In this week’s episode, I’m answering a question from a member of our own Thriving in Motherhood community about how to handle negative attitudes with her child when it comes to certain things about homeschooling.

I’m no stranger to negative attitudes in our home (from myself and the kids), but we are very intentional with addressing those attitudes. 

Here are seven questions we ask when one of our children has a negative attitude:

1. Have they moved their body today?

2. What is the reason for resistance?

3. How can I give them more autonomy?

4. Is the environment set up so it is easy to do the thing they need to do?

5. Am I ready with my part, or are they waiting for me and getting interrupted from what they started to do?

6. What skill am I trying to teach?

7. How can I partner with my child in this and mentor? What principles or truths do they need to understand to want to change the behavior themself?

These questions help me get to the root of the problem and are part of seeking to understand so we can come up with win-win solutions together. (Thank you, Stephen Covey, for the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People that we continue to return to.)

When it comes to homeschooling and negative attitudes, I really love Julie Bogart’s book The Brave Learner. She has so many wonderful thoughts and ideas about what homeschooling can look like to bring the magic and whimsy back into our days instead of battling over worksheets. She helps make it clear what really matters and then suggests lots of different ways that we can reach our objectives that look really different from the public school model.

Listen to this week's episode for more tips on dealing with negative attitudes.