Facts About Child Discipline

Purpose

• The purpose of child discipline is to teach children appropriate behavior and allow them opportunities to learn self-control. Discipline is mistakenly thought of as punishment for misbehavior but in actuality it offers both the parent and child a space to learn together. The parent gets to learn how the child learns, the child becomes more and more aware of what is and is not acceptable in his environment and self-control is developed from the inside out.

Spanking

• The debate of whether or not to spank as a form of child discipline has been around for as long as people have. According to Time magazine, the long-term effects of spanking do not benefit a child. Children who are disciplined with spanking tend to be more aggressive because this form of punishment creates fear in the child instead of a relationship based on understanding.

Punishment

• The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines punishment as suffering, pain or loss that serves as retribution. While discipline is about teaching appropriate behavior, punishment focuses on the child making up for the behavior. Punishment most often teaches a child more about a parent’s anger than it does what the child would benefit from doing in a future experience. Children who experience punishment as a main form of discipline often cannot even remember what they were punished for.

Consequences

• Consequences are the direct result of action. According to Uncommon-parenting.com, the way a consequence is applied in child discipline will determine whether or not it is true teaching of appropriate behavior or punishment. Natural consequences relate to the behavior such as a child cleaning up a spill made from fooling around at the table or having some space away from play mates when hitting. The point of a consequence is to teach the child the correlation between action and result. The parent misses this opportunity when aspects of shame, blame or control are brought into the consequence because the child’s focus will be there instead of appropriate behavior.

Modeling

• Parents and caregivers model behavior in every moment as children are always paying attention. Discipline through modeling includes parents doing what they want the child to do, negotiation and flexibility, clear and firm boundaries and trusting the child to do what is age appropriate. Finding a balance between firmness and flexibility can be a journey for the parent, but one worth the effort to teach children accountability through modeling in the parent-child relationship.