What does it take for kids to learn?

[nois-or-e]

Originally Posted by virus003

Okay so, my 4 year old niece is living in my house most of the time, and I've discovered now that she doesn't listen to anything. She doesn't listen to a single thing, and my sister(her mother) has to always be assertive about things, and it doesn't usually work, she whines about everything and she always lies about things. So today, my sister wanted me to be assertive to her daughter while she gets ready for work. She simply told me just to be straight up assertive with her, like yell and stuff. So I did what I was told, and she practically doesn't listen to A THING I say. I told her to sit down on the couch, and I had to say it about 5,000 times, and every time she actually listens, she just gets right back up and we have to go through the same thing. Then she does the "puppy dog" look and starts purposely crying. My sister has been very stressed out because she doesn't listen, she said that her daughter almost got hit by a truck yesterday because of her listening skills.


I also think this is largely influenced by her father. The parents are split up, so she's always stuck in the middle. Her father is a lazy ass 31 year old still living with his mother, and can get away with anything. Their house is so disgusting, they have two dogs that never get taken care of, and I'm sure their house has plenty of rats. The father is unemployed, he's been like that almost his whole life( which is why I mention he can get away with almost anything). My sister now has a restraining order against him, and he doesn't even pay full childcare, especially when it's needed. But my real question here is, what does it take for kids to listen? At least a kid in the situation of this, or do all kids act like this? I'm the youngest in my family so I wouldn't really know of growing up with any young children in my house.

I haven't perused through the rest of this thread yet, but this post made me rather angry. Your sister obviously has no clue how to parent a child if their response is 'just yell and stuff'.
My daughter is turning 4 in a few months, she is incredibly well-mannered and well-behaved and she has listened to every word i've ever said for a few good reasons.

- I don't yell/scream at her when I want her to do something, I talk to her. She is a small person, not some miniature yelling post that needs to be undermined all the time.
- I explain things to her, and how if she does the right thing it benefits her. Whether that be trying to get her to put her shoes on so we can go out (because we'll stay at home instead) or eating all of her vegetables (because it will keep her healthy and strong)
- I show my daughter respect at all times, even when she is misbehaving. The difference between being firm and in control of a situation and just screaming at them is your level of respect for them imo. In return I get the same respect from her.
- I discipline her by explaining what she has done, and punish her accordingly (usually with the removal of favourite toys/tv rights/having her sit in a time-out till she calms down or to think about what she did). Too many parents are quick to scream and hit their kids imo.

Now I have seen first hand the other side of my situation, as my housemate is also a single parent. But her response to everything is yelling or sending him to bed (where he screams and cries like a little baby for 20mins or so, then storms out demanding to be let out of his room). It all comes down to the parent and their skills in parenting. She sits there at her pc playing WoW all day not giving a ****, so her kid doesn't give a ****.

I could go on for hours about this, but frankly I couldn't be ****ed going through it all. I have put massive amounts of hard work and effort into looking after my daughter on my own and guiding her through life so far so that she will turn out to be a polite and functional member of society. Some people just shouldn't be parents I guess.


tl;dr: Read it. Kids are people, not personal yelling posts. Treat them as such and they will show you respect and behave in return.



Edit: I went up and edited something in the middle of my last sentence, whups.