Breakthrough Parenting Online

Sammy (age 11) chronically loses his homework, can’t find anything in his messy room, forgets to do his chores and really just wants to watch TV all day.  He’s gained considerable weight.  He complains and whines when his parents get on him to do better.  His grades in school are miserable.

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What are we striving to achieve when we say that we are raising children? When children can accept full responsibility for the consequences of their choices, they are "grown up. Responsibility means the ability to respond appropriately given the needs of a situation. Your children will be able to respond appropriately when they have developed these three essential character qualities: rational thinking, the capacity for loving, and sufficient confidence to act on their beliefs. These three qualities are included in our formula R=TLC. Built into this formula is also a way of understanding the best method for reaching the goal, which is tender loving care or TLC.

Thinking: In our formula R=TLC, the "T" stands for thinking. This is the ability to use one's mind to process information logically, to analyze situations and to form conclusions. Attentive parents routinely teach children how to think by involving them in problem-solving activities.

Loving: "L" in the R=TLC formula stands for loving. Loving describes a way of being with oneself and others. It means fully accepting someone for who they are as a person.  Loving means treating others with respect and compassion, and valuing and promoting what is in their best interest.  Children must first know that they are important and learn to care about themselves before they can accept that anyone else is also important. This can only happen when they are treated with respect.

Confidence: "C" stands for confidence in the R=TLC formula. Confidence means the courage to take action, to stand up for oneself and to make independent decisions. It means being self-reliant and trusting in one's own judgment. By showing approval when your children act constructively, you can create an atmosphere in which your children can build confidence.  Our formula R=TLC is a universal formula for attaining the highest goal of a human being, to live a self-actualized life. What this means is to develop one's gifts to their highest potential and to make a positive contribution to society. The ability to live a self-actualized life begins in the family.

The Goal: R = TLC Responsibility = Thinking Loving Confidence

The Method: TLC = Tender Loving Care

Jayne A. Major, Ph. D. is the author of Breakthrough Parenting: Moving Your Family from Struggle to Cooperation which she has taught for the last 25 years. Please visit http://www.BreakthroughParentingOnline.com for more parenting resources including online parenting classes and community.

Parents who understand the use and misuse of rewards in raising their children will excel in the most important job that they will ever have—raising children to be responsible, intelligent, moral and confident adults. Children absolutely need to be rewarded for good behavior.  However, bribing children isn’t a great way to reward them. In fact, if children are continuously bribed to be good, they can end up being punished by their parent’s rewards.

 

For example, “If you are a good boy when you are

with your grandma, I’ll give you an ipod.”

 

Well, maybe not an ipod, but anything else that a child might be given to entice him or her to be cooperative.  The problem is that children should cooperate because it is the right thing to do.  A bribe takes attention away from what is appropriate behavior.  The end result is that a child feels that if there isn’t something in it for me, I don’t have to bother with getting along with grandma or anyone else.  Nevertheless, children should have many rewards -- rewards that are based on accomplishments – large or small can make a huge difference in the positive outcome parents want to achieve. A parent’s approval of a job well done is a superbly important reward.  What children really need when they do the wrong thing is instruction.  The goal is for children to be happy with their performance. Parents need to promote in their children that inner good feeling of “I got it RIGHT!” vs. the inner feeling that “I screwed up.” The first promotes a sense of accomplishment and well-being, the other the despair of being not good enough. 

 

Picture a newborn baby and think about all of the lessons that this baby must learn before reaching adulthood.  There are countless lessons to learn about how to be a fully functioning, independent and responsible adult.  The best method a parent can use is to pay most attention to a child’s accomplishments and acknowledge them with “Catch Them Being Good.”  Great!  Fantastic!  You got it right!  You can be proud of yourself!  These kinds of acknowledgements are reward enough; they don’t have to be followed up with a gift of food or toys or events. Such gifts should be given as a normal part of life, not tied into behavior as a bribe. Furthermore, if a child wants a special thing, there is much more satisfaction if this child earns extra benefits by working for them.  People earn a paycheck by working for it.  Adults aren’t bribed to do a job that they agreed to do; they make an exchange of work for a paycheck.  In order to become a mature adult, children need to learn how to do this. 

 When children don’t behave well they should be disciplined, which in Breakthrough Parenting means to teach; it never means to punish.  Most parents rely too much on punishment, routinely thinking that their child deserves it when the child didn’t do the right thing.  

