Don't Miss A Thing!Question of the Week: Excuse me, please….
How do you teach your children to not interrupt and wait their turn to talk?? They have so much they want to say- how do I teach them when it is ok to speak and when they need to be quiet and listen first?? I know there is a better way than my current raising my voice saying, “EVERYONE PLEASE BE QUIET! PLEASE STOP INTERRUPTING ME!”Â
Thank you to AMY for submitting this question! And thanks to those of you who leave a post/reply below!
We have always used the interrupt rule. We teach the child to put his hand on our arm. When they do that we put our hand on their hand to let them know that we know they want something. Then as quickly as possible we respond to them to see what they need. My husband and I do it to each other too when one of us is in a conversation and the other needs to talk with them. Phyllis
A rather fun way to practice taking turns to talk is by using a practice that we actually used in a management meeting in my “previous life” in the workforce… only one person at a time could hold ‘the microphone’ (which with young kids can be a big serving spoon, an empty paper towel holder, whatever…) and have their turn to speak. Then, the next person was handed ‘the microphone’ and it was their turn to speak. It felt rather ridiculous with a bunch of adults (who should have known how to manage the practice of waiting politely!) but the point was definitely made… with kids, it empowers them while they are holding ‘the microphone’ and they enjoy the game while learning their manners. Just an idea!!
The spoon as microphone is an improvement on our use of spoons to help one-at-a-time talking at the table. Trying to demonstrate “be quick to listen, and slow to speak” we set spoons in the middle of the table the same way you would for a game of cards. In the card game there is one less spoon then people playing and everyone grabs one like musical chairs. We thought everyone could be quick to grab a “listening spoon” and the slowest person could speak! We ended up sitting quietly staring at the spoons, or a little one would give a spoon to a sibling so they could reserve their own turn to speak. It was a very funny lesson (for parents that is). The microphone idea I think is best.
In our house, we just politely remind “the interrupter” that they have interrupted and they apologize and things continue on. It has worked so far, and the 4 year old is never afraid to point out the fact that someone has interrupted her!