Latest / The Family Teams Podcast / Ep. 257 | How Do You Train Kids to Engage in Adult Conversations?

Transcript

Ep. 257 | How Do You Train Kids to Engage in Adult Conversations? · The Family Teams Podcast

• 0:00
  And we've had some just really incredible conversations that really stemmed from the kids just asking great questions.
• 0:11
  What's up, guys? Welcome to another 5-Minute Fatherhood. So one of the things that we were asked in our Facebook group was, how do you train kids to engage in adult conversation? Any practical tips? Any ideas? And it is really important, you guys, if you want your kids to be educated more apprentice style, and a lot of people are now returning to a lot more of that kind of education during this time,
• 0:34
  You want them to be around you. You want them to be learning things. They need to be kind of, they need to be equipped for how to engage with their parents, with other adults. We spend so much time training kids in same age groups.
• 0:51
  that a lot of times the only skills they're really developing is the skill to relate to their direct peers. And we tend to call that socialization. But it's actually, for a lot of kids, a lack of socialization because they really don't know how to engage somebody who's 20 years older or five years younger.
• 1:11
  very well. And so I want to give this dad some practical tips. So one of the things you can do is do some pregame talks. So if you're about to enter into a place where you think that they could learn a lot from someone, you can say, hey, make sure that you're listening, that you're asking questions. You can kind of train them as they're alongside of you. Do you have any questions you want to ask me? What do you think of this? Engage in kind of an apprenticeship
• 1:38
  style kind of moment if you're going out to do something that they may learn from. So that's something that you can figure out how to do. It's also important to, when you do have people over, I know that's not happening a lot at the moment, but one of the things that we would do when we would be hosting dinners, like especially our Shabbat dinner, is that I'll pause if we have a guest and say, hey kids, in a few minutes I'm going to ask you to ask our guests some questions
• 2:08
  while they're telling their story, I want my kids to be coming up with thoughtful questions that they can ask. And so we've had some amazing people at our Sabbath table for dinner. And, and we've had some just really incredible conversations that really stemmed from the kids just asking great questions. And so sometimes you just train your kids to ask or direct them to ask.
• 2:31
  We live in a culture where a lot of times we try to seize the floor and just give our opinion, and we don't spend a lot of time listening to each other and asking questions. And so oftentimes when somebody's in the room, particularly like if you invite grandparents over for a dinner and you want them to tell stories—
• 2:48
  That's going to be their ability to engage your children and to tell the family stories is going to be directly related to how much they feel honored and that your kids are listening. If your kids are making tons of noise, ignoring, and they're not being trained to sort of listen to an adult conversation and engage in an adult conversation, right?
• 3:09
  And obviously at really young ages, that's probably not realistic. But as your kids are getting a little bit older, it's really important to like, OK, like and talk about that when grandpa, grandma talks like it's really important for you to listen. And it's really good to ask them questions. But, yeah, Jeff, what are your thoughts on that?
• 3:24
  Yeah, I would only add one more thing. And it's basically what you already said. But with toddlers, what I've noticed that really helps is to, and I think it's just this is just conducive for it, whether the adult or the toddler, is really play up the story time. You know what I mean? Like, that's what we do is like, kind of like, we kind of make it a story time moment. Like, oh, someone's going to tell a story. This is story time. And just like, you know, when you're at the library or in kindergarten, you know, when it's story time, kids sit down and they perk up, right? Yeah.
• 3:49
  And so kind of like putting it in that bucket for the kids, I've noticed is psychologically makes them pay attention more than usual and then be really ready and hungry to like, oh, you know, what about this and what about that and what happened to the main character and stuff like that. So putting it in the storytelling bucket with those kind of languages and stuff has really helped us and really trained our family.
• 4:06
  And guys, Jeff and I have created a masterclass called the skill of fatherhood. And we know that a lot of you guys are at home and have a lot of opportunity to actually engage your kids in training exercises. We spend an entire module talking about how to do that. There's also a module on how to coach your family as a team. And there's a module on how to build a multi-generational family.
• 4:26
  And so we want to give you guys just for one day only, if you want to jump in and get this 75% off of that class. We want you guys to, this is a great time to learn that. So if you want to use the code 75 off when you check out, it'll take 75% off of the cost of that masterclass. And so Jeff, where can they find that?
• 4:46
  That's a deal. That's a deal. We should have made the code Jeremy is awesome because you thought of that. 75 off the number seven, number five, and then OFF is the code familyteams.com or just shop.familyteams.com. And you just kind of dig around, just go to touch the courses tab or the masterclass tab. And it'll take you right there. But man, that is a deal and a steal. And I'm super stoked to see more of you guys go through it because of that.