Common Sense Parenting with Pam

Foundational Skills #5: Adaptability

• Pam Palanza • Season 1 • Episode 5

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What if we could turn life's unexpected twists into moments of growth for our children? On today's episode of Common Sense Parenting with Pam, we promise to reveal how teaching adaptability can empower kids to face life's changes with resilience and confidence. By sharing personal stories like coping with a canceled family picnic, we paint a vivid picture of how adaptability helps children manage stress, embrace new opportunities, and develop vital problem-solving skills. Imagine your child remaining calm and resourceful, even in the face of sudden changes - this episode is your guide to making that a reality.

Join us as we explore practical strategies to nurture adaptability in young minds, ensuring our children grow into robust and capable adults. By incorporating role-playing exercises and 'Plan B days,' we demonstrate how to make flexibility a fun part of life’s journey. Emphasizing the importance of a growth mindset, we focus on valuing learning and perseverance over immediate success. Together, we'll uncover how modeling adaptability and celebrating small victories can lay the groundwork for our children's success in navigating the unpredictable adventure that is life.

Speaker 1:

Welcome back to Common Sense Parenting with Pam. I'm so glad you're here with me today as we continue our series on foundational skills that every child needs for a successful and resilient life. In this episode, we're going to be talking about adaptability. That's a skill that plays a huge role in helping children handle life's twists and turns with confidence and resilience, which is also a skill we'll be talking about down the road. These all tie in together. It's amazing how that happens.

Speaker 1:

Why do you need to teach your child adaptability? Well, adaptability is the ability to adjust to new conditions and handle change in a positive way, so it's a little bit different than resilience. Adaptability is about embracing the flexibility and not letting it throw you off course. So when things don't go as planned, you know, some people just can't handle that because they expect it to be a certain way, and when it isn't, it just throws their whole world off. Why is that important that they learn how to adapt and how to shift and how to adjust? Because we all know change is one of the few things in life we can count on. We know we're going to have change in our lives, from little, small shifts in our daily routines to, you know, bigger things in life that happen. So being able to adapt is a skill that sets children up to face those challenges, to manage the stress associated with it and to remain open to new opportunities. When your child learns how to be adaptable, they're less likely to be discouraged when things don't go their way, so instead they'll be able to bounce back. They're going to find new solutions. They'll move forward. That's where the problem-solving comes in we've talked about already. So it's important that you teach your child adaptability, because that helps them be more resilient, more independent and more emotionally intelligent.

Speaker 1:

How does it impact their life? How does knowing adaptability have a positive impact on their life? Well, at school, if a child can adapt, they're more likely to keep trying, even when those assignments get tough. Maybe the homework gets a little hard if a friend moves away. Maybe they get a new teacher or just something changes in their environment. They're able to adjust without feeling overwhelmed. They're like, oh okay, that happened, I have to adjust. You know the plan A, plan B, plan C thing I've kind of talked about before. How about with their friends and in the family? Being adaptable helps your child deal with the fact that not everything is always going to go as they expect in relationships and don't we know that, as adults say, for example, you have scheduled a play date with a friend for your child but it gets canceled, say you know it rains or the other person's not feeling. Well, they're less likely to feel devastated and just so upset if they learn how to adapt so they can find something else that they can enjoy instead. That's the plan B. How about how it impacts their life in new situations? So adaptability makes it easier for kids to handle situations like moving to a new home, starting a new school. Those are big things, those are huge life changes, but they can learn how to cope with those and find new routines instead of resisting it.

Speaker 1:

Now I'm going to give you a real-life personal example here. When I was in 10th grade, the middle of my 10th grade year, my family moved from the city to the country. Now, keep in mind I had been born and raised in the same house, went to school with the same children from kindergarten through 8th grade. The school that I went to went from K through 8. Then for ninth grade I went to a different school, so that's where I met new people who were integrated from other schools. And then 10th grade, I went to a whole nother school where a lot of other children were integrated in.

