Fights and tantrums can often arise when children play together. Children may struggle to manage emotions and lack the ability to communicate effectively with other children. Not having the skills to navigate the complex world of social interactions leaves children with few tools to manage them. As a result, children may resort to physical responses such as screaming, pushing, or fighting. Naturally, this escalates conflicts and can result in full-blown fights, leaving parents perplexed as to how to help children through these conflicts.
Learning to avoid these conflicts in a peaceful way through calm communication is an important life skill that can be learned early. Parents can proactively teach their children to avoid conflicts on their own by using simple words or sentences such as “Please give my body space” or “Can I play with this toy?”. By learning to use these simple words in common challenging situations, children may be able to avoid fights or tantrums on their own without parental intervention. Teaching and modeling these behaviors requires parents to be patient and persistent. However, these efforts will ultimately pay off with children developing improved conflict resolution and social development skills.
Cartoon 12 presents four examples of simple words that parents can teach their children to avoid common conflicts.