How to discipline

*Another thing I have been learning a lot about is the appropriate way to discipline a child.

It turns out that most of us are doing it wrong. 😟

I think most of us at this point understand that physical punishment is not good for our children.  Here are some reasons why physical punishment is a bad idea:

• Physical punishment, if effective at all, is only effective in the short run.  It actually creates many more problems in the long run.
• Children that have been punished physically are more likely to be bullies among their peers.

• Children that are overly physical with their peers are more likely to be rejected by their peer group.
• They are more likely to get into trouble at school.
• These problems make it more likely for these children to:
• Have academic difficulty
• Form friendships with anti-social peers
• Be delinquents

• It is easy for parents to lose control when they are using physical punishment, and do a lot more damage than they intended to.

We also should be careful to not be verbally abusive.

• Verbal abuse is talking to your child in an excessively angry or cruel way.
• Many times children that have been verbally abused suffer from more psychological problems than those that have been physically abused. These side effects are:
• Low self esteem
• Clinical depression
• What verbal abuse looks like
• Name calling
• "You're such a brat"
• Sarcasm
• "Wow, it looks like you really thought that through"
• Humiliation
• " I can't believe how stupid you are"
• Accusation
• "You always act like a bully"

• Verbal abuse is also ineffective.
• To be effective as a parent, your child needs to feel like you have his best interest at heart.  He won't feel that way if you are constantly saying cruel things to him.  
• Your child won't care if you are disappointed in him if you don't have a good relationship.
• When what you say is said in an angry way, your child no longer hears what you are saying, and instead he is focused on how ridiculous you are being.

Never discipline a child when you are feeling angry.

It is okay to tell your child that you are angry, but then you should wait until you calm down to talk to your child about the problem.

Punishment done the right way should include these things:

• Identify what the problem is
• You left your garbage on the couch.  
• Describe the impact the behavior has
• When you don't put your garbage in the garbage can, then other people have to live in your mess, or clean up your mess for you. Also your little sister could get it and choke on it.
• Suggest some alternatives to the bad behavior
• You can eat in the kitchen, and then you will be very close to the garbage can and it will be easy for you to put your garbage in it.
• A clear statement of the consequence of the misbehavior.  If a consequence is necessary.  Many times talking to your child is enough.
• Please go pick up your garbage and throw it away.
• Let your child know that you love them

Alfie Kohn, an author, educator and journalist has an online article entitled, "So what SHOULD Parents Do?" He has many ideas of how parents should be with their kids. His ideas are very different from what you hear from most parenting experts.  I think the style he suggests will allow us to raise children that will love and respect us.  I think his style will also allow our children to have very little baggage that they take with them from how we raised them.  These are his ten ideas:

Reconsider your requests. 🤔
Sometimes when kids don’t do what we tell them, the problem isn’t with the kids but with what we’re telling them to do.

2. Put the relationship first. 👪
What matters more than any of the day-to-day details is the connection that we have – or don’t have – with our children over the long haul – whether they trust us and know that we trust them.

3. Imagine how things look from your child’s perspective. 🧒
Parents who regularly switch to the child’s point of view are better informed, gentler, and likely to set an example of perspective-taking for their children (which is the cornerstone of moral development).

4. Be authentic. 👸
Your child needs a human being – flawed, caring, and vulnerable – more than he or she needs someone pretending to be a crisply competent Perfect Parent.

5. Talk less, ask more. 👂
Telling is better than yelling, and explaining is better than just telling, but sometimes eliciting (the child’s feelings, ideas, and preferences) is even better than explaining.

6. “Attribute to children the best possible motive consistent with the facts.” 👼
Nel Noddings reminds us that kids will live up to, or down to, our expectations, so it’s better to assume the best when we don’t know for sure why they did what they did.

7. Try to say yes.  🙌
Don’t function on autoparent and unnecessarily deny children the chance to do unusual things. People don’t get better at coping with frustration as a result of having been deliberately frustrated when they were young.

8. Don’t be rigid. 👮
Predictability can be overdone; the apparent need for inflexible rules may vanish when we stop seeing a troubling behavior as an infraction that must be punished — and start seeing it as a problem to be solved (together).

9. Give kids more say about their lives. 👧
Children learn to make good decisions by making decisions, not by following directions. Our default response should be to let them choose – unless there’s a compelling reason to deny them that opportunity.

10. Love them unconditionally. 💗
Kids should know that we care for them just because of who they are, not because of what they do. Punishments (including time-outs) and rewards (including praise) may communicate that they have to earn our love – which is exactly the opposite of what children need, psychologically speaking.

* Ideas in this post are taken from
Steinberg, L. D. (2005). The ten basic principles of good parenting. New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks.