My four-year-old son insisted on dressing himself this morning. He almost got out the door to pre-school in swimmer trunks, jeans for a six-year-old, a Ninja Turtles t-shirt and a leather jacket.
So ok, he looked pretty cool, but it wasn’t entirely practical. And I was torn; I wanted him to feel like a cool dude for picking out his own clothes and putting them on himself, but I also had to help get him into appropriate cold weather – and fitting! – attire.
So I opted for a little bit out of Column A and a little bit out of Column B: he got high fives, his photo taken ‘to show dad later’ and loads of praise, but we also negotiated for different jeans and a warm hoodie.
Thankfully, he agreed so long as he could do it himself, so getting him dressed only took an hour today. The craic.
As Jacob gets older, he is constantly pushing the boundaries and testing his independence. I’m all for it obviously, but do have to stop myself from complete impatience at times.
Or when he insists on carrying his bowl of cereal from the breakfast table to the sitting room, or wants to hold the dog’s lead himself, I have to remind myself to bite my lip when I can see the potential disaster in the situation.
Because if he drops a bowl we’ll clean it up and if the dog drags his arm too hard, he’ll let go of the lead and I’ll take over. No biggie, right?
The major thing, I think, is to let Jacob try and test his own capabilities in a supervised environment so we get the best out of our little man as he grows up. The benefits to us all as a family is that we hope to end up with a confident little boy who has learned his life skills in a really fun and positive way.
Here are 5 tips on how to encourage independence in your toddler:
1. Give them some age-appropriate jobs to do
The key is not to expect too much. At four, Jacob is not yet ready to ‘clean his room’, but he certainly is able to put his slippers inside the door of his room if I ask him to, and is delighted to help!
2. Be prepared for the toddler version of what you have asked
So you might like the cushions put back on the couch in a particular way, but your four or five-year-old doesn’t particularly care for such things as the perfect home. Let them chuck them back up and old way and thank them for it. They did it the best way they could!
3. Have fun while you get what you need
I used to ask Jacob to put his train tracks or Lego blocks away himself, even providing the empty plastic container that they should go in before leaving the room. When I’d check back in ten minutes later, the plastic tub was still empty and the bits of toys were still on the floor. However, whenever I sat with him and we cleaned it all up together, we had loads of fun, high fives and even a gold star ceremony at the end. Happily, I also had a clean playroom. Win-win.
4. Decide early on where everything goes
If your child is regularly reminded that PJs go on a particular chair in their bedroom, or that coats and shoes are kept by the front door, they will learn that there is a ‘home’ for things that they will return them to. It will of course be important that mum and dad adhere to this too, and don’t just chuck things about haphazardly either – lead by example!
5. Dish out regular pats on the head
We all love a bit of praise from time to time, but kids LOVE praise from their parents. Tell your kids how awesome they are as much as you can. Even if they didn’t quite get it right, like Jacob this morning with his swimmers trunks on, he had ten out of ten from me for effort.
And tomorrow, I’m going to let him pick out his own clothes again. Let’s see what happens..
What do you do to help your toddler gain more and more independence? Let us know in the comments!
