How to love your grand kids
A Gift To The Grand Kids
Lots of grandparents don't really spend as much time with their grandchildren as they would like to. In times past grandparents often lived as part of the extended families and in the same house as their children and grandchildren and as a result often had a closer relationship with grandchildren than many grandparents do now. In those situations they would proabbly have seen their grandchildren more regularly, thus giving them more time and opportunity for telling them children's stories or just sharing the world around them through happenstance conversation.
But what about now when often the grandparents are working as much as the parents and the grandchildren are busy with kids activities and friends of their own, or the grandparents live in different cities or even countries than their grandchildren. As a result the grandparents may see the grandchildren infrequently. So now the question becomes what happens when that time to see the grandchildren does come around? What do grandparents talk about with their grandchildren? In times past before the nucleur family was so much in vogue, grandchildren often heard grandparents recalling their own adventures of bygone days. And young people were often intrigued and revelled in those stories even to the point of writing stories or historical accounts about them. But that was when people still read physical newspapers on a daily basis and probably discussed issues that were in the radio or television news among family members on a failrly regular basis.
But now because digital media doeesn't require or invite the participation of others unless they are explicity invited to do so, the over-heard points of view or the "oh by the way" information that was a part and parcel of an older genrations way of life are fast dissapearing. As a result I think many grandparents are feeling alienated from their grandchildren as they spend much of their time on the net or social media, making real face to face conversation or interaction with them almost non existent. So what can a grandparent do?
A Bit Of Child Psychology Might Do The Trick
Here is a suggestion, how about grandparents approaching the grandchild about something that they can read within the context of their own world? What about a children's ebook that they can look up or even buy from the internet, or perhaps a children's stories that the grandparent would be willing to buy for them as a gift on the condition that the grandchild spends a bit of time talking to them about the ebook once they have read it. Or perhaps the grandparent could pose a question to their grandchild about what are the best kid's websites, or the best place to find magic stories for kids, or animal stories for kids. This could be a way to open the door to conversation and perhaps This may not be what one traditionally thinks of as kids fun but it could well open the door to a dialogue and perhaps a different level of relationship. The parent of the grandchild may play a role in this interchange by approaching the grandparent or the grandchild and making a suggestion. Who knows it could open some creative doors towards a more meaningful relationship between grandparent and grandchild.