Have you considered purchasing a learning tower and allowing her to participate in making dinner? I have found the tower to be very valuable as my toddler always wanted to be on my hip while preparing food also. She now feels included and loves to taste what I’m preparing.

I love this article and am frequently inspired by your work. As a long time early educator, you keep me returning, always, returning back around to my core values as a teacher and a parent. As stress from work and parenting mounts up through the week, you keep my heart alive!

But, one thing that troubles me is a phrase like “I won’t let you…” On the one hand I understand its value in a context of a child confidently knowing that you (or other adults) are there to help and support the child. On the other hand, in my experience children have varying notions and relationships to adults as caregivers and sometimes very mixed notions of the relationship of caregiving and power. Framing like “I won’t let you…” sounds like it’s begging for a struggle, inviting a conflict of wills.

As a practice, I try to avoid mentioning myself when I set limits. I try–as much as I can–to talk in more detail about the specifics of the situation (and not over there kid’s heads). I try to express a confident, on their side body language, straight into “It’s not available because…” or “It’s too risky b/c…” (in a community culture of a little bit risky can be fun, medium risk needs an adult, etc.). Another strategy I try, when my toddler feels up to it, is “it’s not available bc x…” and then a leap into a story about mouse (or the character d’jour) who did the same thing and, say, bumped their head. Usually the tempered rambling of the story gets us to move on to something else. It doubles the message and talks about the limit in an impersonal way. When I’m at my best, I might revisit this story again before bedtime.

I welcome feedback on these strategies and write in hopes of dialogue for learning (at least my own. 😉 ).

Best to you, in your life and endeavors,
g

That is *and* head strong, there is nothing bad about being head strong!

Could you give her a little task, like handing her a towel and a plastic cup to dry and put away? And say how you would love to pick her up WHEN your work is done, and she can ‘help’ you. We put cups in a low cabinet (Montessori style) when our kids were little, so they could get out their own plates and cups.