Waiting requires patience to handle it well. Patience is developed through lots of of experiences, but waiting is a one of the primary ways. This is challenging for many adults who have lots of experiences with waiting. How often do I lose my patience…...often. Actually, I may not have any to lose in some situations.
Let’s think of a child with neurological deficits. He may have the emotional maturity of someone much younger than his age. A child with neurological challenges the emotional maturity that’s ⅔ - ¾ of her chronological age. So let’s say your daughter is 8 but with this guideline, her emotional age is 5-6. Well, that changes a lot.
Let’s think through how a kindergarten teacher helps her students handle social emotional situations in the classroom. She has a group of children with this social/emotional age. This will give parents a window of how to help your child with patience and waiting.
1. Prepare the children for waiting through visual supports, examples, and definitions of what may occur and how to respond. She may role play the situations and responses. She may roleplay appropriate and inappropriate responses. She might get the children involved in roleplaying, as well.
2. She may reward children through verbal praise or a token to each something for appropriate patience and waiting. She may also use a waiting board where she takes away a piece of a puzzle or number periodically for long waits. When all the items have been taken off the board the waiting is over. This helps the child to get a reinforcer of taking off a piece during the waiting process. It is amazing how this process helps some children.
Hope these ideas help. Please check out my pinterest board on reinforcements for more ideas.
