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How to parent more predictably (2018)

555 points by wheresvic1 7y ago

marktangotango 7y ago
We’ve found timeouts are very effective with our kids. Although one parent is more consistent about applying them than the other. One thing we’ve learned is that time out with an angry child is not especially effective. So as our kids have gotten older we will have them owe us a time out for when they’re more calm and can actually get something from it. We’ve also found devices are gold for discipline. Our routine is 20 min before bed on weekdays, 20 min after meals on weekends. Usually we just have to threaten losing screen time, ie if I ask them to pick up theirs shoes 5 times the sixth time will be “or else”. Generally consistency is key, and picking your battles as the author alludes to. There is one downside to raising children in a consistent, predictable, and logical environment. That is; they’re less prepared to deal with chaotic people and situations as adults.
- spiderfarmer 7y ago
  > There is one downside to raising children in a consistent, predictable, and logical environment. That is; they’re less prepared to deal with chaotic people and situations as adults. Do things differently in the weekend.
  - dsfyu404ed 7y ago
    >Do things differently in the weekend. <music>Jose Cuervo you are a friend of mine...</music>
- wil421 7y ago
  If your child is too angry or upset for timeout do you just wait until they calm down and apply punishment? What about tantrums in public or somewhere where timeout can’t exactly work? Expecting parent. Can’t wait for September when my daughter is due!
  - marktangotango 7y ago
    It depends on age, they have to be able to understand what’s happening. So for toddlers we’d redirect to something else, then timeouts, then around 5 is when we started delaying them. Seems to work really well. But you’re right, in public is different. Usually taking them out of the situation worked for us. Like tantrum at a restaurant, take them outside till they cool off.
    - logifail 7y ago
      >> What about tantrums in public > Like tantrum at a restaurant, take them outside till they cool off. Our youngest had a gold-plated tantrum (with screaming turned up to 11) on a flight with me last summer, triggered by me insisting that she fasten her lap belt. Short of carrying a tranquiliser gun (joke!) I'm not sure what one can do with an over-tired, over-excited 2 year-old in these situations, apart from try not to get into them in the first place.
      - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
        I am lucky enough to enable my wife to stay home with our daughter as she grows up and the results have been spectacular (you aren't a bad parent for not doing this, I just was in a position to do so). As an infant she was never ignored or left to get over heated (with the exception of a few times she stayed at grandma's house and her behavior for the next few days changed dramatically) as a result she does not feel the need to scream loudly or throw tantrums as she grows older. Anecdotes are anecdotes of course but we will be doing the same thing for kid two.
        shearskill 7y ago
        I was a hands on stay at home parent. Kid still had a few tantrums. Every kid is different, you’ll probably observe that when your next arrives.
        kaitai 7y ago
        Kids are different. My kids also generally doesn't have tantrums, and I don't stay home. She's just a mellow kid (and also was never ignored or left to get over-heated -- what are you implying here?). Compare to a friend of mine whose oldest can turn into a nuclear meltdown in 5 seconds; she stays home. Hope your kid 2 doesn't destroy all your certainties about children :)
- thrower123 7y ago
  They will start getting experience with arbitrary, petty, random and chaotic behavior as soon as you start sending them to public school.
  - thrownthrow 7y ago
    I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at. A thinly veiled insult perhaps?
    - geekamongus 7y ago
      It could be interpreted that way, but it also holds a certain amount of truth.
    - JshWright 7y ago
      That's not how I read it... Going to school means interacting with dozens/hundreds of other people (many of them peers who are still developing social interaction skills). Encountering those behaviors is inevitable in that setting.
      - thrower123 7y ago
        That's about what I was getting at. You also get authority figures that are inconsistent and tyrannical, the wonders of bureaucracy, and extreme limitations of personal liberty. You get to learn how to deal with stupid and illogical people, bullies, and all the other elements of the vast canvas of personality types. It's great training, and not to be discounted. But having a haven of stability in the home is an essential counterbalance.
        usefulcat 7y ago
        I came here to write basically this. I know some parents who use the attitude of "the world is a rough place, so kids need to learn how to deal with it" as a justification for dealing more harshly with their kids than I would (kind of like valuing a "school of hard knocks" approach). Based on my own childhood, I both totally agree with the premise and come to a fairly opposite conclusion: home must be a haven since it is the only place that has any reasonable chance of being a haven. School almost certainly won't be; other kids can be real assholes sometimes.
