Talking to Your Kids: Ways to Open up Conversation

Do you ever feel like you know very little about your kids? I spend more time with my kids than I spend doing anything else in my life. Yet, I don't always feel as if I know them deeply enough. What are they feeling, what are they thinking? How was their day at school? I mean I ask them this every day, but I get those blah-blah answers that get us nowhere.

I have done a lot of reading on the subject and have discovered other ways to get my kids to open up, by using open-ended questions and asking them leading questions I have discovered so much more about their day and what they are feeling and thinking.

I joined a 5-day parenting challenge with Nina at Sleeping Should Be Easy, and we did a lot of research and practiced using special questions that helped to open conversations with our kids. She even has an ebook that helps stressed parents manage their time.

We are enjoying learning more about talking with our kids -- instead of to our kids -- and it has been helpful to find ways to be more productive as a family. Be sure to check out her ebook and try some of the open-ended questions with your kids. Even just using a few of them on the way home from school pick-up has changed the openness between my oldest and myself. I now know more about the first grade than I ever knew before!