What is attunement? This story from Daniel J. Siegel and Mary Hartzell's book, Parenting from the Inside Out (pp. 64-66), clearly illustrates what attunement is and is not:
“ATTUNEMENT AT THE SYCAMORE TREE”
“Mary observed this interaction between a young girl and a student teacher on the school playground. Sara was a very tentative four-and-a-half-year-old who was socially and physically cautious and was very hesitant to try new experiences. The teachers had worked carefully to build her confidence by providing learning opportunities that she could master with support and encouragement.
“It was the spring semester and Sara was just beginning to challenge herself. In the playground was a large sycamore tree that had fallen over many years before and had been left as a natural bridge spanning ten feet of the yard. The children loved to walk across the log. Doing so was a great accomplishment. Sara, however, had never ventured to attempt walking on it until one day in mid-May, her confidence budding like the lilacs, she stepped onto the log and completed her journey to the other end. A student teacher had been watching her and as soon as Sara stepped off the end of the log the young woman exploded with cheers and applause because she was so excited about Sara’s accomplishment. ‘Yea! Hooray! You’re terrific! You’re the greatest!’ the teacher exclaimed loudly, jumping around and waving her arms with excitement. Sara looked at the teacher shyly and, standing rigidly, managed a faint smile. For weeks afterward, Sara avoided the log and it took a great deal of encouragement for her to try again.
“What was amiss in the interaction? Certainly the student teacher was positive toward Sara’s accomplishment, but she missed attuning to Sara’s experience. Her response reflected her own pride and excitement and was not about Sara’s experience of mustering her courage and taking a great risk. The essence of Sara’s experience was not reflected by the teacher’s remarks. Actually they were overwhelming to Sara and did not support her going back to risk trying to walk on the log again. ‘Maybe I won’t be able to do it that well again. I’d better not try it or I might fall off,’ Sara most likely thought. Being ‘terrific’ is a hard act to follow for a cautious child, so she played it safe and did not build on her initial accomplishment.
“What could the teacher have said that would have nurtured the emerging self-confidence that Sara was exhibiting? How could she have encouraged her in a way that would have been respectful of Sara’s experience? How could the teacher’s response have encouraged Sara to reflect on her own accomplishment in a way that she could own it and develop it further with confidence?
“If the teacher could have reflected what she saw Sara accomplish in a warm and caring way, Sara could have seen herself reflected in the teacher’s response. The teacher might have said, ‘Sara, I watched you carefully put one foot in front of the other and you walked all the way across to the other side. You did it! It was a little scary, since it was your first time, but you kept going. Good for you! You are really learning to trust your body.’
“These statements would have been the teacher’s reflection of Sara’s experience. The teacher’s actual reaction tells more about the teacher’s experience than it does about Sara’s. The proposed reflective message she could have offered would have allowed Sara to integrate the experience and build on her accomplishment. This is an attuned, connected response. This collaboration offers a reflection of both her outer behaviors and an understanding of her internal mental processes to provide an authentic reflection of Sara’s ongoing experiences. In order to enrich coherent self-knowledge, children need to experience the integrating reflections of others in a way that matches both their internal and external experience. When we join with our children in attuned communication we support them in developing an integrated and coherent story of their own lives.
“Attuned communication supports the emergence of a more autonomous self and flexible self-regulation. Emotional communication enables a form of joining that is truly an integrating process that promotes vitality and well-being in both parent and child. This experience of joining helps children develop a stronger sense of themselves and enriches their capacity for self-understanding and compassion.
“That doesn’t mean that we always have this joining experience, or that we have to be listening to and reflecting our child’s experiences all the time. Continual intensity of a parent’s focus on his child could actually be experienced as quite intrusive by the child. Within parent-child relationships there are cycling needs for connection and separation. It is important for parents to be sensitive to times when the child needs solitude as well as joining. The attuned parent respects the natural oscillating rhythms of the child’s need for connection, then solitude, and then connection again. We are not designed to be in alignment all of the time. Attuned relationships give respect to the rhythm of these changing needs.”
