Praising Kids – The bigger the better?

When Carly walked into her mother’s bedroom, she had a big smile on her face. She was holding the picture she had painted that day at school and was excited to show her mom.  As her mom, Sharon, turned to greet her, she noticed Carly’s excited demeanor. Carly proudly held up the picture and said, “This is what I made in art today.”

Sharon’s initial reaction was to smile and instinctively she blurted out, “Wow, Carly, what a wonderful picture. You’re an
incredible artist. That must have been the best picture in the whole class.” Carly kept smiling, but was a bit confused. How could her mom know what the others had painted and how their pictures compared? But she knew her mother meant well.

“Thanks, mom,” was all Sharon got out of her daughter then, as Carly spun back around and bounced out of the room. The picture now lay on the bed next to Sharon, as she gazed down at it again. The bright colors and detailed drawings were quite impressive and Sharon then realized how much Carly has grown as an artist. If she only had the chance to tell her that.

Consider that Sharon may have missed an opportunity to use healthy praise to affirm her daughter. Praise can be a tricky tool for parents, as some forms of praise can actually have the opposite affect than intended on children. Like other parenting tools, there are effective and less-than-effective ways to use praise. For many parents, the bigger the adjective, the better the compliment. This is referred to as “global” praise.

But consider that global praise may confuse a child. At times, global praise can make a child doubt the praiser, wondering how such a lofty description can be offered without full information of the situation. As the parent using global praise is trying to connect with the child, the child is not being reached emotionally.

Specific praise is a healthier way to go. Describe what you see, and let a child use that emotional connection to then praise themselves. Through specific description, a parent can describe with appreciation or admiration what he or she sees or feels, which will connect emotionally with the child. This emotional connection will then enable the child to praise herself.

Sharon went back to talk to her daughter with the painting in hand. “The colors of the leaves in the trees are so radiant, Carly. And I see how much time you spent on painting the animals in the background. I can see each of them have ears!” Carly was smiling. “You seem very pleased with your work.”

“Yeah, mom,” Carly answered. “Mrs. Sweeney says I should maybe submit it to the art show. I’ve never had anything in the art show before. That would be kinda cool.” Sharon realized then how specific praise enabled an emotional connection.

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Mom, I’m tired. You can’t be tired, you just napped…

Adele thought that she was a wonderful parent before she had kids. She was always an “expert” on why the parents she knew were having problems. Then Adele had three children of her own.

Adele realized that raising children can take a parent to the depths of his or her character. Initially, understanding children and what motivates behavior in kids was a mystery to Adele. But she soon learned that the best way to connect with kids and figure out how to motivate them to proper behavior begins with emotional connection. There is a direct connection between how kids feel and how they behave.

Emotional bonding with your kids begins with the most fundamental unit of communication – what Psychologist Dr. John Gottman calls an emotional “bid.” A “bid” can be a question, a gesture, a look or touch, any single expression that says “I want to feel connected to you.” Understanding healthy “bids” for emotional connection is essential to a successful and rewarding parent-child relationship.  A parent needs to analyze his or her style of emotional “bidding” and how he or she responds to a child’s emotional “bidding.”

Connecting with your kids emotionally will strengthen and add power to your relationship. Strong parent-child emotional understanding and bonding can form a healthy foundation for which your kids will benefit in navigating relationships for the rest of their lives.

You may have one now or two when I return…

Delayed gratification is the ability to wait in order to obtain something that one wants. The ability to control impulsiveness is usually considered to be a personality trait which is important for life success.

The marshmallow experiment is a famous test of the concept of delyaed gratification conducted by Walter Mischel at Stanford University. In the 1960s, a group of four-year oldswere given a marshmallow and promised another, only if they could wait 15 minutes before eating the first one. Some children could wait and others could not. They were profiled as “grabbers” or “delayers.”

The researchers then followed the progress of each child into adolescence, and demonstrated that those with the ability to wait were better adjusted and more dependable (determined via surveys of their parents and teachers), and scored an average of 210 points higher on the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT).

The experiment has been done over and over again over the years by Mischel and others. The results are similar and indicate a strong connection between delaying gratification and success in all areas of life.

 

Limit Setting for Kids

While in the “executive” role of parenting, parents often find themselves having to set limits for a child to promote health and safety. Parents should be aware that parental limit setting is needed when a child cannot set limits for themselves. With healthy limit setting, children feel safe and can be more creative and communicative, and find a healthier environment to grow. In the book, Growing Up Again, authors Jean Illsley Clarke and Connie Dawson discuss that without healthy limits children feel “wary and insecure.” They could become “reckless and uncaring about their welfare.”

But setting limits that are too strict can be unhealthy as well. If parents set limits are too restricting, children will over adapt and become passive, or demand attention with rebellious behavior.

When healthy limits are set for them, children learn gradually to set their own limits, to value themselves. Healthy limiting setting builds self esteem. This way children get stimulation and recognition in safe and healthy ways.

