Parenting a 7 Year Old

For all intents and purposes, I reckon we have it fairly easy with Hannah. Our 7 year old listens to instructions well, is conscientious, generally diligent and always seeking to do well. She’s adapted well to her new school environment – if her invitations to birthday parties in her class is any indication – and seems to enjoy school and after-school activities. Of her quirks; she still does not take failure of any kind well at all and easily tears up when she’s faulted for something. She can also be a little bossy, and is naturally inclined to tell people what they should be doing. These seem to have been ingrained in her for several years now.

There is one other quirk that gradually surfaced since starting Primary One though. In the last year, we’ve discovered a few instances where she had not been truthful. The story about this goes back though slightly further back to Nov 2015 and two months before she started Primary One. Hannah’s school advised us then during that briefing for parents that one challenge parents would face would be their child’s tendency to hit the school book store to buy all manner of stationery items they don’t really need but are nonetheless attractive to girls at that age. I recalled the both of us chuckling at that point and musing to ourselves “Nah – Hannah’s not into these things”.

How wrong we were and the irony. The instances where she’d been untruthful have all centered on how she uses the pocket money we give to her to buy food during recess time. Specifically: on those three occasions, rather than use her money to buy food, she’d spend it on cute things at her school book store, and then not tell us. When quizzed on it, she typically acted ignorant first, but folded in short order under Mommy’s interrogation. After which, she teared up and sobbed.

The most recent of these were yesterday evening. Rather than physically discipline her this time though, we got her to write a reflection instead after a stern talking to – which she did:

Got date and itme-stamp even.

After the kids went to bed, the two of us had a further discussion on this, as it struck us that it’s hard for 7 year old girls not to be attracted by these things. Moreover, at a level, we wondered too if we finally needed to provide her an outlet to buy these stationery, as these things often become social topics of chitchat with her friends. We agreed that we would provide opportunities for her to buy these stationery, but in an organized fashion and to better teach her personal responsibility.

Parenting: an ongoing learning journey!

2 thoughts on “Parenting a 7 Year Old

  1. Challenging! Thankfully none of my 4 kids (including my girl) were very enticed by the bookshop. I think the more important issue is not the “wrong” use of money but the lying about it. She must realise that if she’s done something, she has to be honest about it and not made to be fearful of it instead and think of ways to “hide”.

  2. Hi Sam,

    Totally agree with you about the importance of being truthful. It is something which we try to help Hannah build in her character. :)

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