“Mary observed this interaction between a young girl and a student teacher on the school playground. Sara was a very tentative four-and-a-half-year-old who was socially and physically cautious and was very hesitant to try new experiences. The teachers had worked carefully to build her confidence by providing learning opportunities that she could master with support and encouragement.
“It was the spring semester and Sara was just beginning to challenge herself. In the playground was a large sycamore tree that had fallen over many years before and had been left as a natural bridge spanning ten feet of the yard. The children loved to walk across the log. Doing so was a great accomplishment. Sara, however, had never ventured to attempt walking on it until one day in mid-May, her confidence budding like the lilacs, she stepped onto the log and completed her journey to the other end. A student teacher had been watching her and as soon as Sara stepped off the end of the log the young woman exploded with cheers and applause because she was so excited about Sara’s accomplishment. ‘Yea! Hooray! You’re terrific! You’re the greatest!’ the teacher exclaimed loudly, jumping around and waving her arms with excitement. Sara looked at the teacher shyly and, standing rigidly, managed a faint smile. For weeks afterward, Sara avoided the log and it took a great deal of encouragement for her to try again.
“What was amiss in the interaction? Certainly the student teacher was positive toward Sara’s accomplishment, but she missed attuning to Sara’s experience. Her response reflected her own pride and excitement and was not about Sara’s experience of mustering her courage and taking a great risk. The essence of Sara’s experience was not reflected by the teacher’s remarks. Actually they were overwhelming to Sara and did not support her going back to risk trying to walk on the log again. ‘Maybe I won’t be able to do it that well again. I’d better not try it or I might fall off,’ Sara most likely thought. Being ‘terrific’ is a hard act to follow for a cautious child, so she played it safe and did not build on her initial accomplishment.
“What could the teacher have said that would have nurtured the emerging self-confidence that Sara was exhibiting? How could she have encouraged her in a way that would have been respectful of Sara’s experience? How could the teacher’s response have encouraged Sara to reflect on her own accomplishment in a way that she could own it and develop it further with confidence?
“If the teacher could have reflected what she saw Sara accomplish in a warm and caring way, Sara could have seen herself reflected in the teacher’s response. The teacher might have said, ‘Sara, I watched you carefully put one foot in front of the other and you walked all the way across to the other side. You did it! It was a little scary, since it was your first time, but you kept going. Good for you! You are really learning to trust your body.’
“These statements would have been the teacher’s reflection of Sara’s experience. The teacher’s actual reaction tells more about the teacher’s experience than it does about Sara’s. The proposed reflective message she could have offered would have allowed Sara to integrate the experience and build on her accomplishment. This is an attuned, connected response. This collaboration offers a reflection of both her outer behaviors and an understanding of her internal mental processes to provide an authentic reflection of Sara’s ongoing experiences. In order to enrich coherent self-knowledge, children need to experience the integrating reflections of others in a way that matches both their internal and external experience. When we join with our children in attuned communication we support them in developing an integrated and coherent story of their own lives.
“Attuned communication supports the emergence of a more autonomous self and flexible self-regulation. Emotional communication enables a form of joining that is truly an integrating process that promotes vitality and well-being in both parent and child. This experience of joining helps children develop a stronger sense of themselves and enriches their capacity for self-understanding and compassion.
“That doesn’t mean that we always have this joining experience, or that we have to be listening to and reflecting our child’s experiences all the time. Continual intensity of a parent’s focus on his child could actually be experienced as quite intrusive by the child. Within parent-child relationships there are cycling needs for connection and separation. It is important for parents to be sensitive to times when the child needs solitude as well as joining. The attuned parent respects the natural oscillating rhythms of the child’s need for connection, then solitude, and then connection again. We are not designed to be in alignment all of the time. Attuned relationships give respect to the rhythm of these changing needs.”
