my parents to let them know where I was, and I just felt safe there. I felt really, really safe there.

So what I’m saying is, for Bill and these children, he feels this really close connection with them, that he wanted to help them all along the way and he wanted to be an active part of their lives. And so, we discussed the importance of having Parenting Skills and that he cannot rely on what he knew previously to raise these children because the times have changed, and if he wanted to have a better relationship with them, he had to learn some very concrete Parenting Skills.

In our discussion of it, it was really fascinating to see just how much he loved his own father, but yet he didn’t feel absolutely connected to his father. He loved his father, he just didn’t feel as connected to him as he wants to be connected to his own grandchildren. So, we began the journey of learning all the Parenting Skills that we teach here in Smarter Parenting, of Effective Communication, Problem Solving, Preventive Teaching, all of those. We went through all of these skills in order to help him learn how to create an environment that was safe for these grandchildren, and also that would nourish and strengthen his relationship with them.

We are living in a very different time frame than even when we were being raised by our parents. The reality is, is that even from the time I was a teenager and now raising my own teenager, things have drastically changed, and the world that they are involved with now has changed quite a bit. And so, I’ve had to adapt what I was raised with to the current needs of my child. And I foresee that these things will continually change as we go. However, those core concepts that create and establish good relationships, those things stay pretty much the same. They don’t change.

Effective communication is going to be helpful, whether or not you did it in the 70s, the 80s, the 90s, 2000, 2010s, 2020s, it’s stayed the same. So learning these skills are things that carry over. These things are things that you can use now that actually have longterm effects in the future. In raising my own daughter, and I’m getting kind of personal here, but I think it’s important for you to kind of know a little bit more about me and my background. But in raising my own daughter, what I found is the effective communication piece was essential to teach her when she was younger, and that it is a piece that I continually have to go back and use as she’s growing older, in order for us to continue to have that relationship.

So, effective communication. Last night we sat around the table, we ended up talking until 12:30 in the morning, just about school, just about what’s going on in her life, what’s happening. She is at the age right now that a young man actually asked her to go on a dance. Asked her to go on a dance, which is new for me as a father. I knew it would happen because she’s lovely, she’s a wonderful girl, very responsible and very kind. So, I was super excited for her, and yet there’s a part of me it’s like, “Oh man, I’m kind of nervous and scared about this.” And so, we sat around the table and we talked about things.

We talked about expectations. We talked about, I use preventive teaching to help her know what to do if she’s uncomfortable in a situation. We Role-played it. I mean, as you can see, all of the Parenting Skills that I have been using with my child that are in the Teaching-Family Model, which are the same skills that you’ll find on Smarter Parenting, are things that I’m continually using with her. Yeah, these Parenting Skills are pretty eternal concepts. I would say that you will continually use them as they grow.

Now, I will say this, as she has grown, the way that they are being implemented by me and my wife are a little bit different because before, Effective Communication when she was super young was us listening and doing a lot of reflective listening with her where we would repeat back what we hear. Now when we communicate we have to listen to what she’s saying and then interpret that, and sometimes it’s off because she has her own perception of things and so we have to clarify and work through that. And so, we are still learning, but we’re still using the exact same skills, and those skills have actually translated to greater relationships between all of us.

It’s fun to have a teenager, and I know a lot of parents don’t feel that way, but once you get to a point where you can have these relationships and still use Parenting Skills, you start to feel very connected to your child in a way that is unique and very, very powerful. My daughter is being raised in a different time. She introduces me to all the new things. We talked about social media and I was talking to her about Facebook and Instagram, and she’s not on any of those. She has chosen not to participate in those.

However, she did tell us about other social media platforms that are out there and so I’ve become very familiar with TikTok. Yes, I’m an old guy but I’m very familiar with it because it’s something that she’s interested in, and we talk about it. We talk about safety, we talk about being aware, we talk about working through questions and questioning everything you see online, that really what you see is an illusion when people are presenting their very best selves on social media. So we talk about all of that and we are using all of the same Parenting Skills that we’ve been using for a while to continue this conversation.