- ses1984 7y ago
  Timeouts did not work for our oldest. He would constantly try to sneak or wrestle out of timeout and it turned into a game for him. We tried to stick with it but looking back I think it was a huge mistake and the contributed to behavioral problems he has today, basically full blown ODD. If it seems like something is not working for you, don't try to force it. If in doubt, love over punishment. Don't lose your temper.
  - duderific 7y ago
    This is where we're at too, the timeouts just don't work -- same behavior -- running out of his room etc. What I've found is to give him a little of something he wants (5 minutes of legos) before I need something (getting dressed for school). That way I'm not trying to force something "right away" and thus avoiding a confrontation in the first place. Once the power struggle begins, there's not really a smooth way out of it.
- logifail 7y ago
  > So as our kids have gotten older we will have them owe us a time out for when they’re more calm and can actually get something from it. Some would argue that any delayed punishment is less likely to be understood (and so more likely to foster resentment) than one that's carried out immediately.
- empath75 7y ago
  I have a three year old and I don’t think of what I do as punishment at all. I don’t think they have the kind of agency and self consciousness to understand that what they’re doing is wrong, so it doesn’t make sense to think of things that way for me. What I do have is near complete control of their environment so I use that to enforce limits. They can’t engage in some behavior I don’t like if they’re not in a position where they can do it. If they won’t stop messing with the remote, I hide it or move them to another room. If he won’t share toys with his brother, I put the toys away, if he’s acting out in a tantrum, I remove him from the room. There’s no point being angry at what a toddler does, they literally can’t control themselves sometimes.
  - Ma8ee 7y ago
    Most three years olds certainly will understand what they are doing is wrong if you tell them and why. But you are right in that they don’t know how to control their feelings and sometimes themselves. But that is true of many adults too.
    - empath75 7y ago
      I am not sure that's the case. Children are very good at putting things into categories. If you give them a list of things that are right and things that are wrong, they will certainly remember it in the same way that they memorize the names of the trains on Thomas, but I'm not sure that the category "right" and "wrong" has any particular meaning to them. It takes quite a while for them to develop what is a rather sophisticated concept that many adults struggle with. In any case, even if they are aware that something is 'right' or 'wrong', I don't think that doing something that we've defined as wrong for them deserves 'punishment' in the way that you would punish an adult who has a fuller understanding of actions and consequences.
      - Ma8ee 7y ago
        I don't punish. Children can certainly learn what makes other people sad or angry, and have a sense of fairness. I don't think there are any metaphysical aspects of right and wrong that kids have to learn.
- JshWright 7y ago
  > Although one parent is more consistent about applying them than the other. I suspect the "good cop/bad cop" parenting thing is inevitable in most relationships (it's certainly the default for me and my wife). It's something we try to be very aware of and intentional about (I think it can be pretty destructive if allowed to go unchecked). > One thing we’ve learned is that time out with an angry child is not especially effective. So as our kids have gotten older we will have them owe us a time out for when they’re more calm and can actually get something from it. Our view is that the timeout is most effective when a kid is angry (or in any out of control emotional state). The timeout provides a time and space to get emotions under control, then we can have a conversation with cooler heads about expectations and consequences.
  - kaitai 7y ago
    My spouse & I try to be explicit with each other about who is good cop and who is bad cop, and switch off. Good cop/bad cop can really be destructive as you say when it's done carelessly or if it pits the parents against each other. We try to use it gently to maintain a united front. For instance, with bedtime on a rough night, we pick which parent will cajole & start things off and which parent will take over if things go south. One's the closer, and if bedtime goes well that parent can actually just sit it out. For us that helps us have more patience, as if tempers get high, parent 1 simply switches out with parent 2, and sometimes that resets the kid's attitude too. We haven't figured out timeouts at all.
