How Young Children Learn

Children who are 7 years old or younger have not developed the ability to deal with abstractions, such as reasoning. For example, you may tell her 3-year-old daughter, Jennifer, not to go into the street because there are cars and she might get hit and be hurt. Jennifer may be perfectly capable of repeating your instruction back to you, but that is where her ability ends. It is unlikely that she will be able to actually do what you said to do.

Because reasoning with young children doesn't work, parents usually repeat the instruction over and over again. They use threats and nagging, such as "If I have to tell you one more time...." When you have to repeat the instruction, you may begin to feel frustrated and angry. Your child, who cannot reason, begins to feel that you do not like her because you give threats and yell at her. If you keep trying to reason with your young child, it can lower your child's self-esteem. As this process goes on, day after day, the parent gets more and more frustrated and the child develops a very poor self-image.

How do children learn?

Children learn through repetition. They must have the chance to practice the same thing over and over again. If your child needs to learn not to go into the street, she must be shown this lesson over and over again. Every time that she goes too near the street, she needs to be disciplined, in an unemotional way. Every time she starts to go toward the street, but stops short of doing so, she needs to be praised. After Jennifer has made 20 or 30 trips towards the street, with some trips resulting in discipline and some in praise, she will learn to stay out of the street.

Parents cannot tell small children once not to do something and expect the child never to do it again. Parents need to understand that teaching involves many repetitions before something is learned. Children must do something both the right way and the wrong way many times before they learn to do it right consistently. Don't become frustrated because learning takes time. Know that teaching your child is an important skill. The more times a child can experience the contrast between what happens when something is done the right way and when it is done the wrong way, the more quickly and thoroughly the child will learn what the right way is.