Helping your child when they get frustrated...

Our son turned 7 last month.  We don't go bike riding much, so we haven't pushed getting rid of his training wheels.  He is quite the cruiser on his 4-wheeled bike, but this summer, by gosh, he was going to learn to ride a 2-wheeler.

Blaise wasn't quite in the same mindframe as his mother and I were this past weekend.  On Saturday we got the kids into the car, attached the bikes to the trunk thing, and drove to Rosemont Ridge Middle School in West Linn.  The "rubberized" track seemed like a great place to try, and we were lucky that there weren't many people there.  We actually shared the track with another family who was trying to teach their 4(?) year old to ride a 2-wheeler.

My wife, Marie, tried with Blaise for a little bit, but Marie didn't bring the right shoes to go running alongside him.  A 7-year old has the strength to peddle pretty fast and for a good length of time, which is great for learning to ride a bike, but it quite a challenge for a parent holding on and running.  I then had a turn.  Blaise got the peddling thing, but not the balance thing.  And it was all my fault.  Blaise's frustration was rising because I was holding on to him too tight, or pulling him or pushing him the wrong way.   He wanted to quit before completing 100 yards. 

Marie and I were getting a little frustrated too.  And I'm sure it was showing, even though we tried to be patient.  This was just *the* day that we had some time, and remembered, and we wanted to make progress, whether he liked it or not!

I think we eventually backed off before things blew up.  Later in the evening, I asked Marie, how we raised two children who get so frustrated so fast.  She suggested that perhaps we didn't allow them to experience frustration much as younger children.  (I can't remember if we did or didn't.)

But I did find an article on PsychologyToday.com about children's frustration and what you can do about it.  I love how it describes the chain from Frustration to Anger to Despair, and how you really don't want to go down that path.  The author, Jim Taylor, Ph.D, talks about taking breaks from the activitiy before you get to the more negative emotions, and doing something else that your child can be successful in.  Then when the emotional and physical stress is gone, you can go back and talk about the activity and frustration, and try again, or focus on an aspect of the activity that might be easier to succeed at. 

It's a great article, and I think I'll try this if I can convince Blaise to go bike riding sometime this week.  Wish me luck!
 -Ron