Dad: Hey, how was school?
Anthony: Awesome!
Dad: It was a rainy day today. Did you go outside for recess?
Anthony: I don't know.
Dad (A bit confused and frustrated): What do you mean you don't know? You don't know if you went outside or not?
Anthony (A bit frustrated with dad asking questions): Yeah! I don't know!
Conversation over.
Have you ever had a conversation like this with your child?
Well, on this rainy day, I had my fill of "I don't know" and decided to try to tackle the issue. The conversation started as we were driving to religion class. I felt what I needed to do first was directly address the issue. I wanted Anthony to understand that I love that he is so excited about school and his friends and I want to know about his day. I went on to explain that I don't see him all day and enjoy having a conversation about what he did during his day at school. I also expressed how frustrated it is for me when he quickly responds to my questions with "I don't know." I then asked him why he responds with "I don't know." His answer surprised me a bit. He did tell me that sometimes he just doesn't want to talk right after school or doesn't want to talk about school and sometimes he said he doesn't remember. I could relate to him. There are days I come home from work and don't want to talk about my day and there are times I don't remember what I had for breakfast. Even though I could relate I was not going to allow the "I don't know" response to stand. Our conversation took a nice turn where we began to talk about strategies to remember what we did during the day and statements we could say to someone, ME, if they ask a question and he could not recall the answer right away. One strategy we discussed was to visualize. If he was asked about recess, like I did, he could visualize getting ready for recess. This worked. When he visualized himself getting ready for recess he said he saw himself getting his coat and remembered he went outside for recess. When thinking about what he could say to someone asking him a question about his day we came up with the statement, "I'm not sure. Let me think about that for a minute." If he truly does not want to talk he could say, "I'm not in the mood to talk right now. Can we chat later." This comment came out of a side topic about being respectful when speaking to others.
Have the strategies and statements been working? I have seen Anthony pause before answering a question I might ask. Recently, during dinner I asked Anthony a question and before responding he did say, "Let me think." Looking back I also think he was using the "I don't know" statement to quickly end a conversation so he could focus on something else.
Have you had to address this or a similar issue with your child? If so please share.
