Worth a Try Wednesday #3
Talk to Kids, Not About Them
Yesterday on our Instagram, we shared a clip from our Belonging Basics Video Series focused on something we care a lot about:
Our beliefs about children become the choices we make with them every day.
Here’s the clip. Give it a quick watch or listen, and then we’ll break down it down a bit more.
If we presume children’s competence and remember they’re always listening and learning, it changes what we say and how we say it.
We start to:
Focus on what children can do and learn
Save teaming conversations for moments when children aren’t with us
Talk to children, not about them, like they aren’t there
All children notice how they are spoken to and how they are spoken about.
Our advice is to save conversations about children for team meetings or for times when only adults are present, whenever possible.
If something needs to be shared in the moment, we recommend speaking directly to the child and including them in the conversation.
Talk to Kids, Not About Them: When Something Needs Addressed
Talk to Kids, Not About Them: When You Can Discuss Later
None of us gets this perfect all the time. But when we share the value of presuming children’s competence, we can pause, reflect, and make a different choice.
We can talk with our team about how to remind one another to save certain conversations for another time, or to bring children into the conversations we’re having.
Inclusion and belonging are built through these everyday moments … what we do, notice, and create together.
With love and a healthy dose of “we’re all still learning,”
Jackie & Sally