ScreamFree Articles

I devote an entire chapter of my book, ScreamFree Parenting, to the dangerous power of language and labels. In that chapter I assert, "What we say about our kids is more important that what we say to them." Our words about our children not only shape others' opinions about them, they shape the very identity of our children and how they relate to the world.

A man recently told me about an encounter with his 13-year-old daughter. She was the youngest of two girls, and like many younger children, she struggled to leave her older sibling's shadow. It seems that older sis had quite the reputation for her academic skills. In particular, her math skills were the stuff of legend in the school and in her family. You can guess that she was labeled as being "good at math." So anything that fell short of this marker was considered less-than and younger sis found herself with the label of "the one who struggles with math".

Now the dad wasn't sure when the reputation came about. It just happened somewhere in the matrix of immediate family, extended family, and school. This is the typical way that labels evolve since we tend to gravitate toward any descriptions that easily categorize ourselves and those around us.

"I'm not good at math" had become a sort of mantra for this teenager. One night, as she was sitting at the table doing her homework, this label worked its magic. She usually labored heavily, but this night she seemed especially frustrated, especially beaten down by her "limitation." She was working on one problem which she just couldn't get right. No matter how many times she solved the equation, she could not seem to get her answer to match the one in the back of the textbook. After several huffs of disgust, she belted out, "I'm just not good at math!" After a pause, Dad made his way over to the table to see what was going on.

He looked at her homework and the problem she just couldn't get right. He examined her scratchwork and looked at it again. He then looked at the book's answer. He looked back at his daughter's work. After a few scribblings, he announced to her that her answer was correct; the book's was wrong! The trouble was that his daughter could not have even allowed that as a possibility. Because she was "not good at math," she just couldn't possibly be right.

Dad told me of this story and how it has changed his approach with both daughters. He now refuses to label either one, choosing instead to celebrate each daughter's degree of effort, not their level of performance. He employs "can be" language, as in "My 13-year-old can be really good at math and sometimes she can really struggle."

It may not sound like it, but the words "can be" were revolutionary words for this family. Those words created space for his daughter to both succeed and fail, and reminded her that her identity is much larger than any one particular outcome.

It is my sincere hope that we all learn to speak (and hear!) such words ourselves. It will be difficult because old habits die hard and I don't know about you, but I can be a little stubborn at times.