How do you teach children shalom strategies when things are calm?

Do you believe in timeout? And if yes, how would you do it?

When does your child have the opportunity to learn how to regain shalom with her siblings? When does she get to reflect on how the shalom was lost to begin with? What is your expectation for her? Do you want her to develop a shalom strategy that will ensure unbroken tranquility with her siblings? Having never met her or any of her siblings, I can confidently tell you that unbroken tranquility is an excellent example of an unrealistic expectation.

But why can’t she and her brother get along?

Are you sure that they never get along?

Okay, yes, sometimes they play together very nicely, and sometimes they just leave each other alone which is fine with me. But all of a sudden, pandemonium breaks out and I can’t prevent it because I can’t tell when it’s going to happen.

And when it happens, what do you do?

I send the two of them into timeout.

You send the two of them into timeout together?

No, I send her to her room and I send him to his room.

When you send each of them into their respective rooms, what would you like them to be doing there?

I’d like them to be away from each other until they figure out how to get along with each other.

So you imagine that when you send them to their rooms, they are sitting there thinking about how to get along with each other better. I would like to give you some homework about that, what you think?

Okay, I’m willing to give it a try. What would you like me to do?

I would like you to sit down with Mendy and with Mindy, separately, after they’ve finished their next timeouts, the timeouts they got because they were at each other again. Ask each of them what they were thinking about while they were in timeout. No matter what they say, I want you to say, “okay I was just curious, thank you,” and walk away. What do you think about doing that?

Yes, I’m willing to do it. But what if I don’t like what they say?

For the time being, I just want you to find out what they’ve been thinking about during timeout. If you don’t like it, we’ll help them do better gradually. I would like to do this one step at a time.

Mom did it, and a week later told me that both Mendy and Mindy had told her pretty much the same thing.

During their timeout, each of them was planning how to get back at the other one for getting them in trouble. Not much of a shalom strategy. Not that anything came of it, they didn’t do anything to get back at each other, at least not that I was aware of. But it doesn’t look like they accomplished anything either. So, timeout is not a good idea?

Timeout is not an idea. Timeout is an opportunity. It takes a child out of a situation in which she is not doing well, and gives her the opportunity to figure out what went wrong, how to get things right again, and maybe even how to prevent what went wrong from happening again. Your role is to help her make the most of that opportunity, because many children don’t know how on their own.

The next time pandemonium breaks out between Mendy and Mindy, I’d like you to say, “This situation is not going well. I would like each of you to go to your room and sit quietly until you’re not so angry anymore. Then I would like you to try to figure out what happened that you didn’t like that got you so angry. Then, think about what you could say or do the next time that happens, instead of what you did last time.”

I’m sure that if I were to say that to them they would both turn to me and immediately say that they don’t know what else to do.

Yes, I suspect they probably would, and the key word here is “immediately.” So I would want you to say to them, “I know you don’t know what else to do right this second. That’s why I want to go to your rooms, sit quietly for a while, and then see what you can come up with. If either of you still can’t come up with anything, please come to me and ask me to help you.”

All right. So now it’s 10 minutes later, and the two of them come over to me and say, “we don’t know what else to do.” What should I tell them then?

I would try not to be so pessimistic. I have found that children often come up with very good ideas when they’re given the time to think quietly, especially when you give them some gentle guidance about what to think about.

Many of us spend our timeouts feeling bad about what we did wrong and trying to shift some of the blame onto someone else so we won’t feel so bad about ourselves. I’m not sure whether that comes naturally or if it’s something we learn. I am sure that we can become conscious of how we spend our reflective time, turning it into an opportunity for planning shalom strategies and teaching our children how to do the same.

But still, what if they don’t come up with an idea. What should I tell them?

Don’t tell them anything. Speak with each of them, separately.

More, G-d willing, next week.

Rabbi Yitzchak Shmuel Ackerman, LMHC. Men’s and women’s parenting groups now available. Call for details: 718-344-6575.