Discipline

Making Sibling Rivalry Work for You

Sibling rivalry is here to stay; there’s no way you can eliminate it. That doesn’t mean you can’t control it, or channel it into healthy directions; you can’t make it just go away.

Sibling rivalry comes from the natural competitive nature that is in all of us. We are all competitive; you see it in the obvious places, like sports; but you also see it in the way we work and the way we spend money. Without this competitive nature, none of us would strive to get ahead, we’d all become like the sloth, just lazing around.

Rivalry and competitiveness, like any other character trait, has its positive side and its negative side. Usually, when we talk about sibling rivalry, we just talk about the negative side. You know, kids fighting with each other, blaming each other for doing things wrong and just plain being mean to each other. Okay, that’s the bad side, but what’s included in the good side?

The good side of sibling rivalry is the drive that it can give each child to do their best in their schoolwork, their chosen extra-curricular activities, and even in doing chores around the house. That natural competitive nature can be channeled into motivating each child to do the best they can in everything they do.

The key here is to properly reward each child for the effort they put forth, not necessarily for results. One child’s ability might make it easy for them to get straight “A”s in school, while another child may struggle to hold a C+ average. If you reward based upon how many As they get, you’ve just told that child who struggles that they aren’t worthwhile. But, if you set goals for improvement for each child, based upon their ability, then reward them for X number of points of improvement, you’ve rewarded their effort.

What happens then is that the comments between the children aren’t about “I’m smarter than you,” they become “I improved more than you.” That changes the “I’m better than you” into “I did better than you; a much healthier attitude.

Filed Under: Discipline, Parenting Tagged With: Child, Family, Sibling

How To Diversify Discipline

When disciplining a child, it is best to always have a consistent regimen. This means that when a child has done something that requires discipline, the child knows what to expect. The only time this has adverse affects is when the punishment, or discipline, does not fit the crime. This is when you, as a parent, needs to get creative and diversify your discipline. This will do a couple of things, keep your child on his or her toes when acting up, and allow you to have a grade level system that includes discipline that continues to get tougher with the action that is occurring.

By having a diversity in your discipline techniques you will be able to help curb certain behaviors because certain actions will require certain actions to be taken. For instance, if your child constantly refuses to answer you when you call him or her, make the punishment no television, or iPod for a week. This is will reaffirm the need to listen through distractions. This form of correction would not be fitting if your child was in a fight or if he or she was in trouble at school. By diversifying your strategies in discipline, you are creating a check and balance system for a variety of issues that may arise. The other aspect to this diversification is that you can create rewards. Take the lack of listening for instance. If your child begins to respond and you like the efforts made, you can reward with time on the computer, video games, television, or iPod. This will also make your child feel that they have earned the right to use those things, but also they understand that if the behavior were to digress, that those privileges would be taken away. Think of these things as a way to motivate your child to have the proper behavior that you expect.

Filed Under: Discipline, Education, Parenting Tagged With: Child, Child discipline

When One Child Obeys…

You have two children in your home. One child seems to do everything that is asked, has a good attitude, and is pleasant to be around. The other child has a tough time maintaining a good and positive disposition, does not get along well with their sibling, and seems to be constantly competing against others in the family for attention. This is hard for parents, because one child is going to feel like they always get in trouble, and that their sibling never gets in trouble. This is where much of the sibling rivalry stems from, and no matter what you as

Filed Under: Discipline, Expert Advice Tagged With: Child, Sibling

Sibling Discipline

When siblings fight, it is very difficult to get the children’s attention, and to get them to stop. Parents tend to yell, and many times, the parents attempt at stopping the commotion between the children, actually encourages it. For many parents, they use yelling to try and get their children’s attention. So in essence, a parent uses yelling to get the children to stop yelling, or fighting. It has a low success rate.

Instead, try doing something that the sibling least expect. Something that is productive in stopping fight, and encouraging positive relationship building. One good technique is to have each sibling do something for the other, and they must continue to do so, until the fighting stops. Cleaning each others room, switching chores, or preparing a meal for the other. This is a good way for the sibling to realize what the other sibling is seeing, feeling, and experiencing apart from their brother or sister.

The other option is to have a team project with the children. They must work together in order to complete task. You tell them that there will be no parental interference, and that both children must succeed at the task before they are allowed to do their own things or hobbies. A great team project would be completing the yard together, or re-arranging a room, cleaning the garage, or even washing cars. These are things that take little skill, but teach a lot about team work. This will also teach them that if there is fighting, housework is to follow, so they will not want to let you see the arguing.

One last effort that you can do with your children is to have them write a full page about all of the good things that their sibling can offer to the family. Then at dinner, they must share. This is a great way of having the children readjust their attitude towards one another.

Filed Under: Discipline, Expert Advice, Parenting Tagged With: Parent, Sibling

Positive Discipline

Positive discipline is something that many parents struggle with. For one, many people assume that discipline cannot be positive, that it is a punishment, and a punishment can break a child’s spirit, hence the negative connotation. There are some new approaches to this theory, and for many families, is helping create a very peaceful home, without the hurt feelings.