zubspace 7y ago
There are a few things which helped me get better at parenting: * Timeouts rarely work. Try to respond with something which makes sense. Like if your kid throws around things, they need to clean up (with your help). * If things get out of hand, I stay with or hold my kid until the situation gets better and then discuss/explain the current situation and how we will act next time. * It's always good to figure out how your kid feels in a bad situation. Like: "I guess you're feeling <a>, because of <b>?" Sometimes kids do not understand their own feelings and telling them helps them cope better. * Try to stay calm, always. Sometimes it's hard or even impossible. But getting loud or angry never helps. If I can keep control of myself I usually can control the situation and respond appropriately. * Your job as a parent is to provide your kid with all necessities of life and with love. Everything else is extra, like toys, sweets, leisure activities. Sometimes it helps to tune down the extras if necessary. * Admit your errors and say sorry if appropriate. There's a youtube channel which I actually enjoyed while my youngest one was a bit smaller. It's a bit strange to look for help on parenting stuff on youtube, but a lot of his advice was actually quite good I tought: https://www.youtube.com/user/LiveOnPurposeTV/featured https://www.youtube.com/user/LiveOnPurposeTV/featured
- mankyd 7y ago
  > * Timeouts rarely work. Try to respond with something which makes sense. Like if your kid throws around things, they need to clean up (with your help). I usually find timeouts to be more of a cool-down period; both for my kids as well as me. They're never long (I have young kids) so we're talking on the order of a couple of minutes. They provide a good break from whatever it is they were doing and give them a chance to re-approach the situation.
  - empath75 7y ago
    Yeah I use them entirely for removing them from whatever situation is bothering them.
- philshem 7y ago
  </b></a> Making me nervous...
jstewartmobile 7y ago
Jesus, hugs, and spankings. If you agree, share, and reply "AMEN"!
- aklemm 7y ago
  You're 1 for 3 on that list, so no.
  - jstewartmobile 7y ago
    Which one? BTW: Y'all really need to friend-up your grandmas on Facebook.
dkarl 7y ago
One thing I think my parents did right was never telling me in the heat of the moment how I would be punished. I knew how I was supposed to behave, and they let me know when I was not living up to the standard, but if they decided to punish me, I wouldn't find out right away what my punishment would be. The only exception was trivial punishments like being sent to my room or having something taken away for a few hours, or if the behavior problem was ongoing and they had time away from me to talk between themselves and decide what would be appropriate to threaten me with. This accomplished two things. First, they never had to back down on a punishment, because they were careful to only threaten me with things they could stand behind. That meant I never felt any urge to misbehave to call their bluff. Proving parents wrong is irresistible to kids, so if you threaten a punishment you can't follow through on, you've just given them a reason to do the thing you're told them not to. Even if you punish them in another way, it's worth it just to prove you wouldn't do what you said. Second, it forced me to actively imagine what an appropriate punishment would be. To get into their heads and imagine how they would punish me, I had to think about why my behavior was wrong from their point of view. Kids spend a lot of time arguing against their parents, in their heads as well as out loud, and I think many kids don't have enough occasion to go through the opposite process of thinking with their parents to try to predict their behavior.
- winchling 7y ago
  The cold, hard truth I came to realise about punishment is that it's inevitable. Even parents who 'don't punish' actually do punish: they withdraw emotionally. But the corollary of this is that the closer and happier the family is, the lighter the punishments need ever be. For some children even the idea that they're being officially punished is punishment enough.
  - Ma8ee 7y ago
    I’m one of those parents that “don’t punish”. I do tell my child when he makes me angry or sad, and of course it is clear to him that I might not want to, say, play or read to him at that point. I still wouldn’t call that punishing him, but rather a consequence of his actions.
J-dawg 7y ago
I bookmarked this article ages ago because the advice seems so sensible. This post just reminded me of it. https://blog.codinghorror.com/how-to-talk-to-human-beings/ https://blog.codinghorror.com/how-to-talk-to-human-beings/
ycombonator 7y ago
No child is the same. Timeouts ended up traumatizing our child. Anyway I came across this and started to experiment some of the principles from here https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/03/13/685533353/a-playful-way-to-teach-kids-to-control-their-anger https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/03/13/6855333...
acjohnson55 7y ago
One of my best tools with my toddler is "don't react, respond". My first thought is rarely my best thought, and my reactionary tone of voice is not my most loving and supportive. A kid doesn't need your immediate answer to everything. You can tell them, "let me think about that" and literally take the time to consider your options. Almost nothing is an emergency situation requiring your elevated tone of voice or physically rushing towards them. Another tip is that if you see your kid either doing or about to do something you don't approve of, you can slowly close the physical distance so that you can intervene in a non-reactionary way. Lastly, when it comes to predictability, I totally agree with the author. But don't be too hard on yourself. You're going to establish all sorts of bad patterns. Just establish the new pattern, suffer through the couple days of reaction to change, and move forward. My toddler is much better at adopting new normals than I am. A lot of this I learned from being a classroom teacher and also from listening to Janet Lansbury's podcast (https://www.janetlansbury.com/podcast-audio/ https://www.janetlansbury.com/podcast-audio/).
- arkitaip 7y ago
  Any specific episodes you would like to recommend? Thanks!