Ten Guidelines for Establishing Family Ground Rules

Ten Guidelines for Establishing Family Ground Rules

1. Be Moderate. Role model rules

2. Be Specific. Meet specific needs

3. Be positive. Base ground rules on teaching virtues

4. Establish specific, relevant consequences for breaking rules

5. Use consequences that are educative, not punitive, restorative, not retributive

6. Be consistent

7. Communicate rules clearly

8. When giving consequences, make sure to also give reasons

9. Make ground rules non-negotiable

10. Be flexible and revise rules over time.

Source: Linda Kavelin Popov, from the book, “The Family Virtues Guide”

Parenting with Healthy Structure

For children to build their own healthy internal structure and self discipline, they must use the materials offered to them. If they don’t get healthy structure from their parents in the form of consistent and appropriate rules and boundaries, they may become unsure and insecure, perhaps unable to adequately handle life’s challenges. Many will even work on making things look like they’re okay on the outside, but something completely different may be going on inside. They may become rigid and critical inside due to lack of healthy structure given to them while growing up. This may cause inflexibility and sharpness, an inability to make appropriate decisions in challenging or, perhaps, even simple situations. This lack of healthy internal structure may prevent children from taking full account of a situation, their actions and attitudes, others’ needs and their own needs.  (read more)

Effective Discipline – how’s a parent to know?

With the goal of teaching children self-discipline and self-control, parents can appreciate the need for effective tools when teaching responsibility and respect.  In the heat of the moment, though, when the situation may be full of emotion, many parents struggle to know if whatever disciplining tool that is used is helping achieve the goal of self-discipline.

In her book, “kids are worth it,” author Barbara Coloroso explains her philosophy on parenting and effective discipline:

“Kids are worth it.  They have dignity and worth simply because they are.  I will not treat a child in a way I myself would not want to be treated.  The ethic that we should treat others as we ourselves want to be treated and not in a way we ourselves would not want to be treated.  If it works and leaves a child’s own dignity intact, do it.  A serious problem with the many parenting tools that control kids and make them mind is that both parents’ and children’s dignity and sense of self-worth are sacrificed in the name of behavior modification or behavior management.”

Therefore,  when choosing what do do in the heat of the moment, and with the goal of teaching a child and promoting growth, parents will find it most effective to always maintain respect for and the dignity of the child.

Why a certified parenting coach?

What’s the benefit of a certified parenting coach and how can parent coaching help parents be more effective in relationships with children?

Many parents struggle with how to achieve the goals they have in their minds for their children and families. Most parents strive for healthy relationships with their kids, but may be unaware of many effective tools of healthy communication, building self esteem, effective discipline, coping with anger and other emotional outbursts, sibling rivalry, bullying (both physical and relational), and much more.

There is a lot of information available online that may help parents decide what strategies may work for their children, but unfortunately much of the information available misses a huge piece of the puzzle. If a parent feels challenged by something with a child, they may search online for information to increase awareness, but then what tools would be most effective in dealing with day-to-day situations? And more importantly, how does the unique make-up of each child affect how to choose the most effective strategies.

A certified parenting coach can help parents plan effective strategies in dealing with children. Parent coaching is a relatively new field, and parents should make sure they choose a coach who can appropriately assess the most effective strategies for parents, based on the unique nature of each child.

It’s vitally important to understand who a child is, his or her temperament, developmental stage and tasks, maturity level in several different areas, personality and then also how his or her closest relationships have impacted that child to be able to begin considering the most effective strategies. A certified parenting coach can help a parent better understand a child.

Parent coaching must be done is a safe and nurturing environment. A certified parent coach with the proper experience will help a parent be able to process through difficult situations and grow more confident in handling the inevitable challenges with kids. More importantly, a certified parenting coach will give parents the opportunity to practice newly learned skills in a safe environment.

And that’s the secret. The classice Learning Pyramid suggests that practice, practice, practice is one of the best ways to retain new knowledge and incorporate new skills. Practicing in a safe and nurturing environment with a certified parenting coach will empower parents with newly learned information. Once parents become more confident with effective strategies, they will begin to see relationships with children improve, and be able to celebrate the healthy growth in their kids.

Setting Limits for Kids

Many parents struggle with when to set limits for children. Parents need to set limits when a child is not able to set limits for themselves. The child may not be mature enough, developmentally advanced enough, or responsible enough to set his or her own limits and so a parent must then set limits for reasons of health and safety.

Parents need to be aware that limit setting should be done with much thought and consideration, as to avoid power struggles. Many times children don’t understand the logic or reasoning for limits, but research has shown that all children feel safer and much more creative and expressive when limits are understood and consistent.

Setting limits for kids is different than discipline in that when setting limts, parents should not expect a child to really learn much more than where the boundary is or what a rule may be. With effective discipline (using healthy consequences, for instance), a parent should expect that the disciplining tool should promote and encourage learning and growth.

For more information on setting limts, healthy consequences and more, please visit Responsible Kids Network.

It’s important to know who a child is to better understand when to set limits for that child. Help is available from Setting Limits Parenting Coach Marty Wolner.

Free information on setting limits for children and more effective parenting information, resources and feedback in our Effective Parenting Newsletter.