Let’s first discuss the purpose of discipline. Discipline is intended to help shape and train your child, so that when they are adults, they will be independently disciplined, and therefore more successful in life. Some of the traits that we want our children to have included bathing, taking care of their possessions, and respecting others. What you are essentially teaching them is to have a neat appearance, something our society admires, value your things and others things, and be respectful so that you can be respected.

Some of the ways you can handle this training, or positive discipline, is by allowing your child to take ownership of what is happening. For example, asking your child what they think would be a good consequence if they do not do what you have asked, allows your child to comprehend, that they are essentially disciplining themselves. This takes the dirty work out of your hands, and gives them the reigns. They know full well what is coming if they do not comply. Another strategy is allowance, but with a twist. They rank what certain tasks are worth, within reason, and so they already know what they will or will not earn if they accomplish certain things.

Children thrive in constructive environments that have clear cut boundaries. They especially thrive when they have had a hand in creating that environment, because they know exactly what is required of them, what the rewards are, and what the consequences are.

Filed Under: Discipline Tagged With: Child, Positive Discipline

Parent Discipline Techniques

There are many different ways that parents discipline their children. Many believe in talking and certain actions while a few others believe that sparing the rod spoils the child. No matter what you agree on, there are certain techniques that can help any parent in the discipline process. Obviously, the type of discipline you use can depend on the age of the child but some techniques work for any age. Obviously using time out or saying “no” in a firm voice won’t work on a teenager but those are exceptions.

Take away a child’s privileges is one of the efficient ways to discipline without using any type of force or strong voice. For instance, if your child doesn’t put their toys away like they are supposed to then you can take away the toys for a certain period of time. For an older child such as a teenager you can take away their cell phone, computer or driving privileges. These are effective ways of letting the child know that their actions can mean consequences.

Taking away the attention from a child can be effective as well. If a younger child is throwing a tantrum, giving that child more attention can only fuel their fire. Being ignored is much worse than giving in to the temptation of addressing said tantrum.

One of the most important things to remember is to remain calm in any situation so that you don’t do or say something you regret later. Children can be stressful and put us on edge but giving in to their displays of disobedience only worsens the issue when it can be addressed logically.

Lastly, always show discipline with love. There aren’t many things worse to a child than thinking that they are not loved or that their parents hate them when we all know that isn’t the case.

Filed Under: Discipline, Parenting Tagged With: Child, Child discipline, Family, Parent

Positive Discipline Techniques

Disciplining our children can be stressful and something no one wants to do even though it is necessary. Positive discipline techniques send a different message than traditional discipline because it allows for positive reinforcement and a general feeling of self control. There are a few ways you can incorporate positive discipline techniques into your discipline regime.

Show your children that there is a choice in their actions. Redirecting your children and showing them that they have a choice is a positive discipline technique that has your child thinking instead of acting out. This way of offering your child an alternative is a great way of using discipline without force. It is simply a way of offering a child a way out; a way to offset normal discipline. For instance, if your child never puts away their toys, take them away as a punishment. This does not use any force and shows the child that there is always a reaction to a negative action.

Time out is a popular way of using positive discipline instead of negative actions when a child does something wrong. This type of punishment allows your child to take the time to think over their actions and what they have done to be in the time out setting. It doesn’t use any physical action and is still quite effective in controlling children.

There are many ways to use positive discipline techniques and the ones given to you are just guidelines. You have to use whatever works for you but these are an excellent start in choosing a disciplinary action that isn’t physical but still allows your child the opportunity of knowing that there are consequences to each action they have that is negative. By choosing these forms of punishment you are setting a good example of consequences without violence.

Filed Under: Discipline, Parenting Tagged With: Child, Parent, Positive Discipline

Discipline Management

Disciplining children can be difficult because you never know if you are coming on too strong or letting them get away with murder. It is important to have excellent discipline management skills, especially in a household with sibling rivalry. This is due in part to wanting to be fair to both children and not showing favoritism, which can cause even more sibling rivalry.

A good rule of thumb is to try to make the punishments as close to each other as possible. This can be more difficult on children that are of different ages but typically children have more sibling rivalry that are closer in age. If that is the case then try to make their punishments equal. Let’s say that your two preschool children are fighting over a toy. It can be effective to take away the toy from both of them, telling them that neither one gets it until they are willing to share.

With any age, showing love and compassion is important, especially when dealing with discipline management. You want to be able to discipline your children without coming off like you are spiteful and mean. That is why it is important to perform any discipline with love and caring so that your children know that you still love them.

Regardless of how you decide to do it, it is a good idea to have some kind of discipline management in mind before you start. That way anger doesn’t take control of your actions and you either do or say something you hadn’t intended. This also lets your children know what will happen if they disobey your orders or rules instead of them be frightened of you. Consequences are fine but they should be ones that are thought of as a fitting punishment, not a dire sentence.

Filed Under: Discipline Tagged With: Child, Management, Parent, Punishment