First
things first: corporal punishment – hitting kids or spanking them, as a means of
discipline – is now almost universally regarded as counter-productive at best,
and severely damaging at worst. And yet, as Dr. Joan Durrant explains in
Fatherly.com,
parents need effective ways to deal with children who misbehave, test limits,
or simply create chaotic situations. To help, she has developed Positive
Discipline in Everyday Parenting (PDEP), “a framework for positive parenting
that trades punishments and rewards for emotional regulation on the part
of both parent and child.”
“Positive
parenting” focuses as much on parents – or any caregiver, including teachers –
as it does on kids. Her system encourages us to look inward and assess our own
feelings before reacting. According to Durrant, this inspires kids to do the
same. She feels self-examination and contemplation are contagious.
READ MORE: The art of setting consequences
We,
as parents can learn to help our kids articulate their feelings, identify
what’s upsetting them. Then you can work together with your child to fix the
situation. It teaches kids empathy, and helps parents see through the eyes of
the child, rather than succumbing to the knee-jerk response of deciding, and
then saying, the kid is “bad.” It acknowledges the dignity of both you, the
parent and your child.
Dr.
Durrant says, “The framework is all about being conscious of what you’re really
trying to aim for in the long term. Right now, it might be driving you crazy
that your child won’t put his shoes on. But if we respond with punishment in
that moment, it leads us down a very different pathway than where we want to
actually end up. We want to end up with children who are skilled, competent,
confident, empathetic, kind, optimistic, good problem solvers, and non-violent.
When we shout and hit and threaten and coerce, we’re going down an entirely
different road.”
Dr.
Durrant’s Positive Discipline in Everyday Parenting book is available online for free. Her nine-week positive parenting course, developed in collaboration with Save
the Children Sweden, teaches caregivers in over 30 countries how to implement
these skills in everyday life.
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