Why I don't often start with "why" - supporting children through conflict series

I spent a long time observing conflict among children, researching it, writing about it and learning from it when experimenting with many different ways I can support my own children through it. I also spent years professionally researching children's conflict and peacemaking, and writing about it for teachers and professionals. One of the things I learnt was, if I choose to get involved, not to start with “why”. And here's why ;)

Z rolls around on the floor upset and starts kicking, then moves her body closer to where her sister is sitting and kicks directly in the middle of a block tower her sister had been carefully building. Her sister protests, understandably. It seems too hard for them to deal with on their own, as they are clearly both very upset, and need an adult brain to bring some regulation onto the scene.

If I get involved and ask Z “why did you do that?”, from experience, I imagine there are three likely responses I might get:

😕“I don’t know” (or any version of it), possibly a shrug - though this might be more likely from my nearly-teenage son. This is because genuinely, very often, they don’t know.

It is often hard to know exactly why we do what we do. Especially when we’re upset, when our nervous system is out of balance, when we feel upset or annoyed. In moments like this, a genuinely true answer would be “Because I had some frustration/irritation/anger in my system and needed to get it out.” All of these feelings need to find a way out, and at times this is how they get out - by our children walking into conflict with someone else. Surely we can relate this to adult situations as well, though most of us would prefer to argue otherwise.

😕 “Because she didn’t let me play, she kicked my tower, she did this and that to me yesterday, the day before, some other day…” - parts of which may or may not be what had actually happened. 

This is because we asked for a logical explanation, so we are getting bits of a logical explanation - except now we may need to follow up on this story, check which parts happened, which didn’t, who did what to whom and why. The other child might protest and give us their version of the story. In the heat of the moment, it might not be the most supportive thing to do. If we are asking “why” we must, surely, want some story about “why” that is palatable to us. The trouble is - what do we do with this story. Do we now want to turn into a policeman, judge, or jury? By doing that we are taking all their power away from them, and putting ourselves in the position of the one who will be resolving their issues for them.

😕 She might start crying, kick even more, or start kicking me. This is because her brain is flooded with emotion, and in order to support her, I need to co-regulate rather than play detective.

Trying to answer a question that starts with “why” requires us to use our prefrontal cortex - our “logical” part of the brain. Having just pushed someone, kicked their block tower, yelled, pulled someone’s hair suggests that at that particular moment the child who did that had no access to their “logical” brain. And to access our prefrontal cortex in moments when we are overcome by emotion is not easy, takes time to develop and practice.  For young children especially, it also takes a regulated adult, who acts as their external frontal brain, simply because theirs is not yet developed enough to be able to do it on their own.

It does not mean that Z was unaware that destroying her sister’s block structure was not a great idea. If your child is in conflict with another child and he hits them, kicks them, bites them or destroys something - this is not a conscious choice of behaviour. It is, as Gordon Neufeld puts it “a child acting on orders from their limbic system.”  

This (in most cases) was not a planned, premeditated action, that was well researched and chosen for its potentially favourable outcome. This was impulse, a reaction brought about by emotion. Sometimes that emotion is connected to our interaction with another person - it might be that Z really wanted to be involved in the block building activity and her sister said “no”. And there are times when emotion pushes our children to react to another human being simply because they were there. Like when you wake up in the morning with a headache, don't have time to finish your coffee, come to work sleepy and achy and someone asks you something and you just snap? 

And to support our children through those moments and through these kinds of conflict, emotion needs to be considered and responded to first, before we do anything else.

So, instead of asking “why”, I start with connecting to their emotional state. “Wow, it looks like you’re really frustrated/sad/annoyed…”

• Naming the emotional state of my child helps ME put their emotions in focus.

• It supports ME in putting on the emotional lens on any behaviour.

• It allows ME to remember, in the words of Gordon Neufeld, that “emotions happen to us”.

• It enables ME to stay here and now, and not shift into playing detective, or judge, or jury. In the long run it models for my children to do the same.

How they respond to this is secondary. They might respond quickly and be soothed. They might need to let it out more. We might need to move through things slowly and gently, or walk out of the room. I might have to quickly grow multiple octopus-like tentacles, to support both of my children (or however many are involved).

This does not mean that we do not handle behaviours, we do not stop and make sure everyone is safe, that we just let our children do whatever they want because it’s their emotions driving them. On the contrary - it means understanding the drivers of their behaviour and responding in a way that makes sense for where they’re at developmentally.

What matters is that conflicts among children are emotional events, and when they erupt we need to be connecting with their emotional side, before we move anywhere else.

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If you are a parent, teacher, caregiver and you'd like to learn more tools to navigate moments of conflict and turn them into opportunities - with your children, between your children, or among the children you care for, join me on the upcoming online course. All info and registration here.