Mom passes Sarah's room, and sees her throw her pajamas on the floor. "Put those in the laundry!" says Mom. Sarah picks them up, and puts them in the laundry basket.  Sounds good, right? Is there anything wrong with this exchange? You might be surprised but there is. Stop and think about the way Mom is speaking to Sarah. Is she authoratative, permissive or a breakthrough parent? Can you improve on the way Mom communicates?  If you're not sure, let's look at the conversation again. Mom believes the old saying that when you know better, you do better. What's wrong with throwing your clothes on the floor? They make your room messy, and they don't get washed. You want to have a clean room and clean clothes.

Mom is using commands to shape Sarah's behavior. "Pick up your room." "Take a shower." "Turn the TV off." "Do this." "Don't do that." There are probably hundreds or thousands of commands that parents use to guide their children, but commands like this are the characteristic of an authoritarian parent. These parents give orders and expect their child to do exactly what they're told. The child isn't expected to think for himself - he just follows orders.

But if Mom were to change from giving Sarah orders, to making statements, would that change the communication? "Sarah, your clothes are on the floor." Mom makes a statement, and once Sarah is made aware, she can choose to either pick up the clothes or leave them there.  If she fixes the problem by putting her clothes in the laundry - Mom can say good choice, or say nothing at all because Sarah solved the problem on her own. She obviously knew what the right decision was.  If she doesn't understand what the problem is, Mom can explain, "If your clothes aren't in the laundry, I won't be able to wash them, and you'll run out of clean clothes." Now Sarah has a reason for picking up her clothes, and can choose to do it herself.

By involving your child and encouraging them to make these decisions, you're avoiding thinking for them. This helps increase their critical thinking skills as well as their IQ. When parents give children information and expect that the child will analyze it and come to their own sensible and practical solution to the problem, you may be surprised at how often they actually will.

Trying to avoid using commands constantly actually increases the impact they have when you do use them. "Get out of the street!" "Don't touch the stove!" Your commands will begin to have a special meaning - especially in dangerous situations. Then, once the danger is gone, you can explain why you had to speak that way so they understand, and this will continue to develop their thinking skills.

If your child is a brat, chances are that you've developed a permissive parenting style. Put a stop to it now.  This situation may sound familiar - you are a busy executive, or a working single mom, or simply a parent that is busy with the demands of life. Maybe you feel guilty because you don't spend as much time with your child as you think you should. Whatever the reasons are, you've developed the habits of a permissive parent.

 

A permissive parent over indulges a child, caves in to whatever the child wants, and tries to buy or bribe to get good behavior. Many parents often start this behavior justifying it as wanting to give their child all the best things in life. Unfortunately, these indulgences begin to create an attitude of entitlement on the part of the child, which sets them up for becoming a "brat".  This attitude often presents itself by children becoming more and more demanding, expecting to always get their way, and even picking fights with other children. But if you allow the child to carry this attitude into their adult life, they will usually end up as a person that is unable to function appropriately in the normal give and take that health relationships (and society in general) require. Other people will resent them for wanting more than their fair share. They may find they are having difficulties not just with personal relationships, but also in professional work-related relationships.  Taking the time to learn about the different styles of parenting, and ways to establish and maintain effective boundaries will not only improve the quality of your relationship now, but will prepare your child to have healthy adult relationships as well.

I am struck by the amount of counseling that I do with parents where it appears to my client like as though I am a genius when I am simply helping them use the six steps of logical problem solving. If parents would do this for themselves, they wouldn’t have so many unsolved problems with their children. Some people say logic is “common sense.” However, common sense isn’t so common. Why not? Because -- drama gets in the way.  Drama is what happens when our emotions distort what is logical. Emotions are powerful persuaders – making what is illogical appear logical. We can get ourselves into big messes that way – one mess leads to another and another until we are tangled up in a ball of confusion.

 

While this happens to everyone, some people live their lives in drama – not logic. They also have a crazy-making way of getting you involved.  A really good way to get you involved in someone else’s drama is for that person to blame you for the problem. Your knee jerk reaction is to defend yourself. Few people have adequate boundary controls to stop the problem from escalating, so – OOPS! – defenses go up and the argument starts:  “You did.” “No, I did not.” “Yes, you did.” And so on.  Of course, the way out of this drama is to use logic to figure out a solution. Try out the six logical problem solving steps on a problem you have and see how it works.

Catch Them Being Good is the most important method you can use in disciplining children. It effectively points children in the direction that you want them to go: toward responsible, good thinking, loving and confident behavior. You will not only have better children, but your children will have better parents!

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