Parenting Coach Reveals Secrets To Household Rules That Work

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Parenting Coach Reveals Secrets To Household Rules That Work

Posted On : Feb-05-2011 | seen (667) times | Article Word Count : 1026 |

How often do you set up rules for the kids, and yet a week later you are changing them? Or worse yet, your children keep negotiating and convincing you to back down? This article by Dr Randy Cale, Parenting Coach, explains how to set up household rules that actually help you manage child behavior problems more easily, and end the useless negotiations and arguments that drive parents crazy!

As a Licensed Psychologist and Parenting Coach, I receive many questions from parents about how to establish household rules that really stick. For many of us, it's difficult

to find the right set of rules, with the right consequences, and maintain these rules over time. Child behavior experts agree that consistent limits with clear consequences are

the answer to tantrums, whining, acting out, discipline problems homework struggles and more.

In his recent State of the Union Address, President Obama offered several comments, suggesting that parents must be strong in maintaining healthy rules. As The President

emphasized the need for parents to cut off the TV and ensure that children do their homework first, his comments point to an important tip for helping parents with daily

routines.

Many parents struggle with this critical principle. Instead of a set of simple and consistent guidelines, daily life is filled with negotiations, fine tuning and battles over

the rules and the consequences that support them.

These struggles occur because we tend to make several critical errors. In this article I will outline the critical errors, and the corrections that will keep you on track to

help ease the challenge of child behavior problems.

Critical Mistake One: Too many rules.

The more rules you have in your home, the more violations of the rules that will occur. The more violations, the more frequently you have to end up managing your children's

behavior.

This leads to constant intervention, and decisions making about consequences. If you have a difficult or strong willed child, this will mean you are frequently adding

consequence upon consequence, and the environment begins to feel very punitive and negative.

Parent Coaching Solution One: Have just a few essential rules.

Rather than dozens of rules, focus on the critical rules that will maintain structure and routine. If you understand how to manage behavior using the leverage you possess in

your home, this is not too difficult to do.

In fact, it is easier to manage your home, and to maintain order and sanity with just a few decisive rules, than it is when you have lots of rules that you can't keep up with.

Critical Mistake Two: Setting rules that we don't follow.

This is one of the biggest mistakes that we make. We establish guidelines for our children, and then we violate them repeatedly.

For example, we might set the rule that there is no disrespectful talk in our home. Yet, when our children aren't listening, we're willing to compromise that rule for ourselves

and we yell in an ugly voice to our children. We may not think of this as disrespect, but if we had a video camera sitting on our child's forehead and we played it back for the

world to see ... I suspect that it would appear quite disrespectful.

Another common example would be a rule that says that we don't eat in front of the TV. Yet, our children repeatedly finding us gleefully chomping down a late night snack in

front of the Letterman show, and then we pretend that this won't matter.

We tell the children they are getting pudgy, and so we limit their snacks. Yet, they see us failing to exercise and putting on the pounds, while we eat chips and ice cream

during the ball games.

We can all pretend these little things don't matter. It does matter.

Parent Coaching Solution Two: We walk our talk.

If we set a rule, then we have got to be willing to follow it ourselves. Now there are certainly rules that apply to children that don't apply to adults. Many of these are

built into every fabric and structure of our lives, and thus children see it repeated over and over. These are not problematic, because ... like it or not ... they reflect

reality.

The problem occurs in more of the ongoing, day to day routines where we expect our children to do one thing, and then we do another. It's just hard to keep a household going in

a peaceful, loving way when we set up our lives in this manner.

Critical Mistake Three: Setting rules that do not reflect reality.

I find that every parent has a positive intention behind their rules. However, many of these rules do not reflect the reality we live in, and thus often waste both parent and

child energy.

For example, we can waste extraordinary amounts of energy by focusing on rules that are arbitrary, and have no real life parallel. Examples could be, "At our home, you don't

eat with your elbows on the table." Or, "You must put away your shoes first, and then you can hang up your coat."

Parent Coaching Solution Three: Have reality based rules.

"You can't eat unless you wash your hands." Learning to wash our hands before eating tends to be supportive of health. Good rule.

"You lose it...if you throw it." Good rule for toys and your child's goodies. It teaches your children to care for their possessions.

"You will repair it, or replace it, if you have a tantrum and break it." Good rule. Again ... it parallels what happens in the real world.

The more we can stick with reality, the more we establish rules that really make sense, and more importantly, reality based rules prepare our children for the future.

Remember: Keep it simple. Minimize the number of rules. Walk your talk, and keep focused on rules that reflect reality. You can always learn more about parenting tips and

tools at

Re-Publish this Article

<h1>Parenting Coach Reveals Secrets To Household Rules That Work</h1> Author: <a href='http://www.articleseen.com/profile_Dr Randy Cale.aspx'>Dr Randy Cale</a> As a Licensed Psychologist and Parenting Coach, I receive many questions from parents about how to establish household rules that really stick. For many of us, it's difficult

to find the right set of rules, with the right consequences, and maintain these rules over time.  Child behavior experts agree that consistent limits with clear consequences are

the answer to tantrums, whining, acting out, discipline problems homework struggles and more.

