Crumbs cover the table and chocolate covers his face, but your preschooler still denies he ate the cookies. When you try to get him to tell the truth, he persists, blaming his sister, the dog, or even a monster that came out of the TV. So how do you get him to confess his misdeed and, more importantly, understand the value of telling the truth and accepting responsibility?
Figure Out The Why
Lying has a fiercely negative connotation in our society. People consider liars both sneaky and untrustworthy. You may feel a bit queasy when you catch your own child in a blatant lie, but you can take comfort in the fact that, at the preschool age, children don’t lie out of malice. They may be suppressing the truth for many reasons, including:
A natural fear of known consequences such as a time-out, separation from a welcome activity, having to return what was taken, etc.
Wish fulfillment, in that they secretly regret what they did and thus imagine other reasons it happened, reasons they may believe could be true because of their still-hazy understanding of the difference between fantasy and reality
A need for attention, by exaggerating or making up a heroic action or deed
Encourage Confession
A direct, angry accusation like “You ate those cookies, didn’t you?” can be very intimidating for a child still grappling with reality, regret, and consequences. A confession may be more likely if you begin your approach to the rule-breaking in an oblique way, using language like:
“Hmmm. This isn’t right. What do you think happened here?”
“Somebody doesn’t know that drawing on the walls is a no-no. You know that, don’t you?”
“Someone has broken the rules. What do you think we should do?”
Engaging in their fantasies is another way to encourage confession. Maybe cartoon characters only eat cartoon cookies, so it must be someone else who ate the chocolate chip cookies for breakfast. Who does your child think that could be?
Exhibiting empathy with their underlying fear can also get them to ‘fess up. “I know you wish someone else had thrown that toy at the computer because now the computer is broken. You feel sorry about that, don’t you?”
Praise Vs. Punishment
In your household, you’ve probably set up rules that include age-appropriate consequences in response to rule-breaking. These are the very consequences that your child may be trying to avoid by lying. But if your child breaks a rule and finally confesses to it, anger and punishment shouldn’t be the first response, else he’ll have no incentive to avoid lying again.
A child who accepts blame and confesses deserves a hug and praise for his growing maturity. In this case, you may want to consider an exception to the usual consequences by focusing less on punishment (limiting TV time, time-outs, etc.) and more on him making amends for the transgression, such as saying sorry to the injured party and cleaning up the mess he has made.
Teaching honesty and the value of trustworthiness takes time and patience. Try reinforcing real-life lessons with fictional ones, including modern retellings of Aesop’s fable The Boy Who Cried Wolf.
