Transition Times-A Time For Learning

Transition times are often stressful for parents and children. Your child may experience transitions in many different ways. Their response may be of great excitement and anticipation which puts them in an emotionally charged or at the other end of the continuum, they might be so engrossed in their current activity that they are not ready to stop and move to another activity. If you have more than one child they will likely not both be ready at the same time. You can make transition times easier by focusing your child's attention on the moment of transition, away from their perception of loss in letting go of the activity they are doing. Directing your child's attention to the feelings and responses of the objects they are putting away keeps the focus off their own struggle with the transition and teaches them empathy when under stress.

Young children are under tremendous stress because they spend much of their day in transition, moving from one place or activity to another. Let’s look at the lessons that are learned during transitions. Transition times teach children to think and reason, to apply and reinforce concepts, to manage their emotions, to work in cooperation with others, and to follow instructions.

The better training you can provide to make transitions fun the easier it will be for your child to adapt to changing situations. Many times young children are told to “sit down, be quiet and wait or hurry up and move along”.

Training

Transition activities are different from regular activities in length and provide the opportunity for children to be engaged in the transition. You may provide a silent signal for transition times, such as flicking the lights on and off. For those children who are not yet finished with their current activity you might put the focus on your child making the transition easier for the ball, toy or drawing that they will be putting away to transition to the next activity . You might say, “Your drawing may not be ready for a nap so we have to be very gentle. Let's explain to the drawing that it is OK, you have a special pillow for your drawing to take a nap and tell your drawing that you will be back later".

For young children a special song that is sung during times of transition may ease them into the “warm up area” in preparation for the next activity. You may use the approach of “let’s pretend you are a frog. “All frogs jump to the sink to wash your hands.” What you are doing is keeping your young child in the moment, relating to and taking action on behalf of their toy, game, or drawing. Messages that keep your child in the moment focused on taking action and moving forward helps to keep them from getting stuck in the past activity. By "painting" vivid pictures or engaging specific sounds to keep young children in the present moment of transition activity, it moves them forward. You help them overcome a natural tendency to cling to the last activity and decrease the fears of loss or missing something.

Once your child makes it to the “warm up area” for the next activity you want to make it special as you create a calm place where they are focused and listening, where you have their full attention. You can do this with magical things like a wand or a listening bunny. You might use a favorite rhyme or anything they can see or hear to engage their attention. For young children you might draw their attention to the clouds in the sky, raindrops, fingers, animals and what they do, even objects like pillows.

I have a pillow, it has a cover

I can squeeze it and it doesn’t make a sound

I can push it and pull it and smooth out the cover

Most of all I can put my head down on my pillow

I am so lucky I have my pillow to lay my head on when I go to sleep

My pillow is with me when I dream about the stars in the sky

I am so lucky I can talk to my pillow

We go together to

My favorite places

I spend lots of time with my pillow

My pillow is a very good friend.

Once children are calm, you have engaged their imagination and they are listening intently, you are ready to transition to the next activity. If your child is still wound up you may tell a story which reinforces and supports their calmness.

At the end of the story you can have them act like squirrels and quietly gather up all their “nuts”, the things they need for their next activity such as swimming suits to go to the pool, or water bottles to go into the car. Try to leave some mystery and encourage continuing calm by quickly gathering and counting all the "nuts", the items they gather. Excitement is great, what you want is well regulated excitement. Your words and images help your child practice building "emotional muscles" and flexibility. Your child with your structured help, practices thinking about the present moment, and begins to experience emotional regulation at the same time.

If your children are very different in their pace of things done, you can help coordinate the finish time by having everyone with yellow on gather their “nuts” first. Or for everyone with red on do an additional task. In this way you provide time and pace regulation by adjusting for individual differences between your children. This adjustment is essential so that one child isn’t frustrated and angry that another child is holding them up which then gets them out of the calm of the transition phase.

The rewards

There are specific goals for every transition time no matter how you structure the time for any age group. Your goal is to get your child’s attention and create a calm balanced emotional state. Calmness and engagement makes transitions easier and gives you a gentle presence as you make transitions positive rather than stressful. While this takes more time, the frustrations and melt downs that come with pick up times and transitions become a learning time in which everyone learns that transition time is a time of getting themselves calm. You are teaching your children how to effectively cope with the stress of transitions. These tools will serve them well even when you are not present. You may even find your children teaching these fun strategies to friends.