The Stress-Free Way To Get Confident Little Bikers
Dads, don’t make this common mistake.
Teaching our kids to ride a bike can be as challenging for us dads as for our kids.
Here is the no pressure art of teaching your kids to ride a bike with confidence.
Dads, here’s the simplest way to teach your kids to ride a bike confidently.
The challenge: Teaching our kids to ride a bike is often frustrating for us dads.
Even when our intentions are good.
It doesn't have to be this way.
Here is my no-pressure art of teaching your kids to ride a bike with confidence.
First, here's how learning to ride went for me as a child:
My dad, a firefighter, was more of the cool-aid man (brute force) than a patient teacher.
He took the philosophy when teaching me to ride a bike:
1/ You will thank me later
2/ I don’t care about what you “Feel”. I care about results.
My dad’s approach:
1/ Buy me a new bike.
2/ Take me to a bike path.
3/ Give me a push as I wobble down the trail.
4/ And stay at it until I learned
The problem with this:
Every time he let go I was afraid to go on my own.
Falling down hurts.
He grew impatient.
I could feel his frustration, which only added to my hesitation and fear.
I started to cry.
“Dad, I wanna go home”
His response:
“We can go home if you learn to ride your bike, or we can go home after you have fallen five times.”
The results:
Skinned knees.
Tears.
I left defeated, cycling equaled fear & pain.
I didn’t try to ride my bike again for a year.
It doesn't have to be this way.
Here is my no-pressure art of teaching my son to confidently ride his pedal bike.
And there are 3 simple steps:
1/ Make sure the bike fits your kid properly.
Adjust the seat so their feet sit flat on the ground.
2/ Remove the pedals from the bike.
3/ With the pedal-less bike, they can scoot around on their own. And become more confident on 2 wheels.
The 2 reasons this is better:
1/ Encourages our kids to gain confidence at their own pace.
2/ Allows the experience to be pressure free: this isn’t a zero to a hundred process, but a gradual increase in skill.
Back to my childhood...
Eventually, I did learn how to ride my bike, free from my dad’s impatience.
I’m not mad at him I get his intentions.
He saw the neighborhood kids riding and knew that I would feel excluded If I didn’t learn.
But he made something that should've been fun, super stressful.
It doesn't have to be this way.
Give your kid the tools they need to teach themselves.
Soon, they will be asking you to put the pedals back on their bikes.
The Five-Step Art of A Family Dinner Convo
The Five Step Art Of A Family Dinner Convo
“Instruction was splendid, pa-pah”
Do your dinner conversations sound like this?
“How was school today?”
Good.
“Anything fun happen?”
Nope. Normal.
Let’s take a step back.
The fact that you are having a dinner conversation is awesome!
Eating together is not simply family bonding time. According to Harvard,
“Regular family dinners are associated with lower rates of depression, and anxiety, and substance abuse, and eating disorders, and tobacco use, and early teenage pregnancy, and higher rates of resilience and higher self esteem.”
Ok! You’ve got the family dinner down, but you want to have more, let’s say, engaging conversation.
Here is a five-step guide to asking your kids questions they will be excited to answer.
This isn’t a formula; think of this more as a framework. If you feel like getting crazy and modifying it, do it! It will probably keep your little conversationalists on their toes.
HiLoFunFailFav
I apologize for the awkward mnemonic device, but if you say it fast, it does(kinda) roll off the tongue.
As I said, this isn’t a formula to spit at your kids. This is a framework for you to use!
Hi-Highlight of The Day
Here, you give your kids the opportunity to tell you what made their day awesome, if only for a moment.
Examples:
What was the best part of your day? (and you aren’t allowed to say “going home!”)
Did you learn anything today that blew your mind?
Did you see any squirrels water skiing?
Lo-Lowlight Of The Day
Time to let your kid get Emo
Give your kids the opportunity to act like an adult, and complain.
Examples:
What SUCKED about today?
What’s the most USELESS thing you learned today?