When she turns 18, obviously, she’s legally an adult at that point, and our whole goal was to continue to nurture this relationship so when she is 18-years-old, we can continue to be an influence in her life to help her make good choices, but also give her the independence and know that we did all we could as parents to prepare her for that path. All of that comes from parenting skills.

So, in going back to talking about Bill, with Bill, embraced this idea, this whole concept that, yeah, we do need to raise our children a little bit different in this time and this era by using some of these Parenting Skills effectively. And raising his grandchildren in a way that they will connect and attach emotionally to him, but also feel independence and at the same time respect their boundaries. And help them grow and learn these life skills that they’re going to continue to use throughout their lives.

I’ve gone maybe too personal on this podcast, I hope you don’t mind. The point that I’m bringing across is that there are generations and there are people who feel, well we don’t need Parenting Skills. No, we do need Parenting Skills. They’re very important. And it’s important for us to learn to adapt to the needs of our children because it’s very different. Now, for children who have ADHD, I’ve been working with a lot of parents online, which has been great. And in fact, if you haven’t signed up, sign up for a free 15-minute coaching session. I’ll help coach you through the skills with specific issues.

But with those children who are struggling with ADHD, I’m often working with parents who are new to the realm of ADHD and they’re not exactly sure how to proceed. And so, that’s where all of these skills come in very, very handy in helping them along. So we give them exactly the tools that they need in order to work with their child and they work through it, and they’re able to work through it. To any of the naysayers out there saying, we don’t need Parenting Skills, or I was raised this way and I’m going to raise my children that way, I would highly suggest you think about that.

You honestly think about that, and realize that we can’t just copy what we received in the past. We have to adapt and adjust, and we can do things better. There’s always a better way of doing things. That’s progress and that’s growth. Anyway, so Parenting Skills. Why they’re important? They’re important because our children need it. They’re important because we need it. They’re important because they help strengthen relationships over the long term. We need it because it teaches them independent living skills. We need it. We all need it because it makes the world a better place. That’s why.

So to all my friends out there, to anyone who is like Bill, who’s like, “I don’t know.” Really, take some time. Look at the lessons on the Smarter Parenting website. Learn a skill, practice it with your child. You can choose anyone that’s there, work through it. Or if you have a very specific issue that you want to address, call me up and you can sign up for that on the Smarter Parenting website under the coaching tab, and I’d be happy to communicate with you and we can see exactly where we go from there.

Right, that’s it for me. Remember, Parenting Skills are essential. They’re very important. I am so grateful that I was able to learn this while my child was still young and that we’ve continued to use it over time because it’s proven to be very powerful in maintaining our relationship with each other. All right. That’s it for me. I hope you have a great day and I’ll see you again next time. All right. Bye.

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS PODCAST

Behavior skills of the Teaching-Family Model

Ep #5: ADHD strategies for kids with Tanya Stevenson

Ep #12: How to teach behavior skills

Ep #14: Compound effect of behavior skills

Ep #22: Mastering ADHD behavior skills

Ep #46: Understanding the ABC’s of Behavior

Ep #47: Mastering Observe and Describe

Ep #48: What it takes to change behavior

Ep #49: Compound effect of Effective Communication

Ep #50: Changing behavior through praise

Ep #51: Finding Success with Preventive Teaching

Ep #52: How to fix negative behaviors

Ep #53: The importance of Following Instructions

Ep #54: Teaching kids to make better decisions

Ep #55: Reducing bad behavior with Effective Negative Consequences

Ep #56: Reinforcing good behavior using Effective Positive Rewards

Ep #57: Teaching kids to Accept No Answers without issue

Free 15-minute ADHD coaching mini-session

Ep #59: The ADHD Smarter Parenting Coaching process

Ep #40: When do I need ADHD Parenting Coaching

Ep #41: How I coach parents of kids with ADHD

Blog post: What are good parenting skills? Why parents need behavior skills

Blog post: Smarter Parenting skills work even during a tornado!

Blog post: Using Parenting Classes to make you a better parent

Podcast sponsor Utah Youth Village

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Podcast Transcript

The transcript text is below. You can also download the PDF file of the transcript here.

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