Is Your Child “That Kid” in Public Places? Three Ways to Combat this Issue for You and Your Child

When your child is the kid that enters the room and the teacher or sitter has a look on their face that says, “Oh no, not that kid again,” what should you do?

1.       My first instinct would be to react defensively and protect my child from the misconception happening in the classroom.

2.       I might be tempted to just pull my kid out of that teacher’s class or fire that sitter.

3.       Another possible response would be to overreact toward my child and constantly harp on my kid because evidently he or she is the “bad” kid of the given environment.

But what if this happened in every environment he or she was involved in?

In my experiences while working with children, parents tend to overreact in three ways:

1.       The first way is to deny that their child can do anything wrong. This happens a lot to parents who take a defensive attitude and try to protect their children from the criticism of their peers or teachers.

2.       The parents tend to prematurely protect their child by taking that child out of the environment that seems to be the problem. Now, I am not saying not to remove your child if he or she is in emotional and physical danger, but I am saying that this situation can be a learning experience for everyone involved, even you as the parent. But especially for your child because, let’s face it, there are difficult people in our adult lives and we do need to know how to deal with them. How do we learn how to deal with them? Experience, plain and simple, experience in socialization with people in authority and/or peers.

3.       Some parents tend to verbally or physically beat up Johnny or Julie. What do I mean by that? I mean the parent is embarrassed at their child’s behavior, as if it somehow reflects poor parenting skills, and makes the parent feel bad about themselves and they inevitably destroy their child’s self-confidence. This choice can even affect the way the child thinks about God. Kids coming from these homes usually grow up thinking that God is a harsh and cruel God instead of a loving and merciful Father, because they feel God made them “wrong” since they believe that, “even Mommy and Daddy say I am bad.” If the parents convey this message of grievance against their child then the child feels as if they must somehow be a mistake.

All three of these choices are easy choices without even being aware you are doing them. How then should we react to our children who others view as “that kid?” I suggest these three counteractions to your thoughts and nurturing:

 

1.       Reveal to your child how much they are valued and loved by God and you as his or her parent. Always affirm that they are a gift to you from God, and that God has a purpose for their life, that you can discover together as they grow and mature. This God-given purpose will be the most important thing in his or her life.  

2.       Realize your kid is going to mess up (sin). We all are sinners and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23). This is not a reflection on you or your parenting in general. It is a reflection that your child is a human being who has, like the rest of us, chosen to disobey God, parents, and whatever other authority that is set up. Why? Because that is who we are as human beings. We have free will and our very nature is self-centered and we want our way or the highway. Yet, we live in a society, so we need to get along with others, and in doing so there must be law and order. Therefore, think of your child needing the lesson of law and order and that is why we must obey the rules. We obey the rules and our teachers because they protect us or help us. Sometimes this may not be fun but we must obey because this is what our loving God expects us to do and we want to obey Him because He loves us and created us to be loved.

3.       Do not worry about what others think about you or your child. Period. Your child will continue to mess up because that is how they learn and some kids are more intense learners than others. It usually comes down to the child wanting to know “why is this wrong or right?” Or, “why do we have this rule or that rule?” If we take the time to explain over and over again, your time explaining conveys to the child that you care about them enough that you desire they know right from wrong, although they may not say it quite like that. So instead of worrying about what others think about you or your child, focus on what God thinks. If you do not know how He feels, read the book of John or read the Bible to your kids. The Bible is God’s love letter to you and your child revealing that your worth (and your child’s worth) is greater to Him than Heaven itself.

 

I am not saying that your child will turn around and then never do wrong or be a hardship in the classroom; remember that some kids are intense learners. They need to learn the hard way and that way is sometimes the difficult way with discipline needed or intense rules for the intense learner.

I cannot leave this blog without saying one more thing. If the intense learning is not getting through and you suspect there is a learning disability you may need to seek professional advice from counselors and doctors, but please, please make sure the teachers and or sitters realize this and that they in turn give the same positive feedback mentioned above.

Finally, if your child does have some handicapping situation, please always convey to him/her that God does not make mistakes. Each individual has a purpose just the way he/she was made by God and it is our job as parents to help each child find his or her God-given purpose.