Dealing with child aggression
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Aggression, on a funnier side may give an indication to a level that parents feel that they have failed at parenting. It's not so important why you as a parent aren't effective at times- what's more important is what you are doing to make the situation better. Some parents feel helpless at the time of the awkward situation created because of the child's unruly behavior.
While visiting a mall or a shopping complex, it is a common sight watching children throwing tantrums or even being aggressive right in the public view trying to influence their parents on buying a toy or a game of their own choice which is termed as a forbidden fruit for them.
The parents need to understand the problem rather than imposing it on the child as his own problem and getting all aggressive about it. They fail to control their child's behavior. Some parents jump right in, as soon as they hear or see a problem and get in the child's face. This would only escalate the situation and it will teach your child that aggression is how you solve your problems. In contrast some parents are more passive but their child may become aggressive due to his parents' indifferent attitude and not dealing with issues. The crux is we can be gentle, quiet person and an effective parent but still we need to be firm and set clear limits.
There are many ways to handle child's aggression. We need to be consistent. We can't be ignoring their behavior on one day and respond by screaming at them the next day. Sometimes we need to take our child out of a situation, to help him regain control of his emotions.
At home we can make them follow the rules and ensure they follow them. Writing them down is the best thing since this will make them apply the right behavior and make the behavior concrete in their mind.
There is another situation supposed to be most commonly experienced. A child commits mistake at first place but then blames it on the other for same without taking accountability. The parent needs to make the child realize that the best way of solving things out is dropping down the weapons rather than pointing them out at the opponent. This is one way of making the children polite and assertive rather than being aggressive.
Ways need to be developed to have problem solving conversations. For example, whenever a little child threatens his sibling to get off the computer the parent is advised to intervene calmly so that the whole situation is managed amiably.
It's common to see misconduct such as quarrels and aggressive exchanges occur in day care and preschools as well.
No wonder this is the way that these children learn to get along with each other but then you cannot let the extremes happen and sit down in ignorance. We also need to coordinate well with the caretaker so that we both are consistent.
We should check in with the caretaker regularly so as to make sure that the behavior is improving.
If you have a child in primary school and you see symptoms of aggression in him, you must keep his behavior under check by keeping proper communication with the teachers concerned there.
Changing and becoming a more effective parent can be a very long process. But we can make it short by taking small steps everyday to reach our goal of good parenthood faster. Never feel discouraged. Just like your children give their tests in school, it is your time to give tests as a parent and succeed in parenthood.
References
https://www.psychology.org.au/publications/tip_sheets/bullying/