Setting Limitations For Your Children This Summer

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By Christina Lemmey

Published:
1-June 2006

Children see their summer vacation as a time for relaxing, playing, and having more freedom. There's no schoolwork, friends want to just hang out, and doing chores or having a strict schedule sometimes goes out the window. Often we parents want to avoid arguments and want to be "friends" with our kids, thinking they deserve some leniency since they've worked so hard in school. You may think that you're rewarding high achievement but in reality you're conceding control of your household.

Children need strong, positive role models who will teach them how to make proper decisions in life. Parents are the very first role models for their children and the responsibility of teaching their children lies with them. When the parents relinquish their teaching duties, chaos in the household will ensue.

Here are some ideas for keeping the parents in charge of the household this summer:

1. Wake up your child by a certain time each morning. That doesn't mean he has to be up by 6:30am but make sure he's up by 8am or 9am at the latest. He's still "sleeping in" but can also have some morning hours to play or plan his day. Letting kids sleep until all hours of the afternoon will only lead to staying up late at night and it will be a tough habit to break come September when school starts again.

2. Limit your child's television and computer time. Why contribute to the childhood obesity epidemic? Watching mindless TV shows or playing endless hours of violent video games will make your child's mind go numb and she's not learning anything worthwhile. Try using "TV tickets" where 1 ticket = 30 minutes of TV. She can use her tickets anytime during the day but when they're gone, the TV stays off.

3. Reassess your child's responsibilities. Every child is capable of handling age-appropriate chores so take this time to make changes to their chore list. Encourage your child to have daily responsibilities that need to get done and find a block of time for your child to accomplish these things. If your child is an early riser, encourage him to do his chores right after breakfast and be done with them for the day. Or set a kitchen timer and see if they can finish their chores before the timer dings. Be sure to remind your children that doing chores is helping the family and not only a means to earning allowance.

4. Set your child's bedtime. "Night owl" behavior can often lead to trouble and bad sleeping habits so make a set bedtime and stick with it. If you want to make it 30-60 minutes later than usual since it's still light out, then go ahead, but growing children still need lots of sleep and it will help your child learn to stick to a schedule.

5. Don't be afraid to set rules. Make up additional rules that help your household run smoothly. Be sure these rules are fair and age-appropriate based on the number and ages of your children. Always remember that your children will look to you first for guidance so teach them how to make rules and stick to them.

Summer vacation doesn't have to be full of tantrums from spoiled children who have no respect for their parents. Earn your child's respect by showing him/her how to set limits, how to follow a schedule, and how to handle household responsibilities. You'll keep control of your household and your child will have the basis for becoming a functional adult.

Christina Lemmey is the mother of two girls and the owner of http://www.survivingathome.com For a free list of 101 Things To Do With Your Kids This Summer , visit http://www.survivingathome.com/newsletter.html