In his recent State of the Union Address, President Obama offered several comments, suggesting that parents must be strong in maintaining healthy rules.  As The President

emphasized the need for parents to cut off the TV and ensure that children do their homework first, his comments point to an important tip for helping parents with daily

routines.

Many parents struggle with this critical principle.  Instead of a set of simple and consistent guidelines, daily life is filled with negotiations, fine tuning and battles over

the rules and the consequences that support them.

These struggles occur because we tend to make several critical errors.  In this article I will outline the critical errors, and the corrections that will keep you on track to

help ease the challenge of child behavior problems.

Critical Mistake One:  Too many rules.

The more rules you have in your home, the more violations of the rules that will occur.  The more violations, the more frequently you have to end up managing your children's

behavior.

This leads to constant intervention, and decisions making about consequences.  If you have a difficult or strong willed child, this will mean you are frequently adding

consequence upon consequence, and the environment begins to feel very punitive and negative.

Parent Coaching Solution One: Have just a few essential rules.

Rather than dozens of rules, focus on the critical rules that will maintain structure and routine.  If you understand how to manage behavior using the leverage you possess in

your home, this is not too difficult to do.

In fact, it is easier to manage your home, and to maintain order and sanity with just a few decisive rules, than it is when you have lots of rules that you can't keep up with.

Critical Mistake Two:  Setting rules that we don't follow.

This is one of the biggest mistakes that we make.  We establish guidelines for our children, and then we violate them repeatedly.

For example, we might set the rule that there is no disrespectful talk in our home.  Yet, when our children aren't listening, we're willing to compromise that rule for ourselves

and we yell in an ugly voice to our children.  We may not think of this as disrespect, but if we had a video camera sitting on our child's forehead and we played it back for the

world to see ... I suspect that it would appear quite disrespectful.

Another common example would be a rule that says that we don't eat in front of the TV.  Yet, our children repeatedly finding us gleefully chomping down a late night snack in

front of the Letterman show, and then we pretend that this won't matter.

We tell the children they are getting pudgy, and so we limit their snacks.  Yet, they see us failing to exercise and putting on the pounds, while we eat chips and ice cream

during the ball games.

We can all pretend these little things don't matter.  It does matter.

Parent Coaching Solution Two: We walk our talk.

If we set a rule, then we have got to be willing to follow it ourselves.  Now there are certainly rules that apply to children that don't apply to adults.  Many of these are

built into every fabric and structure of our lives, and thus children see it repeated over and over.  These are not problematic, because ... like it or not ... they reflect

reality.

The problem occurs in more of the ongoing, day to day routines where we expect our children to do one thing, and then we do another.  It's just hard to keep a household going in

a peaceful, loving way when we set up our lives in this manner.

Critical Mistake Three:  Setting rules that do not reflect reality.

I find that every parent has a positive intention behind their rules.  However, many of these rules do not reflect the reality we live in, and thus often waste both parent and

child energy.

For example, we can waste extraordinary amounts of energy by focusing on rules that are arbitrary, and have no real life parallel.  Examples could be, "At our home, you don't

eat with your elbows on the table."  Or,  "You must put away your shoes first, and then you can hang up your coat."

Parent Coaching Solution Three:  Have reality based rules.

"You can't eat unless you wash your hands."  Learning to wash our hands before eating tends to be supportive of health.  Good rule.

"You lose it...if you throw it."  Good rule for toys and your child's goodies.  It teaches your children to care for their possessions.

"You will repair it, or replace it, if you have a tantrum and break it."  Good rule.  Again ... it parallels what happens in the real world.

The more we can stick with reality, the more we establish rules that really make sense, and more importantly, reality based rules prepare our children for the future.

Remember: Keep it simple.  Minimize the number of rules.  Walk your talk, and keep focused on rules that reflect reality. You can always learn more about parenting tips and

tools atAbout the Author: Dr Randy Cale, Licensed Psychologist and <a rel="nofollow" href="http://terrificparenting.com/parent-coaching">Parenting Coach</a>, has helped thousands of parents find solutions for their child behavior problems, discipline struggles, and even challenges with everyday chores and responsibilities. Learn more at Terrific Parenting, or click here to learn about Parent Coaching from Dr Randy Cale Article Source: <a href='http://www.articleseen.com/Article_Parenting-Coach-Reveals-Secrets-To-Household-Rules-That-Work_51659.aspx'> http://www.articleseen.com/Article_Parenting Coach Reveals Secrets To Household Rules That Work_51659.aspx</a>

Article Source : http://www.articleseen.com/Article_Parenting Coach Reveals Secrets To Household Rules That Work_51659.aspx

Author Resource :
Dr Randy Cale, Licensed Psychologist and Parenting Coach, has helped thousands of parents find solutions for their child behavior problems, discipline struggles, and even challenges with everyday chores and responsibilities. Learn more at Terrific Parenting, or click here to learn about Parent Coaching from Dr Randy Cale

Keywords : Parent Coaching Tips, Child Behavior Help for Parenting, Parenting Help for discipline, tantrums, whining, homework battles, ,

Category : Home and Family : Parenting

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