Speaker 1:

Now this is the middle of my 10th grade year. Right after Christmas we moved from the city, which was hustling, bustling take a walk to the bus, take the bus, take the street car, you know, go to school for this was like my junior high and high school to the country where we lived across the street from a farm. You know they had cows and pigs and chickens and, yeah, totally different environment, totally different. Just school. The school was so totally different. It was adjustment. It was so totally different. It was adjustment. It was a huge adjustment. But thank goodness my parents had taught us how to adapt, how to roll with the punches, how to go with the flow. It wasn't a huge overwhelm, it was different. But you know, I made friends and everything was fine.

Speaker 1:

If you don't have your child prepared for how to deal with scenarios like that, it can really cause some serious issues. So it's so important that you teach these skills to your children young. So it's no big deal when they have to adapt, it's like okay, not a problem. So let's go through a couple of real life scenarios that can maybe demonstrate for you and highlight the importance of teaching adaptability in your child. Okay, let's say scenario one.

Speaker 1:

Say you plan a family picnic for the weekend. You're all excited, the kids are all excited, you're going to maybe see some friends, they're going to meet you, they're going to play at the park, whatever it is, but then it starts to rain. Your child might be disappointed who wouldn't be? But if your child's adaptable, they could find excitement in a new plan. So you could say you know what? I know you really wanted to go to the park and the picnic and we were excited to see your friends, but with the rain we can't. What are alternatives? What can we do instead? Well, we can have an indoor picnic. Your friends can come over here. We can just do it in the house. We can have a movie day Pop some popcorn, put all the lights down, pull the curtains and have a movie day, teaching them that instead of focusing on what went wrong, they can see the fun in what comes next. They can get excited for that. That's teaching them adaptability.

Speaker 1:

Scenario two your child is learning a new game with friends, but it's not quite going their way. If your child knows how to adapt, they might quickly accept well, I'm not going to win this one, but I'm still going to have fun and we'll keep playing and maybe I'll win the next time. They learn that fun isn not only in winning, but in playing and improving their skills. Because they've learned to adapt, they know not to expect that everything's going to be perfect for them. All right. So what are some strategies that you can use to teach adaptability to your children? Well, here we go again. I feel like I repeat myself on every podcast or Facebook Live that I do Model it. Children are watching you. They're seeing how you handle things.

Speaker 1:

If you respond to unexpected changes calmly, with a flexible attitude, they're going to be more likely to do the same thing. For example, say, you're running late for work, something doesn't go as planned. Maybe you know, spill coffee on your shirt as you're running out the door who hasn't done that a time or two? And you handle with grace. They see you going oh no, I spilled my coffee. All right, I'm going to run and change. I might be a few minutes late, but it's going to be okay. You don't blow up. You don't like get frustrated. You're like oh okay, this happened, got it, I'm going to handle it. You talk through the process like, oh, say, you're stuck in traffic. Oh, we're stuck in traffic, I guess we'll be a bit late, but we're going to get there eventually, instead of being one of those people that's like, oh my gosh, I can't believe we're stuck in traffic, blowing the horn, making faces at people, maybe sending them friendly gestures with your hand, if you know what I mean.

Speaker 1:

Showing them how you adapt gives them a real life example of how they should manage change. Change is inevitable, like taxes. Emphasize problem-solving skills. Teach your child that when their plans fall apart, it's not the end of the world. Help guide them to alternative solutions or backup plans. For example, if they're disappointed because a friend couldn't come over, you know originally was going to and then something happened. Encourage them to think of another activity they would enjoy instead. You know, ask them like what's something fun you think we can do together instead and get their input on it. So it shifts their focus from the problem to finding a solution which is adapting.

