Teach Your Child To Negotiate For Life
Your child will encounter moments in life when they will have to negotiate. Actually, parents know that their children are excellent negotiators at home, but what about outside of it? Your child will encounter situations where his own wants and needs collide with those of other people.
Learning to handle these situations is a vital life skill that children need to start practicing as soon as possible. Try and reinforce the following principles, whenever you have the opportunity, so that your little one learns, little by little, to defend what he considers fair for himself.
How to teach children to negotiate for life
It is necessary to consider the following tips to teach children to negotiate for life:
- Help your child understand that life is not a competition. It’s not just about getting what you want, it’s about finding solutions where everyone gets something of what they want. If two people have given in a bit but walk away happy, it is a far greater success than getting away with it but leaving someone else feeling crushed.
- Emphasize that maintaining a respectful and considerate attitude toward the other person is essential for negotiations to work . If people feel attacked, they will not be in the mood to compromise.
- Remind your child that one way to do this is to openly and directly acknowledge the other person’s feelings, needs, and concerns. Phrases like this may help: “It is horrible to feel left out. Let’s find a way to do it so that it is fair to everyone. “
- Successful negotiation depends on both listening and speaking. Encourage your child to ask questions that help him fully understand the other person’s point of view.
- Emphasize the importance of keeping an open mind. Help your child to think flexibly and creatively when searching for solutions.
- Reinforce the importance of keeping a cool head. If things heat up, teach your little one that the best way forward might be to take a break for a few minutes. Then return to the negotiating table once everyone has calmed down.
Laying the foundations to negotiate
You can lay the foundation for these skills even with very young children using games that teach the value of collaboration or commitment to achieve their goals.
Comprehension and memory games in which competitors have to answer questions about narrated stories in exchange for candy or other symbolic rewards can also train children to listen carefully.
Simple pieces collecting games can be modified so that players can trade pieces, lost, and have to negotiate and compromise accordingly. Older children can learn a lot about the principles of negotiation from games like Monopoly.
The importance of negotiating for life
Negotiations in life that teach and emphasize fairness and understanding must be promoted in order to walk in the shoes of the other person. Negotiations that end in results that are as favorable as possible for all parties involved.
Children receive power, independence and respect when their parents allow it and encourage them to negotiate, even as young children.
Deciding with a parent what clothes to wear, what breakfast foods to eat, how neat their room should be, what time is best for homework, etc., can be good opportunities to teach children negotiation.
Parents who embrace negotiation and compromise as a family value raise children who know that their opinions, feelings, and needs will be honored and respected. Children who are taught this way are also much more likely to return this honor and respect to others.
It may be difficult, but not impossible
It can be difficult to see the correlation between successfully negotiating a later bedtime with the nine- and seven-year-olds, and coming to a reasonable compromise with your teenager about a weekend curfew. But this comparison is valid and necessary.
The respect, honor, and empathy that build up during successful parent-child negotiations during the younger years often result in pleasant negotiations and compromises in the teen years. Remember that negotiating with your children is not giving up, because you are teaching them one of life’s important lessons.
