Honesty. Apparently this is an issue in our house right now with a certain little kidlet. If you read my post on the The Chocolate Milk Fib and you’ll see this is becoming a thing.
I played Go Fish with Fancy Nancy cards today with Baby Girl a certain small, female child. She was desperate to win (I can tell she’s been playing a lot of games with Little Son because he is very competitive). So when I asked her, “Do you have the card with pink shoes?”–a card I knew she probably had–she looked thoughtfully at a certain card in her deck for awhile and finally replied, “Nope. Go fish.”
So I fished. Then it was her turn. She said, “Mom, do you have the pink shoes?”
Hmmm . . . . okay, somehow her cheating seems so cute, so do I say something? Yup. She thought she had swindled me. So as I handed her the pink shoes card I called her on it. “Hey, I thought you didn’t have that card?” She totally kept her best game face on and said, “Well, I’m lucky to have the match now.” So I said, “Well, let’s give true answers from now on.”
We continued the game to the end. It turned out that we both had 8 matches each, so we tied. When she found out that she had not beaten me she said, “Oh, well I’m going to count this match twice, so now I have 9 matches. I won!”
Now I don’t want you thinking that Baby Girl is a little naughty thing. She’s actually wonderfully obedient and well-behaved. She’s just having a hard time with this. And I know to many people this would not be a big deal, but honesty means a lot to me, so I decided to nip it in the bud.
So I finally said, “Okay, there is not going to be any Cheater-Pants in this game. If you want me to play then you have got to say what cards you really have . . . .[insert long-winded Mommy lecture on why cheating is not honest].” Honesty is such an abstract idea to a child that age, but I tried the best I could to explain it.
We played another game. She didn’t cheat, but she lost . . . totally diminishing the theory I had just mentioned that cheaters never prosper. So we played 2 more games which she HONESTLY won by a long shot (whew!).
I hope she understands now, but I don’t really know. It’s amazing the drama we can have while playing Go Fish. How do you teach honesty in your home? Do you believe it’s as important as I do? Share your good ideas!
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