The Damaging Effects of Tale-Bearing
Parents often pardon rather than correct the tattler simply because they do not know how to deal with the issue.
Articles within this series
- Overview
- Help Your Child Behave
- Taming the Tattletale
- The Damaging Effects of Tale-Bearing
Remind your children that their relationships with one another will last longer than with anyone else in the world. More than likely, they will be friends long before they meet their marriage partners and long after their parents are gone.
Therefore, it is important that they nurture their friendship. Encourage them to be best friends and to seek every opportunity to develop a bond of closeness. Explain how tale-bearing divides friends.
- Sample Questions — “Honey, how do you think your brother/sister feels when you tattle?” “Will tattling bring you closer to your brother/sister or tear you apart?”
- Benefit — Directing attention to the importance of their friendship helps them to see past one another’s wrong doings and develops an attitude of unity.
Replace Tattling with Encouragement
It is not enough to reprimand your child for tattling. You must teach the tattler how to replace wrong behavior with right behavior.
- Sample Questions — “Rather than tattling, what could you have said to encourage your brother?” “When you encourage your brother/sister rather than tattling, how do you think that makes him/her feel?”
- Benefit — Teaching your child how to replace wrong behavior with right behavior helps him to grow in wisdom for daily life.
Practicing Not to Tattle
Training is more effective when your child is required to put his knowledge into practice immediately. The training will stick better when the child uses it in a hands-on situation. Have the tattler act out the right alternative to his wrong behavior.
- Role-Play — Lead both children back to the scene of the crime. Allow them to re-enact what happened. Require the tattler to encourage his or her sibling to do what is right. Require the sibling to heed the encouragement and thank his or her brother/sister.
- Benefit — Role-playing causes your child to put the verbal training into practice, equipping him to respond better to similar situations in the future.
Children learn by repetition. Be willing to work with your children over and over. On those tiresome days, when you become weary from taking the time to teach them, remember Galatians 6:9: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”