  - acjohnson55 7y ago
    Not that immediately come to mind. I kind of nonlinearly cherry-pick, splitting between ones I think I can relate to and ones I don't immediately think I relate to. The latter are interesting to me because I find my increased emotional distance to the problem she's talking through helps me better understand her logic, if you know what I mean. Plus, I never know when something not applicable might become applicable :) The other thing is that her approach has a very nuanced logic to it. There's kind of a gestalt behind it that's a bit hard to internalize from individual examples. I should probably just read her books, which I'm guessing would be a more direct way to understanding her full philosophy.
- asdfghjkl 7y ago
  a
DumbBoy 7y ago
You can avoid this whole class of problems entirely by simply choosing to be an antinatalist.
- geekamongus 7y ago
  Ah, I see they have a name for people that don't like kids now.
- bigred100 7y ago
  You don’t have to be an antinatalist to simply not have kids
ca98am79 7y ago
I've read a lot of parenting advice and it all sounds good in theory, but in practice everything goes out the window. I'm in the throws of it now with a 9-month old and a 3-year old. It is hard to think about advice you read in an article when you have not slept and the kids are screaming and having a trantrum. Or you try to do what the article said and then it doesn't work at all and only makes things worse. I think you just have to wing it and do your best. Just be intuitive and as empathetic as possible with your kids.
- asark 7y ago
  With three kids (or even two!), any advice from someone with one comes off as at least as grating as advice from people with no kids did when I only had one. All the time-consuming "just hang out with them and talk to them like humans! Hug them for ten minutes! Make them complex, healthy dishes for every meal! I do it and it all works so well! I mean I also have a night nanny and cleaning service but I won't mention that..." goes out the window when one kid's about to kill themselves with furniture, somehow, you're not sure where another snuck off to but you suspect the worst, the third's making some god-awful noise in the other room that you're pretty sure will end up being expensive one way or another (oh no... did they make that sound or did the dog?) and meanwhile if you take your eyes of this sauce for one second it's gonna burn and it'll be pizza night... again. Yes it's not constantly like that but it's always kinda like that. I understand it gets better when they're older. And I've heard from multiple people with four or five that the difficulty levels off after three kids. Up to three it's certainly non-linear. When for some reason we're down to one it's about as easy as having zero, now. Yeah, I bet whatever crap you read about on the Internet works, one-kidder. F*cking anything would. One's nothing.
  - vianneychevalie 7y ago
    Being the second in a family of six kids, I would never imagine my parents getting on a horse half as high as the one you're towering from.
    - asark 7y ago
alexandercrohde 7y ago
I used to spend time and energy collecting thoughts on how I could be a great parent. Then one day my aunt told me she was mad at her father for being "too logical" when raising her because it gave her unrealistic expectations. Then I started to question everything... If a parent never misbehaved is a kid going to be thrown for a loop when they meet emotional teachers? Did my own fathers weaknesses force me to develop greater strengths?
- jrumbut 7y ago
  You always want what you didn't have, and no one is perfect, but I do think that you make people (not just kids!) around you better and stronger when you model goodness and strength. I'm not in favor of being a bad person to teach people how to deal with bad people. Chances are, despite your best efforts, you'll do plenty of bad stuff anyway. Where logic and emotion come into this is anyone's guess, but showing some affection is a good idea in a household, as is showing how to deal with negative feelings.
- throwayEngineer 7y ago
  The whole identical twins separated at birth thing makes me believe environment is the only thing a parent can provide. Children do not listen to their parents for very long. A decent school, technology like a laptop, and maybe an awareness to dissuade bad friends. That seems like all you can do.
  - Xcelerate 7y ago
    > Children do not listen to their parents for very long. I disagree with that. I listened to my dad growing up because I respect him and think he is a good person. I probably would have gotten into more things if that hadn’t been the case.
  - war1025 7y ago
    I don't know that I "listened" to my parents very well, but I did watch them a lot. Their actions influenced mine quite a bit.
  - 7y ago
RobertRoberts 7y ago
We have some family friends that are decent people, but lousy parents. After about 16 years of observation two of their kids have graduated (one with honors) and the older they get, the more decent they have become, very similar to their parents. What I learned: Kids will turn out like their parents. And poorly skilled parents can still raise decent and well behaved kids. Who you are and how you treat people is more important than technical skills to get your kids to behave.
- kungfooey 7y ago
  This is the whole thesis of the (very good) book by Bryan Caplan, "Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids."
