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The Know-it-All Stage
The Good, the Bad and How to Keep Your Sanity
By Shannon McKelden
No matter how important this stage is in developing confident, independent children, it can be enough to make the most patient parent lose it. So what can you do about it?
"If they're not harming anyone by 'thinking' they're right about something, then I just let it go," Elliott says. And if her third grader insists that the math problem he is working on is correct (when it's not), she tells him to show it to his teacher. "They always believe the teachers!" she says.
But when it comes to more serious issues, letting it go is not an option. "If they're being a know-it-all telling me they won't crash on their bike and don't want to wear a helmet, then I'll insist," Elliott says. "When it comes to safety and harming themselves, they clearly do not know it all!"
LaRowe assures parents that setting boundaries and enforcing consistent consequences will usually nip this behavior in the bud, and agrees that there are times when it's OK to let them learn that they don't know everything they think they know, if it's not a safety issue.
"When it's safe, allow your child to take safe risks that allow him to learn on his own," LaRowe says. "It's like fighting with a toddler who doesn't want to put on his jacket. It's not really worth it because when he takes his first step outside in the cold, he'll be begging you for it. No harm done and lesson learned. It's the same sort of thing with grade-schoolers."
Even LaRowe, an International Nnny Association "Nanny of the Year," knows that it can be tempting to scream "You don't know! Why do you say you do?" But she cautions that feeding the behavior will just foster it. "Set limits and boundaries and hold firm to them," she says. "Acknowledge and validate your child's feelings and congratulate him with positive, purposeful praise when he does master a new task, but do not tolerate inappropriate expressions of his feelings."