If you could do today over again, what would you leave in the past?
Fun-Funniest Thing That Happened At School
Let’s see them try to make us learn…
Give your kid the chance to show off his storytelling skills.
Example:
What was the CRAZIEST thing you saw at school today?
What made you ROFL today?
P.S. (Don’t worry I had to look up what it meant)
P.S.S (Yes, be a corny dad and say “ROFL” out loud, like roff-all).
Fail-Failure Of The Day
Get like Mike!
Here, you give your kids the opportunity to show you they understand failure is normal. This is also a perfect opportunity to start by modeling this question.
EXAMPLE OF MODELING:
Today I had such a hard time finding the right words for this blog post. It felt like my brain was deep-fried. After I meditated though, I felt way better and crushed it in like 45 minutes. What about you guys?
WHAT YOU ASK AFTER MODELING:
Did you get stuck at all today?
What was super hard in class today?
Fav-Favorite Food/Drink
Might as well be a 3 michelin star meal…
Ok, this one is an easy home run. No explanation needed.
Example:
What was the BEST thing you ate today?
Did you drink anything DELICIOUS at school?
How To Use It
This isn’t a checklist in which you have to hit each category in order. This is a tool: if the conversation is flagging, come back to it for guidance.
Oh by the way…
Don’t forget to give them a chance…awkward silence is what brilliance is made of…
Now go engage those little monsters! Make them spill their guts. If they are hesitant, show them how! Model how a conversation works. You are already doing the right thing by having a family dinner, now make it fun!
The NO Pressure Art of Teaching Your Kids To Ride A Bike
Dads, don’t make this common mistake.
Teaching our kids to ride a bike can be as challenging for us dads as for our kids.
Here is the no pressure art of teaching your kids to ride a bike with confidence.
When my dad taught me how to ride a bike, he had two things to say:
You will thank me later
I don’t care about what you “Feel”. I care about results.
His Methodology:
Buy me a new bike.
Take me to a bike path.
Hold me by the shoulders as I wobble down the trail.
The problem?
Every time he let go, I would put my foot down.
I was afraid to go on my own.
This is rational; falling down hurts.
He was patient with me at first.
He would tell me, “The faster you go, the easier it is!”
While this is literally true, this advice did not factor in the real fear I felt.
He grew impatient.
I could feel his frustration, which only added to my hesitation and fear.
I started to cry.
Now, I can recognize that I was crying because I felt like he wasn’t listening to me.
“Dad, I wanna go home”
His response:
“We can go home if you learn to ride your bike, or we can go home after you have fallen five times.”
The results:
Skinned knees.
Tears.
I left the trail defeated, now associating cycling with fear and pain.
I didn’t try to ride my bike again for a year.
It doesn’t have to be like this.
This isn’t about the training method I am going to share with you, but about what the spirit of it teaches us about being a loving coach.
The New Method:
Make sure the bike fits your kid properly. For this, that means adjusting the seat so that their feet sit flat on the ground.
Remove the pedals from the bike.
With the pedal-less bike, let the kid scoot around on their own. They will naturally become more confident on two wheels, and soon they will be ready for you to put the pedals back on.
This method does two things better:
Encourages our kids to gain confidence at their own pace.
Allows the experience to be pressure free: this isn’t a zero to a hundred process, but a gradual increase in skill.
I did learn how to ride my bike eventually. Alone, out in our quiet street. It was in this environment, free from my dad’s impatience, that I found the confidence to try again.
I’m not mad at him; I understand how pure his intentions were. He saw all the neighborhood kids riding, and knew that I would feel excluded If I didn’t learn.
In his zealousness to help me, he made something that should have been fun incredibly stressful.
We don’t have to parent like this.
By creating an environment in which learning a new skill is fun and gradual, our kids will be able to teach themselves.
Don’t put your hand on your kids shoulder, and then be frustrated when they miss your support.
Instead, give your kid the tools they need to teach themselves.
Soon, they will be asking you to put the pedals back on their bikes.