How to teach young children about consent

If you are the parent of a baby, the topic of consent is probably not high on your agenda. And even as your baby grows into a vocal toddler, it’s still hard to imagine how you would begin to have a conversation about consent. It feels like a very serious topic, perhaps something that you would want to discuss when they get older, maybe when they reach school age.  

But actually, we can start to lay the groundwork for understanding consent from the very first year of a baby’s life and continue to develop that understanding as they grow.  

Consent might sound like a confusing concept but it’s something everyone should understand. We want to raise children who are confident in both giving their own consent and respecting the consent of others. We want them to be able to say no to things that make them feel uncomfortable and to expect to have a say about their own bodies and their own choices. And we also want them to grow up to respect other people’s rights. To understand that other people may or may not give consent. And to understand that sometimes it will feel hard to accept this decision, but that accept it we must.   

Even for our youngest children, this learning starts small 

 If you have a young baby, they won’t yet be able to fully understand choices. They definitely won’t be able to understand the concept of consent as a whole. However, you can start by showing them what happens when their feelings or needs are respected, even in small ways.  

Simple things like accepting their cues that they are full, or stopping a game when they turn away.  

You could also get into good habits yourself by asking them before starting a massage or explaining what is going to happen next as you put them into a car seat. Of course, your baby won’t be able to reply yet, but these are good reminders that despite being entirely dependent on us, babies are still mini human beings with choices. You show your baby that they have the power to stop things they don’t like, and that other people should respect that.  

These experiences, over time, will mean that they have healthy expectations of others as they get older. As they start to socialize more it will also mean they know how to treat their friend’s choices.  

As your child grows

As they grow, you can then support them with this concept further by helping them to understand things like the importance of respecting a friend’s choice to say no to a certain game or understanding when to give someone personal space, such as when a sibling doesn’t want to hold hands. You can explain that someone else can make this choice and that’s ok. That they are also able to make and communicate these decisions for themselves.  

Of course, young children are still learning to manage their impulses and won’t always get this right or be able to hold back their instinctive reaction.   

This is why it is so important for them to see adults respecting consent, so they have a clear understanding of what we are asking of them, even though sometimes it will be hard.  

It is also why this is something you will need to practise and support your child with over time.  

Over time, you will be able to extend the conversation. If, for example, you ask your child if it’s ok to wash them in the bath, you can do this every single time and explain why you ask again and again. Your child will begin to understand that consent is not something that happens once but must be gained repeatedly.  

Consent in social situations

There are plenty of social situations where you can demonstrate body autonomy with your child and support them in communicating their own boundaries. 

“You didn’t want to kiss Grandma last time and that is absolutely your decision. What would you like to do today? We could wave or high five instead?” 

From not being forced to sit on Santa’s knee through to saying “no” to a slide that feels too scary, when we listen to what our children are saying and feeling and then respect their limits, we teach them about boundaries. We can also use these situations to teach them about respecting other people’s boundaries too. 

“Can you ask Grandma what she would feel happy doing? Does she want a kiss today?” 

There will be plenty of times that your child gets it wrong and these also bring an opportunity for further discussion. This brings a chance to set your home up as a space for safe conversation. Our children then learn that they have trusted adults that they can speak to about this topic, which is also important.   

Teaching consent starts young and small. It starts with being respectful, asking questions and modelling consent ourselves as adults. A baby won’t be able to understand the term consent but hopefully by making consent an inherent part of our children’s lives growing up, they will be able to gain and give it well into adulthood.   

This content is taken from the My First Five Years app, available here:

Apple: https://apps.apple.com/myfirstfiveyears

Android:  https://play.google.com/store/myfirstfiveyears