Trying new things

How do we encourage small children to try new things, to risk failure, to risk a sad outcome, to risk discomfort. There are some strategies that people use, the most common being to hype them up, both the child and the event. This has massive drawbacks because the child then has expectations that, if not met, cause devastation and disappointment, even if nothing bad happened at the event.
Another less used strategy might be to tell them as little as possible and let them find out for themselves. This also is not great, I rarely like to do something I know nothing about. When preparing for my first beach mission for example, I wanted a blow by blow description of what each hour of each day would hold.

I think the best way is to create a pattern where new things are tried regularly, with a choice not to, and accepting the natural consequences of trying each thing. Trying a new food may have the consequence of liking it or not liking it. If a child does not want to try an optional event or food, just say "OK, it is Simon's turn now then" and move on without a fuss. That way she will see that her decision not to try was firstly respected, and secondly did not receive any attention.

The worst things to do seem to be to firstly push the child into trying. This may mean that, even if the new thing is fun (like a water slide) they will choose not to enjoy it on principle. They may think they genuinely didn't enjoy it, then blame you for making them do something they didn't want to do. Secondly gushing and attending their tears with "Thats ok, you can have a lolly" This draws attention to and embarrasses the child in tears. A quite hug if the child reaches tears on their own, otherwise d not making a big deal of it is a good strategy.

I remember times when I accidentally cried in public, people crowd around so you can't escape, they ask you what the matter is requiring talking, they tell you that is no reason to cry (obviously it was) they tell you to stop crying. None of these are helpful, a quiet shoulder or by myself is best. I especially hate attention being drawn to it. If a child is crying because of perceived failure, they will also not want attention drawn to it.

Everyday new things to try with children to develop a pattern of easily trying and making decisions about new things might be:
Foods, active games, water fights, tickle fights, water slides, diving through legs in the pool, feeling different textures and substances, sleepovers, pillow fights, tasting different things, cooking new things, going new places, meeting new people.

They need to be new but not compulsory. Getting on a plane may be new, but it is also compulsory if the whole family is going somewhere.

No Chocolate

I went to stay with my sister in Perth for a week and in that time we talked about many things. One of the things she mentioned was that consuming chocolate affects how she can deal hormones. Going off chocolate in the lead up week means that the whole process is less painful and she does not need drugs. I have also heard that it can bring on migraines in some people. She also mentioned that last year she did a "No-treats-vember" for a month in November, no lollies, chocolate, ice cream, take out or anything.

I have decided to combine these ideas and, from tomorrow the first of May, I will begin a month of no chocolate. I will tick days off the calendar that I have not had chocolate in. This will mean that firstly I will eat no chocolate (that can only be good for me) and secondly I will be able to test my sisters theory.

In June I will ideally go No chocolate and No Whatever-I-replaced-chocolate-with, because I will replace it with something. If it is fruit that I use as a replacement, I will obviously not ban that.  

Making decisions

The 7 yr old boy, the eldest in the family, feels like he is not getting enough playing time and that I am constantly nagging at him to do his jobs. Both of these things are true but neither are things I can help. After he brought these feelings to me I thought about it for a few days then said "The amount of playing time you get each day depends entirely on your choices and actions. If you choose to do your violin straight away, and do your homework without mucking around, then you will get more playing time. It will now be your choice WHEN you do your violin and homework but you are not allowed to play or read until they are done. You can choose to lie on the floor and put off the inevitable but it is your playing time you will waste."

We started this on Monday and it went pretty well, I reminded him that he could choose when but he was not allowed to complain about how much playing time he got. On Tuesday he collided with the boundary I set and sulked for 2 hours about having a bath before dinner. Unfortunately when and if he has a bath is not up to him. Also he hopes to put things off indefinitely and just not do them at all, however I am hoping to teach him to fulfill responsibilities before having leisure time.

It is already an improvement and he can't blame me for no play time. Since it is his decision to do violin practice now, he is more proactive. I will keep it up till the end of term and then re evaluate if it is working or not.

Cars

I have driven a few interesting cars in my fairly short driving life. One was the camry, this was fairly straight forward except that the speedo needle stopped telling us how fast we were going after we hit 60 km an hour. I fixed that with a pocket knife.

I also drove the verada. This was called The Music Bus because when MEC first started it shuttled most of the music team and their instruments to and from church. This one developed a few interesting quirks; firstly the doors handles disintegrated so that you needed special training before being able to exit the car. Next the the right hand windows, while going down with amazing ease, had difficulty going back up. Then, at intersections, we discovered we had an automatic that stalled to the point where it did it four times in a 5 minute drive one day. Then the speakers merely produced a grinding noise when the radio was on.

Whenever another person drove the car, I would diligently explain all these facts and what to do about them. This does not stop every single mechanic from winding down the driver window (a real problem since it rain here a lot). The funniest one though was when my aunt had to drive it and forgot about the window till she tried to wind it up, then couldn't open the door from the inside and had to get help. She decided I needed a new car.

The last car that I will tell you about is the Nanny car I use while I am here. I named it very early on in the piece, it is called the Seacow because she is ugly, grey, slow, smells funny and really irritating to handle. A Seacow is a Dugong or Manatee and my boss reckons calling the car Seacow is an insult to Dugongs but I reckon it fits nicely.