Speaker 1:

Celebrate flexibility. Highlight the moments when your child does demonstrate adaptability. Recognize it when they handle change well, like, say, adjusting to a new bedtime or trying a new food. Now let me just tell you, as I'm recording this, we had daylight savings time two days ago. It has totally thrown me off. Every time the season changes, the time changes like that, it throws me off for a couple days. I get really fatigued and tired. Same thing happens to your child. They get up and it's like they think it's six o'clock, but it's really only five o'clock in the morning and you're going oh my goodness, why are they up so early? But they're having to learn to adjust and adapt to that so you can tell them things like I noticed you didn't get upset when we had to change our plans. That was a great example of being flexible. So reinforcing those positive moments helps them feel good about adapting and know they learn that this isn't hard, that it's okay, that it's easy to adapt. It doesn't have to be this overwhelming experience that totally throws them off course for the day.

Speaker 1:

Another way is to introduce small changes in their routine. So help them get used to these changes by introducing small, manageable shifts in their daily routine. For instance, maybe one day you serve dinner in a different room or at a different time, maybe 15 minutes earlier, 15 minutes later, or you try a new family activity that you've not done before. These types of mini experiences will teach them that change can be fun and positive rather than being scary. Encourage open-mindedness with new experiences. Adaptable children are often more open to new experiences because they've learned that trying new things is exciting. So encourage this by gently pushing them out of their comfort zones.

Speaker 1:

And we all know, even as adults, we don't like being pushed out of our comfort zone, but sometimes it can be the best thing that happens. Let's say, for example, you're in a job and you've been out for 20 years and you really don't like the job, but you're like I'll never leave because it's my job and it pays my bills. And what would I do? Where would I go? I'm comfortable here, I've been here for 20 years, I know everybody, I know everything. And then one day you're laid off because the company downsized or for whatever reason. Now you were comfortable in that little zone you were in and you would have never left unless you were pushed. You were pushed out of your comfort zone.

Speaker 1:

So gently push your children out of their comfort zone. Sometimes you know whether it's they try a different food, a new hobby, maybe they make a new friend. If they're hesitant, help them focus on the positive, you know, say things like I know it's different, but let's give it a try, it could be fun. And for you, if you are now out of your job because you've been pushed off your comfort positive, you know. Say things like I know it's different, but let's give it a try, it could be fun. And for you, if you are now out of your job because you've been pushed off your comfort zone, you know there could be an even better job waiting for you. This could be a time when you say I'm going to start my own business. I've always wanted to do that, but I was always afraid to leave. And now you have the time, and maybe you got a little hefty severance package to go with it. Now's your time. So focus on the positive in that instead of the negative.

Speaker 1:

Here's some examples of teaching adaptability. So I'm going to run through some practical examples that you can use with your own children to help them build adaptability. Role play with them to help them build adaptability. Role play with them. Role playing is a great way to prepare kids for change. For example, let's say your child is nervous about an upcoming trip. Walk them through it with different scenarios. Say things like well, what if our flight is delayed? What could we do to pass the time? What could we bring with us in case that happens? So this practice helps them kind of think ahead and feel more prepared and then less anxious if those unexpected changes do occur.

Speaker 1:

Always embrace plan B days. Now remember, I've taught my kids A, b, c and D, but plan B days are so important. Designate a day now and then to embrace unpredictability. So start with a plan and do this intentionally. Right. You start with a plan and then midway through the day, you change it. It could be something as simple as changing from an outdoor day to a game day indoors or swapping one activity for another. This fun practice teaches them that flexibility is sometimes part of the adventure and it can be okay.

Speaker 1:

Help encourage a growth mindset with your children. When children are adaptable, they're more open to learning and improving. If they face a challenge, say like struggling with a new sport, emphasize the importance of learning and trying over immediate success because it's okay, you know. Tell them this it's okay, it's tough now, you're just learning, but when you practice you're getting better and eventually you'll be able to do this and it won't be any big deal to you. So this teaches them that growth happens through change and effort. Now, adaptability is a skill that helps children grow into resilient, flexible and capable adults. As parents, teaching this doesn't require big life changes. It's about making small adjustments, you know, showing your child that change isn't something to fear and helping them view it as part of life's journey. Remember, it's not just a skill that makes things easier for our kids, now it's a quality that will serve them well throughout their lives. By modeling adaptability, celebrating those small victories and practicing problem solving with them, you're helping them build a foundation for success, no matter where life takes them.