YouTube, Google and the Internet as a parenting tool

Ever had that experience when your toddler refuses to believe any facts or knowledge that you try to share with her?

I did, often! Let me share my experiences.

My daughter loves to draw, and she cut and make lots of artworks, but she wants to do her art in a new, clean sheet of bond paper. Sometimes she would just draw a single line or circle and that is already her art. She refuses to maximize and use the other empty space. She wouldnt want to use other papers with print on the back either. In all her 4 years of life, she already consumed about 2 rims of new bondpapers, 3 sets of notebooks and a bunch other set of painting/watercolor papers.

With this I told her that she should recycle, to use newspapers and save mother nature because the papers comes from trees. She did not believe that paper comes from trees. How could she? She’s just turned 4 last June and she wasn’t taught of this process yet. She would insist on getting a new set of white, clean paper. So, I invited her to watch this video from YouTube showing the process of how paper is made from tree barks. After the show, she understood, and since then, she would use old newspaper to make her artworks and would always remind me to “cycled” – how she pronounce recycle 😛

Then there was that time when using slippers for her is a no no. So I told her she would get worms inside her feet and legs, I searched from google images of varicose veins and told her that she would have those on her legs. She was scared of getting those and so from then on, she would wear her slippers in the house and would always show me and tell me – “See mommy, I’m wearing my slippers, so i don’t get “cosveins” – her term for varicose veins. 😛

Kids just need to understand things in order for them to make something a habbit or refrain from doing it. They find it hard to just blindly follow, and I wouldnt suggest it either, to just follow without understanding. I think the knowledge and information will linger more in their minds if they understand the process and the reason for every action, rules or facts.

So thank you to the internet for an easy access to these knowledge and information that helps me in raising my kids 😀