Should Our Children Be Taught To Respect Grandparents?

Yes, parents need to teach their children to respect their grandparents; grandparents give grandchildren a lot in the shape of unconditional love, kindness, patience, humor, comfort, and lessons. With grandparents living away from grandchildren and meeting only on important festivals like Diwali and Christmas, it is difficult to instill this attribute in grandchildren.  

Ways to teach children to respect grandparents:

• Grandchildren need to spend quality time with grandparents to develop that special bond of love that instills respect. You could welcome your parents/in-laws to come spend some time with your children; you could visit them more often with our children if they stay in the same city.

• Encourage your older children to communicate through e-mail, text and phone calls with grandparents

• Set dates when the grandparents can take the grandchildren out for movies, to the park or for ice-cream.

• Set an example by respecting your parents/in-laws by being polite and thanking them next time they give your advice.

• When you visit your parents/in-laws offer services like cleaning the dishes or doing the laundry; it would act as an important lesson in love and service to your children.

• Make sure you speak in a respectable fashion always to your elders in front of children.

• Convey to your elders that you wish to teach your children important lessons in respect; your parents/in-laws needs to know that it is futile to be over-indulgent and pampering. Also let the children know what acceptable or unacceptable behaviors are with elders.

• You need to tell grandparents to be authoritative and assertive when the children make a mistake. Next set clear and consistent expectation regarding respectful behavior; children need to greet, wish and thank grandparents when gifts are given to them. This attitude with some amount of pampering would give grandparents the due respect.

• Don’t we want our children to share in the wealth of personal experience and knowledge of grandparents that we always did as kids? We should encourage our children to ask their grandparents to narrate stories, funny incidents of their childhood and their experiences that they could relate to their own lives. Grandparents would also love to narrate family history and traditions to children.

• Lastly with parents working in outside jobs, staying with grandparents not only helps grandchildren to spend more quality time with them, but to also benefit with their supervision and disciplinary measures that are set jointly with parents. This would not only build a positive relationship between grandparents and grandchildren, but would also instill respect in them for their grandparents.