A few months ago I was having a conversation with a co-worker about how to correct a child’s behavior within the program. During the conversation I used the word discipline. She shrunk when I used the word and quickly changed the subject.
I was surprised and intrigued, discipline had become a dirty word. The definition is still the same, but the connotation in our society has changed.
What is Discipline
Discipline can be looked at in two different ways as defined in the Merriam-Webster dictionary.
(1) control gained by enforcing obedience or order
(2) orderly or prescribed conduct or pattern of behavior
The first definition is compliance enforced by external powers: Parents, teachers or the government. The second is compliance controlled and enforced internally by ourselves.
The first definition is still not wrong or bad – but this is where our culture has begun to replace the feeling of the word. Instead of seeing discipline as a way to teach and correct, we often see it as a way to abuse.
How Abuse is Different Than Discipline
The definition of abuse
(1) a corrupt practice or custom.
(2) excessive use or treatment
(3) language that condemns or vilifies usually unjustly, intemperately, and angrily – verbal abuse
(4) physical maltreatment – child abuse, sexual abuse
As you look at the different definitions you can see how the first two lead to the second two. The first two, corrupt or excessive, take what discipline should be and misuse it. When discipline is misused it stops being discipline (a teaching moment) and becomes abuse.
This is where we need to start having a discussion in society. We can all agree that abuse is bad. The problem is agreeing on what abuse is.
For example…
Legally if it leaves a mark it is abuse. Which I personally agree with.
When it comes to being home alone, some states dictate very specific ages in which you can start giving children autonomy.
Others states have chosen to let the parent decide when a child is responsible enough by protecting what is now being called “free range” parenting.
We used to have “time out” to encourage time for a child to think instead of being hit as punishment, but even that is starting to be seen as abuse.
The truth is, anything can become abuse when it becomes corrupt or excessive.
As a result we have people who are afraid to act at all in the betterment of child behavior.
Where has Our Fear of Discipline Led Us?
We have parents afraid to reign in their children’s behaviors, teachers who feel they have no rights to bring control to the classroom and the government placed with the final choice of penalties and imprisonment.
We can and should teach children how to control their behaviors. This is called discipline.
Discipline with Love
It is vital that we discipline our own passions, so that when we discipline a child it is out of love meant as a teaching moment. Discipline doesn’t always means punishment or consequence and it never means abuse.
If we can view our roles as an opportunity to teach, we will conquer the largest hurdle of possible abuse. We will help a child have a better life by helping them learn to control themselves. It will bless their lives into adulthood.
5 Ways to Implement Good Discipline
-
Calm down
Let them know you will discuss the consequence with them in five minutes.
-
Give yourself time
Good parenting or teaching does not mean you have to react immediately. Allow yourself time to decide on a just consequence. It is ok to point out the child’s action was not ok and you will be thinking of a way for them to fix the problem.
-
Give consequences you can and should follow through with
Nothing is more confusing than having irrational threats yelled at you. As in, “I’m going kick you into next week.” Not only should you not do this, you can’t. Practice giving consequences you can follow through with and that you wouldn’t regret the next day.
-
Be consistent in expectations and reactions to behavior
Work on talking first. If needed calm down and give yourself time to regroup. Remind yourself this is a learning opportunity for your child. You are correcting them for their benefit. Somethings you can and should ignore, pick your battles so to speak. If anger is building up inside, address the issue to avoid randomly blowing up about things you previously let go.
-
Discuss with the child what happened that was unexpected
This is the learning opportunity. Believe it or not, children don’t always know why we got so mad. Still even if you kept your cool and told them to go think about what they did, a child will need help to regroup and process what did happen and how it could have turned out differently. As the adult in a child’s life we can be the link to help them understand how to improve things next time.
Thanks for reading, you may also be interested in 3 Ways to Increase Good Behavior in Children and The Art of Saying Yes.
Please leave a comment, I’d love to read your thoughts.
Also like and subscribe. 😊 ❤️
I believe your post was very well put together and very well thought out. Thank you for this much needed advice!
I will leave my info on your Twitter post and I appreciate you reciprocating!
Thank you Melodie. I have put alot of thought into it. This article came after years of working with parents and children and months of thinking about why we view correction so negatively.
I love your “5 Ways To Correct Children’s Behavior” post. My son is in college now and I will still wait for him to calm down before we talk. You gave a lot of great tips.
Thanks Deb. That is good to know it’s needed in college too. I haven’t got there yet. I’ll be needing more fiancé as wet get there.
I work with children and parents and parents who say they are worried about disciplining normally don’t provide anything else either so they end up with children who aren’t behaving!!
I often recommend time outs, counting to 5 and taking items away. Children need to learn how to behave.
Katie xx
http://www.katienor.com
Thanks Katie. Those are great go to teaching tools. I agree with you, if we become too afraid to discipline we’ll have children that don’t know how to control themselves.
Thanks for doing by and reading.
Lots of great tips esp for the younger generation coming up!! Thanks for sharing !!
https://jessierenea.com/push-the-reset-button-when-youre-ready/
Thanks for stopping by. I hope this article is helpful to many people.
This was great Natalie. Thanks for the thoughtful post. I have never heard of the saying “I will kick you into next week.” Haha! But, there are so many things we say that are figures of speech when we discipline, and it does not make it through. I think even the most well-spoken lecture can be lost, let alone the figures of speech we use in discipline.
I struggle with consistency. I am still trying to find that right disciplinary consequence when the consequences are needed… I can’t agree more though, a good discussion is best.
Thanks!
Thanks for reading Erin. I always love to hear your thoughts. When it comes to consequences I try to make it as natural at possible. You can give yourself time to give an appropriate consequence. I feel like I come up with more suitable solutions when I’m not on the spot.
This post means a lot to me. Although I don’t have children of my own yet I was a child who was abused when disciplined and that gave me an outlook on what I would and would not do when I have my own. This is an awesome post!
Erica Raquel
https://www.grandfashlife.com
Erica, thank you for stopping by, I’m so glad you like the post. I am sorry to hear discipline was used incorrectly in your life. Being able to recognize that is putting you in a good situation to change your own future. I searched out more information in this area in college to try and change my situation as well. I think my parents did their best, but needed more knowledge. Which is why I write now. 😊
So well done! It’s amazing how we get so caught up in our own emotions to something we should just let go! Also, I have seen it countless times where a child is behaving very poorly and the parents sit there and watch. I even had a friend last week that had multiple kids bully her son, walked up to her door and started kicking it. When asked to leave or she would call the police..they said, “Go ahead!”….what?
You wrote a fantastic article. Great job.
Wow! It is amazing and kind of scary how brazen some kids are becoming.
I’m so glad you like this article. I’m hoping that through writing articles like this we can start turning things around.
As a society we tried to stop abuse by saying ‘all this is bad’, but we didn’t really say what was good, what would work. So instead we see alot of hands off parenting.
Here’s hoping we can make a change.
The Network That Could Earns You 5x More Than AdSense: Media.Net
Media.net started Bing and Yahoo’s (they run it together) answer to AdSense
It’s a large network that caters to big advertisers. Their advertising roster includes Forbes, Elle, Cosmopolitan, Reuters, and the like.
Their ad design is genius, so the click-through rates are insane.
They also have mobile-specific ad units, which allow you to test and enhance specifically for mobile visitors. Media.net does a good job here. Not only do they allow mobile ads, but your account rep will design and test them for you.
Head to signup page: https://www.centtip.com/earn-10-more
Best Regards,
Brett L. Kern
Sounds great, thanks Brett.