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Ask HN: What are your best unusual parenting practices?

10 points by aethertap ↗ HN
What things have you discovered about raising children that seem to make a big difference for you? I have two to contribute:

1. Every night, we all talk as a family about what the best part of our day was and why. This spawns great conversations, and I think it helps each of us notice the good things that happen during the day that might otherwise be missed.

2. I have a son who's prone to throwing tantrums. We have worked out a deal so that when he feels like he's going to throw one (or when I can tell he's getting ready) one of us will ask the other if we can "take a minute." We then sit quietly for about a minute in each other's company, after which we go back to resolving whatever our problem was. The minute really seems to help short circuit the descent into chaos and lead to better results all around.

3 comments

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eb0la
Not allowing my 3yr-old son to use tablets, mobile phones. I am a big fan of physical stuff, and cause-effect in the real world.
adictator
Showing my 6 yr old daughter & 4 year old son, youtube videos of tooth decay and explaining what happens if you do not brush or eat too much candy. This has helped them both become self aware and I have never had to force them to take care of their teeth.
aethertap
That's a great idea. My son (also four) really needs to see the consequences of candy eating. I'm pretty convinced that he would try to live exclusively on candy if we would buy it for him.

My daughter was a thumb sucker, but she stopped when I showed her a few pictures of what could happen to her teeth if she kept it up. I was actually very surprised at how much impact it had. She was three at the time, and I wasn't sure if she was old enough to make that connection. One of the things I've slowly learned from them is that kids have a lot more ability to reason through consequences than most people give them credit for; the trick is to present it in the right way.