Today’s guest is Nicole Schwarz, from Imperfect Families. She’s a mom of 3 girls, a parenting coach and child and family therapist who focuses on helping parents use positive, respectful strategies with their kids. Today we are talking about sibling conflict. The questions we are discussing come straight from the community - join us!

What you’ll hear in this episode:

•   How to keep sibling conflict to a dull roar with a relationship focus in your parenting

•   Balancing the desire to step in with giving space for them to work it out for themselves

•   “Say what you see” approach to conflict resolution by describing it

•   Role of modeling and coaching for creative solutions

•   Deescalating techniques to resolve conflict

•   Understanding the role of neurological development on decision making in conflict

•   Having empathy for a sense of injustice and encouraging empathy in your kids

•   Teaching kids that “people get what they need” and how that might be different and lead to perceived inequity

•   Understanding impulse control limitations and flooding and how it leads to physical acting out

•   Using proactive practice and play based knowledge to avoid future conflict

•   How to focus on what led to acting out to avoid shaming while encouraging learning

•   Exercising compassion around evolving nature of self-regulation

•   Understanding jealous and resentment around new babies and the needs of other siblings

•   Introducing the concept of mixed feelings to kids who are too young to have that insight for themselves

•   Coaching around sharing toys and how to place limits on it – sharing power, soliciting and implementing solutions from your kids

•   Improving connection to reduce rivalry – using one-on-one time to address your child’s jealousy

•   The value of shifting focus from our kid’s behavior to our own behavior – recognizing it’s the only thing we can control

•   Contextualizing power struggles as kids trying to navigate their world

•   Reframing “bossy” behavior in a positive way and channeling it for good

•   Changing how we see tattling

•   The value of redo’s and self care

Resources:

Brain in the Palm for Kids video Siblings without Rivalry by Adele Faber Peaceful Parents Happy Siblings: How To Stop the Fighting and Raise Friends For Life by Dr. Laura Markham

Where to find Nicole:

Facebook l Twitter I Her website

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