(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
Welcome back to the Simplicity Diaries with me, Kim John Payne. This week we're going to be talking about transitions. There's a whole bunch of episodes that talk about how to transition children and this is lensing an old tool in a little bit of a new way based on the feedback I've been getting from parents.
Before that, I wanted to let you know that we have an emotional self-regulation seminar coming up for care professionals. In other words, any educator or care professional therapist or medical professional who supports parents and wants to support them more with their own emotional self-regulation. It's a big theme, right? That seminar is coming up on Saturday, July the 1st.
Sunday, July the 2nd. Three hours on each day. I personally lead it actually and it's via Zoom live with people all around the world.
It is recorded, right? So if you can't make one day or another or either of the days, it's perfectly fine. It's recorded. It's a part of the coaching track of Simplicity to become a Simplicity Parenting coach.
This is one of three seminars that folk need to do. So anyway, that's coming up soon. If you know of anyone who might be interested, let them know.
Go right to the website, Simplicity Parenting. It's pretty prominent. You'll see it right there.
Anyway, on with the show. Our Little Worlds. All right, so this is a transition tool that for those of you who have been listening to these podcasts for a while now, quite a ways back there's this tool called Your World, My World, Our World.
Okay, so that's the strategy. It's a lot of parents have used this strategy. It's also in the Soul of Discipline book.
So it's become quite well known. But I want to look at it from a different lens. Look at it in a different way in that with three things in mind.
The first thing is to make it small. The second is to make it pictorial. And the third is to make it light-hearted.
Now let's break it down a little bit. The Your World, just to sort of give a quick review, Your World is when you know you've got to get in the car or some such thing. Getting in the car is a big one, right? So let's choose a hard one.
And you go to a child and you sit beside them and you look at the project they're doing or whatever it is they're up to. You spend 10, 15 seconds, 30 seconds at a stretch. But you just sit beside them and they'll tell you about the magnetiles they're doing or they will show you their sketchbook of what they're sketching.
Or if they're older kids they might just be hanging out, you know, just relaxing. Just go sit beside them and, you know, what you're up to today. And that's with an older kid.
How's it going? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Soccer practice this afternoon, that's right. Yeah.
A younger one, you might look at their fort that they're building out of a shoebox and you let them tell you about it. So the first part is connecting. But it's connecting with the child's world, your world, child's world.
Then comes my world. And my world is now what I'm going to be doing, what I'm up to. So 10, 15 seconds on just saying what it is that mummy is up to, daddy, grandpa is up to.
So what we're doing. But it's in terms of the transition that we're going to be making. It's a preparation.
It might be something like, you know, now I'm going to get the lunches ready. Okay, good. I'm going to go get the lunches ready and I'll circle back to you in a minute.
Yeah, okay. And then the third step is our world. So it goes from your world, my world, our world.
And our world is that we make now, we come on back to the child and you make the transition. Okay, so that's the review. Here's the breakdown of this in three little pieces.
The first one is to make it small. So when we're talking about our world, the daddy's world, you know, the person who's trying to move a child on through the day to that big one, like getting in the car or whatever it is, getting, going to bed. So the first step is to make it little, make it small.
So to say, rather than, well, I'm just going to go over and get everything ready because we're going to get into the car in a minute. That has a child like, you know, metaphorically chaining themselves to the, to the handrail. You know, it's like, that's too big.
That's no fun. I want to play with my magnet tiles or I'm too comfortable sitting here just hanging out. I don't want to do that.
And it basically, you get resistance. But if you make it small, I'm just like, if it's a young child, for example, I'm just going to go over and, and I'm going to set out the rain boots. Looks like there's going to be rain today.
I think I'll set out your froggy boots. Oh, that's right. You haven't worn them since last year.
Gosh, I hope they fit. We've got some big ones, bigger ones if we need, but let's see if the froggy ones work. So what you've done is that you've made it small.
The my world that you're hoping to transition a child into is a small little world. That's the first thing. The second thing about this is to make it pictorial, right? So that you might say something like, well, you've already mentioned froggy boots, right? And if they don't fit, I think we'll put the red ones on.
I think you might have grown into them by now. Yeah, you're a bigger girl now. Let's see.
Or it might be, well, I'm going to go over and see if all the things can fit into your sparkly lunchbox. I think they can. Yes, that's right.
You have a new sticker on it, don't you? Now, you just made it pictorial. Simple thing to do. But what you've done in making it pictorial is that you've lifted things up into a child's imagination, because they've got their imagination going with their magnetiles or their shoebox that they're cutting out.
Their imagination is powerful. It's strong. So in a sense, you almost calibrate with another imagination.
You bring an imagination alongside their imagination, and it's not a direction, it's an imagination. Now, neurologically, that's also activating partly, it's activating the limbic system, which begins the journey to the empathy brain, to the attunement brain. That's the first steps to being attuned and moving with the program kind of thing.
So the pictorial piece is lining an imagination up alongside an imagination. It's almost like coming alongside in a canoe, you know, the two canoes coming alongside each other. And it's not a command, it's not a direction.
It's an imagination. So you've made this little halfway step before giving the direction that we're getting in the car. You've actually gone through that, I'm with you in terms of imagination.
Then the third step is our world. Now, um, both in the in the, the my world, and our world, the third step is to make it light, to make it a little bit of to have a little bit of levity in your voice. You may have, you know, heard the way I'm saying this.
We'll go and see if those froggy boots still fit. We'll go hop, hop, hop all the way across. And we'll sit.
Yes. I'll hop too. No, I don't have froggy boots.
I wish I did. Now what you're signaling to a child, I'm voicing this for a young child, but you could do it for any age. The older the child, you don't want to be embarrassing.
Although sometimes it's good to be goofy and embarrassing. If you were the 15 year old, and they you get this little tiny smile of Oh my goodness. But, but the the levity in in your gestalt in your gesture, that little bit of levity in your voice without being super goofy about it, but just that little signals that we're about just to have a nice little time together.
It's the voice is almost like a let's play voice. That voice of, hey, do you want to play? Or, hey, do you want to see if those froggy boots still fit? It's the same voice. It's the let's play voice.
And very few children can resist a let's play voice. Because as soon as we use that voice, our eyes soften a little bit, our shoulders round just a little bit. And our body language also becomes the let's play body language, rather than the stiffening, you know, command, we're getting into the car, because we know getting into the car is often hard, you know, and so we're, we're issuing orders.
And, you know, sometimes that can work if we're going to just overpower a child. But these three simple, you know, your world, my world, our world, it's not without its clarity. It's not, it's not sort of directionless, rudderless.
It's definitely moving in a direction. But you're onboarding the children to actually have a greater chance of moving with you. Okay.
So Emotional Self-Regulation Care Professional, Saturday, July 1, Sunday, July 2. For anyone who is helping parents with their own ability to, to offer co-regulation to a child, stay centered, stay oriented. Yeah, and it's right on the website. It's pretty prominent.
Anyone interested, right there. It is again, it is recorded. So if you can't make it, it's okay.
And the seminar is one of three parts to become a Simplicity Parenting Coach. There's three seminars required, and this could be one of them. Anyway, hope that's all helpful.
Bye bye for now.
(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