- watwut 7y ago
  Why are they lousy parents?
  - RobertRoberts 7y ago
    It's a combination of a lot of things. Heavy drinking, gambling, lying to each other (parents), kids don't have bed times or waking times, miss school when they are too tired. Force the older kids to watch the younger kids so they can smoke, drink and talk with friends instead of watch their own kids. Kids would scream and fall on the ground when aren't noticed... the parents will be in the same room talking with friends while their kids scream at them... etc... Keep in mind, I like these people, odd as they are, we just don't participate in much of what they do/have done that I disagree with. Our friendship overlaps a nice quiet area in life where we barbequed together, and mostly relax and let kids play or school activities. They do sometimes overcompensate it odd ways, sending their kids to camps and overly involved in sports and outside school stuff. But they are kind, helpful, hard workers. And despite the fact that they don't do many things well, they do spend time with their kids. Maybe there's something valuable about time spent, even if it's not "well" based on parenting experts advice?
    - cloverich 7y ago
bjcubsfan 7y ago
Advice from Alan Kazdin from Yale has influenced my parenting of my 4 young boys more than any other single source. His recommendations against punishment are based on the fact that research shows they are not effective for long-term behavior change in children. It is challenging to use the methods in heated moments, but even without perfect application, they have been helpful. Here is an article that introduces the ideas: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/03/no-spanking-no-time-out-no-problems/475440/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/03/no-spanki... Here is his book, that has full details and many examples: https://www.amazon.com/Everyday-Parenting-Toolkit-Step-Step-ebook/dp/B008LQ1VU8/ https://www.amazon.com/Everyday-Parenting-Toolkit-Step-Step-...
- ludicast 7y ago
  Thank you for recommending this. I'm going to try this method with my "less easy" kid.
canercandan 7y ago
You may also try Non-violent Communication, that's the way I would do with my kids.
sambeau 7y ago
One of the easiest ways to be predictable is to tell children what is happening and what is about to happen soon—especially if it will cut short a game or a play session. I have experienced so many tantrums of other people's children when they surprise their children with home time when the child is completely engrossed in playing. Children are constantly making their own plans and may have been expecting their turn with a toy or be only half-way through building something when they are told to pack up and leave. If it was me I'd be furious too. I like to give a few warnings so that they can get a feel for how long they have left and I tell them to start thinking about packing up, to get to a checkpoint as soon as they can so they can save their game and if they are waiting their turn with something, now would be a good time to have a final swap over. I can't recall a time when my kids had a tantrum at leaving time.
- thenobsta 7y ago
  Agreed, My (almost) 3yr old responds really well to this technique. I'll give give her a 10 or 5 min heads up and reminders at each halving of the countdown. When we get to zero she's ready for action. I almost never have issues when I do this. But, if I forget, I'll often get pushback.
happy-go-lucky 7y ago
Sometimes I pity myself for I’m currently not able to spend an adequate amount of time with our only child. Until a couple years ago we used to go play in a playground on a daily basis and this helped us properly bond with our child. Even my child’s academic performance was better back then. Now that we are less outdoorsy thanks to being too busy to have fun, we have become weary of our monotony. It is my experiential learning: the less time we spend together, the more we lose in terms of our family bonding.
lazyant 7y ago
A pattern that I see a lot in parks etc is parents wanting to leave and telling the little kids "5 more minutes!" then after 5 minutes "just one more minute!" or whatever. Pro-tip: kids are not aware of what 5 minutes looks like, make it a specific number of activities: "going down the slide 10 times more", you can count together and it looks initially like a large number. Not a magic wand but works way better than the time warnings.
- JshWright 7y ago
  We generally use the 5/1 minute warnings, then when it's time to go use the (Daniel Tiger) "pick one more thing to do" approach.
- asdf21 7y ago
  Lol, I would drag out going down the slide 10 more times to like, 40 minutes.
  - RandomBacon 7y ago
    "We have to go soon, we have enough time for you to go down the slide about 10 more times." Both you and the OP are right. Phrasing like this example though should help. This way it's not you restricting the kid, and there's no hard requirement. If they try to drag it out, you tell the kid that they had the time; it was their choice to take longer than usual to go down the slide those last few times. That explaination also helps them realize that they can choose to either make the best of a situation or the worst of a situation, but the situation will happen regardless (the time limit).
