Offering Controlled Choices

Arguing with your child about every little thing can be exhausting, am I right?

Enter CONTROLLED CHOICE-MAKING. Giving your child the power to make choices is an important strategy for any parent. It allows children to have some control over their own lives. Which in turn can help you avoid those dreaded power struggles.

With controlled choices, children are given a limited set of options, any of which you are ok with them choosing.

Still not convinced that giving controlled choices would work for your child?

Check out this story that my mom wrote about her experience with controlled choices from when I was a child.

“Any parent of a preschooler knows how much time you spend bargaining with your child! Beginning at a young age, kids have amazingly strong feelings about what they do/don’t want to do.  When, your child digs their heels in, it can be a challenge getting them to bend. However, when you have a great strategy, many of these issues can be avoided.

When my daughter was a preschooler, I would lay out her clothes at night.  That way she could independently dress for school in the morning. Often, she helped me get her clothes ready. Choosing clothes and dressing herself gave her the independence that she craved while giving me some time in the morning to do other things.

My wonderful strategy began to break down when my headstrong daughter decided she wanted to wear a dress every day to school. After a couple of mornings spent arguing about what she was going to wear to school, I knew I had to come up with another idea. Enter “dress days” and “pants days.” Together, we decided which days of the week would be “dress days” and which days would be “pants days.” We used a calendar as a visual so she would know what day it was. Then she could choose from a few options of pants or dresses on that day. It was a simple solution that could be applied to many other situations as well.”

Would you like to use a visual calendar or choice making strips with your child?  Check out my Visual Schedule Boards and Icons Resource.  There is even an option to CUSTOMIZE an additional page of icons, if you need images that are tailored for a specific situation or activity.