Concern #6: How to address preschoolers that interrupt you and each other

The situation of preschoolers interrupting a grown up when a grown up is addressing the class, reading a book or speaking to another grown up is quite common in any preschool including ours. Children that are three thru five years old get really excited to make connections between what others are saying and what they are thinking—interruptions are rarely done with any malicious intent and, if any thing, it is a sign of the students’ enthusiasm for learning at this age. Yet, interruptions lead to situations that tempt grown ups to snap at the child to not interrupt a.) without modeling interpersonal skills that would give the child other options other than interrupting b.) without using “thinking words” or choices when addressing the child’s problematic behavior and c.) without setting any true limits.  As with all other situations, the Love and Logic approach to the situation of teaching preschool students not to interrupt includes a.) modeling the desired interpersonal skills/behavior so that kids have the tools to make better choices b.) presenting kids with choices in an affirmative way using thinking words and c.) setting limits in a firm/un-protective yet loving/empathetic way. In this particular setting, I will discuss these three aspects of the Love and Logic approach as they relate to the situation of preschoolers interrupting teachers, parents and each other.

A.) Modeling interpersonal skills that would give the child other options other than interrupting

I realized a couple of years ago, that the preschoolers at our school would get angry and yell at each other when they were interrupted by one of their peers. One rude action was the response to another rude action and the situation of aggression would escalate. Then I realized that the grown ups were modeling that anger and frustration at being interrupted in the way they were snapping at the kids that were interrupting them when they were addressing the class. The first thing that the grown ups at our preschool need to do is to model kind behavior towards the person that is interrupting us as we show them different options for requesting attention/a time to speak. Correcting someone when they interrupt us should not become an excuse to be unkind to each other—especially because our actions and attitudes towards each other are what kids are learning in terms of interpersonal skills no matter how much we may preach to students that they be kind to each other. This is in keeping with the idea introduced at the beginning of the Love and Logic text—that kids do what we do, and have the attitudes that we have modeled for them. Our actions and attitudes have a much deeper effect on our students than our words/lectures.

Besides, modeling a kind emotionally neutral yet firm reaction to interruptions, adults at the preschool should also model ways to avoid interrupting someone when they are speaking. The second half of the Love and Logic text includes practical applications for the Love and Logic Approach to problematic behavior—these applications are called “Pearls” in the text. There is one particularly useful pearl that we can apply from this text to our preschool children. This pearl demonstrates how we can teach children to implement a non-verbal request to speak without being so disruptive to the person speaking. When a grown up is speaking in a one-on-one situation to someone else, the child can come up to the grown up and touch him/her to let him/her know that they have something to say once the grown up is done speaking. The grown up can then touch the child’s hand back to acknowledge that he/she knows that the child is waiting to speak. This is a way to make a request to speak without interrupting the person speaking. It does not work however when a grown up is addressing all of the preschoolers on the rug or reading a book to them however since we don’t want fifteen preschoolers all going up to and touching the grown up because they have a something to say.  In the context of not interrupting a person addressing a group, we can model for children how they are supposed to use yet another non-verbal indicator that they want to speak—by teaching them to raise their hand to let us know they are waiting for their turn to speak. We can also model phrases they can use to politely let the person know that they want to say something to them: phrases such as:  “Is this a good time to tell you something? Is this a good time to make a connection with what you said? When you finish your story I would like to say something too.” Finally, we can model not interrupting by not interrupting each other as grown ups and not interrupting our preschoolers when they are talking to us. When preschoolers are sharing out on the rug, for example, we can say--"Is it okay to add something to what you said now Danny, or would  you like more time to talk?" It is a good idea to teach a lesson on ACTIVE LISTENING and to have a talk about how to have a conversation in a polite way without interrupting at the beginning of the school year when we model how story time and story time sharing should look like.  This is also a great opportunity to teach them interpersonal skills that are invaluable for their success in future school settings.

B.) Present kids with choices in an affirmative way using thinking words

Before addressing a group of preschoolers, we can remind them of their choices when it comes to sharing out to the group without interrupting the original speaker:

Example:

“I would love to hear your thoughts about what I am going to read after I am done reading this page. At the end of the page I will give you a chance to get a better look at the picture and to raise your hand to share out any of your thoughts. Remember to speak up after I have picked your raised hand, that is how you know that it is your turn to talk.”

  

( PS: We should also have reasonable expectations about how long a child can hold their thoughts about topics being shared out and we, as grown ups, should allow for plenty of opportunities for children to share their thoughts when a book or something interesting is being talked about instead of having the unreasonable expectation that they will be silent throughout the reading of a whole book or the explanation of an art project etc. It is not developmentally appropriate to expect the kids to sit in silence that long).

“I see that you really want to share something with me.  Once I finish saying what I am saying I would be happy to give you a chance to say whatever you want to say. If we both start talking at the same time though, neither one of us will understand each other and then we will just have to stop the conversation. I really want to hear what you have to say, can you let me share with you what I want to say so that we can keep this conversation/story time going?”

“I would love to hear what you have to say after we are done listening quietly to what our friend has to say”. 

"Uh oh, my ears hurt when everybody is talking at the same time. Can you please wait your turn to talk after your friend--that way my ears can stop hurting and I can keep listening to everything you all want to share one at a time. I don't want to have to end this conversation over ear pain". 

c.) Setting limits in a firm/un-protective yet loving/empathetic way.

If we find ourselves needing to apply consequences because kids interrupt the teacher after a warning or because they talk over kids that were waiting their turn to speak with their hands raised, here are some examples of how we can apply consequences:

“Danny, I see that you are choosing not to wait your turn to talk when all of these kids have sat patiently with their hands up waiting for their turn to talk.  I’m going to have to ask you to leave our conversation until you are ready to listen to your friends.” Swiftly remove child from the rug (or have another grown up do it) and give them a quiet activity to do in a separate (supervised) area while the conversation/story time winds down.

 After they have had some time alone to reflect, we can tell the child something like this:

 “I’m sorry that we didn’t get a chance to hear what you had to say. I think it would have made our conversation so interesting.  You can tell me now, now that no one is being interrupted”

or

“ I would love to hear what you have to say the next time that we are on the rug and you raise your hand and wait for your turn to talk.  If you ever want to practice how to let someone know you want to talk in a quiet way let me know, I’d be happy to practice with you.”

or

“I know that it is hard to be patient and wait to share something we really want to say. You know what I do while I’m waiting to share? I put all of my brain power in listening to what the person talking is saying or I look at the face of the person talking to make the time go faster before my turn. Do you have any ideas for what you could do to pass the time while somebody else is talking and you are waiting to say what you want to say? Doing something else while we wait for something sure makes the time go by faster doesn’t it?”

Good luck!