- Scarblac 7y ago
  Also in general the trick "I will count to three, and when I say 'three' you will have put that down and stand here. One..." is a far more successful method than it has any right to. I count to 10 for getting them dressed. The trick is to always let them be successful at reaching the goal, slow down as much as needed, say "two and half, two and three quarters......", they should never find out that I have absolutely nothing planned for the case when it finally fails.
leokennis 7y ago
The author rightfully states that being rich(er) helps in being more predictable. Likewise, to be good at parenting it also helps a lot to have “nice kids”. That’s why I take a lot of advice with a big grain of salt. My 4 year old is a really soft, sweet and sensitive boy. Just saying something like “it would be great if you cleaned up that mess of Duplo!” results in him immediately doing it. So is my tip to get kids to clean up “just suggest they do it?” No, because it will probably not work on most other kids who are more stubborn and less sensitive to maintaining a positive atmosphere.
- ahaferburg 7y ago
  What are you doing after he's cleaned up? I'm guessing you're doing something to reinforce his behavior, and that that is way more important than the initial suggestion.
beat 7y ago
Raising twins pushed me way over to the nature side of nature vs nurture. What works well for one child may be entirely counterproductive for another. That said, one thing this article really gets right is the importance of not letting your emotions control your mouth and making threats/promises that you can't/won't keep. I also think it's very important that when you screw up while parenting (and you will screw up), that you be sure to take responsibility and apologize to your children. I think a lot of parents think apologizing will make them look weak or diminish their authority, when it's really the opposite.
shearskill 7y ago
The book 1-2-3 Magic tames even the wildest kids if you are consistent. It feels humane to give kids a few chances to change their trajectory. Highly recommend.
bg4 7y ago
We've had a lot of success with praising desired behaviors rather than discipline of unwanted behaviors. Also, using 'think throughs' has been an effective teaching tool (ask the child to think through and say out loud what needs to be done etc) Per: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14391149-calmer-easier-happier-parenting https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14391149-calmer-easier-h...
ben7799 7y ago
My kid is a bit of a behavior problem. The worst thing about some of this is these days so many of us are stuck leaving our kids with day care/school so much of the time, and plenty of these "professionals", don't get this stuff. Day care here ran about $2k/month and the education level of the teachers was just not up to par for that amount of money. I always wondered where the money was going, they all had college degrees but got paid 1/2 or less what public teachers do in this area. There was a ton of bragging from management at the day care about how great the academic start was (this chain even brags about higher SAT scores!) and I think it was mostly hogwash. I was always thinking someone was making a lot of money on the day cares as it was not hard to figure out their approximate gross revenue/month. So often the day care was making things worse... take one step forward at home and 2 steps back at day care. Thankfully my child is in public school now, we have a great school system, and the teachers are a million times better at dealing with this stuff in productive ways.
- pjdemers 7y ago
  for a while I was on the board of a day care. We were not -for-profit, but charged only a little less than for-profit day care. Some things about cost: Running the building cost more than I thought, and we got free rent. Heat, insurance, repairs, etc, were all more than I expected. Plumbing & HVAC repairs alone were more than I would have thought for the whole building. We had only two teachers with benefits, but it cost about $10k per month just for their benefits and statutory taxes. That is, we spent $10k every month on labor before the teachers received dollar one.
namuol 7y ago
Apparently parenting is all about consistency in punishment. What about reward?
mekane8 7y ago
I really like these tips. My wife and I have followed a very similar approach, and I like to think we have two well-behaved, considerate, and appropriately responsible 5-year-olds. We find timeouts to be quite effective, and we use the clear "you need to do X or it's a timeout" and then clearly counting to three. This is often after a few attempts to ask in a regular tone of voice and/or cajole. In fact I have found the number of timeouts we actually give has decreased dramatically, and just counting does the trick now when we need them to respond quickly. My wife and I were both classroom teachers in the past, so we've both been able to use some of those tools with our kids. We do of course let them be kids, let them have their occasional freak-out moments, and we couch all of this in a lot of love, affection, and communication.
jwr 7y ago
If you want to be better at parenting, get a dog first, and learn how to deal with dogs. Properly, using modern behavioral techniques. You will find that many rules apply both to dogs and kids (which shouldn't be surprising, really). Things like consistency (try to set as few rules as possible, but if you do set them, enforce them without exceptions), deciding ahead of time and sticking to it assertively (do not change your decision based on pleading), calmness (dogs do not follow or listen to people who are agitated and nervous), avoiding too much control (do not issue too many commands), enforcing control (when you do issue a command, it needs to be obeyed, and not repeated), and punishment (calm, immediate, understandable, predictable and linked to the transgression) — you can learn all of those while properly raising a dog. Also, never lie to your kid (or dog) and answer their every question seriously.
