My almost 5yr ds has a hard time understanding how people are related. Like for example he doesn’t understand that his grandparents aren’t my grandparents but my parents. Or, he will ask a married man at church where his mom is, but means his wife. Is this common at this age and how do I teach him how people are related?
My younger two are at the same place. I think it just takes time. I think my 6 year old has figured it out but he still gets confused now and then.
I agree- I think it's age. Both of my children went through it as well. I had the hardest time getting my daughter to understand when she grew up she couldn't marry her brother!
Have you tried drawing a picture (like a family tree)? I never really thought about this, actually. I know my son is a visual learner, and I know he's seen the family tree in his baby book many times, so perhaps that's why he's never confused them? I didn't know back then that he was a visual learner, though. Looking back, it makes sense to me now why he would know them.
i tell my kids that i am there mommy and that my mommy is called grandma.. they get it than.. i usually see when mommy was a baby and kid grandma took care of me and i call her mommy... and i do tease them sometime and tell them that i am goin to tell my mommie on them..lol. my 5 yr old gets it.. same with sister, and brother, and dad,,
Very common at age 5 not to "get" relationships. Even at 6 and 7, sometimes kids don't understand the difference between "best friends" and "cousins". Usually the farther distant the relationship (like aunts-by-marriage or uncles-by-marriage, or "the child of my cousin is still a cousin"?....) the more difficult to quite grasp. Every now and then, just run through the family tree and establish "mommy's family" and "daddy's family" and how they all come together as "your family" -- eventually they'll get it. If you're talking about family tree, it might not hurt to build a poster-sized one with room for pictures of the people named.
Another thing that popped into mind... I just happened to think that all of my family lives in AR, and all of dh's family lives in TX. We sometimes say "your TX grandma" when we're trying clarify something. If everyone lived in the same place, it might be more of an issue, I don't know.