- selimthegrim 7y ago
  And then you have the kid and the dog at the same time...
- fjsolwmv 7y ago
  It also works to practice with coworkers, friends, and really anything with a modicum of intelligence and a limbic system.
jefftk 7y ago
I hope my post ends up being helpful! Here are a few others I've written about parenting that might be interesting: * https://www.jefftk.com/p/equal-parenting-advice-for-dads https://www.jefftk.com/p/equal-parenting-advice-for-dads * https://www.jefftk.com/p/parenting-optional-vs-required https://www.jefftk.com/p/parenting-optional-vs-required * https://www.jefftk.com/p/street-training https://www.jefftk.com/p/street-training
cm2012 7y ago
There's a pretty large body of twin study evidence that says as long as you don't abuse your kids, your parenting styles don't matter to their long term personality (or outcomes, when you adjust for parental income) One such study here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07418820701864599 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0741882070186459...
- perlgeek 7y ago
  Even if parenting doesn't matter for long term outcomes very much, it certainly affects how parents and kids feel in the 20ish years that typically stay in the same household.
  - cm2012 7y ago
    Also true!
- User23 7y ago
  One thing parents do has a huge effect on outcomes and that is controlling their child's environment. For example, children that attend school with more children with an incarcerated parent are more likely to get in trouble with the law[1]. Similarly, sending a child to a school with a culture of academic achievement, where doing well increases their social status, will have better outcomes. Simply put, childrens' peers influence their development more than their parents, but parents do have some control over who those peers are. [1] https://www.nber.org/papers/w25730?sy=730 https://www.nber.org/papers/w25730?sy=730
rotrux 7y ago
I think it's better to be unpredictable. Once or twice a year I like to throw my kids into a pit-maze, which I've been digging for the past several months, and fill it with various kinds of dangerous creatures and turn on strobe lights. Do they hate it? Sure the ones who make it out definitely do, but that's life. I'm preparing them for life.
kr4 7y ago
A good reading on mindful parenting is [0]: >>> Mahatma Gandhi’s son Manilal Gandhi moved to South Africa to carry on the work his father had left behind – fight against injustice and discrimination. One day, Manilal had a daylong meeting in Johannesburg and he asked his son, Arun Gandhi, to drive him there. Arun thought this would be a good opportunity to also get his car serviced. They left for the meeting in the morning. In Arun’s words: I dropped my father off for his meeting and got the car to the garage by one. Since it was a long time until five o’clock, I figured I could go to the movies, which I did. That day there was a double feature being shown, and when I got out I checked my watch and realized that it was past five o’clock! I rushed to the corner where my father had said he would be waiting for me, and when I saw him there, standing in the rain, I tried to think of excuses I could make. I rushed up to him and said, ‘Father, you must forgive me. It is taking them longer to repair the automobile than I thought it would take, but if you wait here I will go and get the car. It should be ready by now.’ My father bowed his head and looked downward. He stood for a long moment and then he said, ‘When you were not here at our meeting time I called the garage to see why you were late. They told me that the automobile was ready at three o’clock. Now I have to give some thought as to how I have failed, so as to have a son who would lie to his own father. I will have to think about this, so I am going to walk home and use the time during my walk to meditate on this question.’ I followed my elderly father home that rainy, misty night, watching him stagger along the muddy road. I rode behind him with the headlights of the car flashing ahead of his steps. And as I watched him stumbling towards home, I beat on the steering wheel and said over and over, ‘I will never lie again! I will never lie again! I will never lie again!' What struck me as particularly interesting in this story was how Manilal didn’t shame his son, he didn’t start shouting at him or telling him how Arun had failed him as a son. Instead, he seemed to have understood one thing clearly: children do love their parents. They may act or behave otherwise but deep down they love their parents and need their parents’ love and presence in their lives. We can never inspire anyone to do anything by creating fear in their minds or by shaming them. We may force a child – or even an adult – to do something and they may do it well temporarily, but to instill in them a lifelong habit or to inspire them, love remains the only potent weapon. And no, by this I don’t mean mollycoddling. I simply mean embracing a sense of acceptance. 0: https://www.amazon.com/Children-Tomorrow-Monks-Mindful-Parenting/dp/9353029341 https://www.amazon.com/Children-Tomorrow-Monks-Mindful-Paren...
tmp2846 7y ago
One my most painful realizations as an adult was realizing that my parents were emotionally negligent and that I have long suffered from CPTSD as a result. They treated parenting as if it was just providing food and shelter and failed to realize that good parenting is actually about teaching your kids to be emotionally mature. I struggle with feelings of emptiness, depersonalization, and numbness in ways that make it hard to feel normal most days.
jvagner 7y ago
My single greatest piece of advice: Institute a safe word with your child. It goes both ways, no exceptions. When the safe word is issued, whatever was safeworded stops. Typical rules of safe words, but my kid is 15 and we still use the safe word when things are going wayward (jokes, fights, annoyances, repetitions, references). Probably started it when he was 1 or 2. Second favorite bit of advice: Routines (brushing teeth, going to bed, leaving the house) should be as close to silent, w/r/t instructions, as possible. Talk to each other, but don't negotiate "whatever's next" or "c'mon" or "hurry up".
- sequoia 7y ago
  In our household the word "badingo" means "I recognize that you are doing a joke premised on being annoying or repetitive,* I acknowledge your joke, it is funny, now please stop." I've never used a "safe word" for anything else but it's an interesting idea. *for example an impression of a person who gives far too detailed explanations, or singing a repetitive song with no end
  - hathawsh 7y ago
    Hmm, if we did that, here's what would happen. Kid 1 does something too repetitive. Kid 2: "badingo!" Kid 1 stops, but does something else too repetitive. Kid 2: "badingo!" Kid 1: "You're saying badingo too many times. Badingo!" Kid 2: "badingo badingo badingo badingo badingo!" Kid 1: "badingo times infinity!" Kid 2: MOM! Actually that kind of discussion impresses me because it shows they comprehend infinite loops and recursion at some level.
    - jvagner 7y ago
      Our safe word has become sacred, because there's a lot of benefit to having it, so yielding to it works. I did date a woman who had two daughters.. she needed a safe word in their dynamic but tried introducing it too late in the game. I think you have to start this one early.
  - jvagner 7y ago
    Ours has become very multi-use, but it's pretty righteously observed. My girlfriend and I may be in the car with my son, and the conversation may steer into very adult territory, the kind of thing that makes my son uncomfortable, and after a bit of the talking, we'll hear a moderately voiced "baaaadingo..." from the backseat, which we know means he thinks we've gotten too far into adult-land and he's not feeling comfortable. But sometimes when we lose our tempers, the safe word can be a gift. He's 15, his teenager-ness is kicking in just about now, and we can use the safe word to disrupt a self-esteem spiral. He'll stop whatever rant he's on, and sit down and wait it out. The safe word most often stops a behavior and introduces silence... everyone can use that gift regularly enough.
sequoia 7y ago
My advice to new parents is to ignore most people's advice & trust their instincts. The best response to the deluge of "you're parenting wrong" articles is to tell the authors of such articles, politely but firmly, to go pound sand. Sure, read books and articles to learn strategies you can try, tools for your toolbox, but ultimately, "relax–you'll figure it out!" is the best advice. Most parents care immensely about their children & this fact is more likely to lead them to parent well than any article or "tip." Source: I've been a parent about my entire adult life (since 20), I have 4 kids, I've read a ton of stupid parenting articles, as a young parent everyone felt comfortable giving me parenting advice.
- fjsolwmv 7y ago
  Your first paragraph contradicts your second paragraph.
- seer 7y ago
  Sorry for the short reply, but I couldn’t resist the obligatory parenting xkcd: https://xkcd.com/674/ https://xkcd.com/674/
hamilyon2 7y ago
This article ignores large body of knowledge about parenting, unapplicable in most cultures and families in the world. I tried it personally. Techniques described serve no good purpose, just irritate everyone and ultimately destroys family from inside
guest2143 7y ago
This book changed how I parent: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/6162649-healing-stories-for-challenging-behaviour https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/6162649-healing-stori... The ability to modify behavior by singing a couplet from a story I read -- no raising of voices, or wagging of fingers -- was revelatory. It's from the waldorf educational tradition.
sudosteph 7y ago
I'm glad the author here called out that being predictable via following through on "rules" isn't enough - rules need to comprehensible and reasonable in their own right to be understood. He's also got a good grasp on the importance of properly phrasing things for children to understand. His point here seemed spot on: > Similarly, adults understand that you don't have authority over everyone around you, but with kids phrasing like "Mama can read to you when we get home" isn't as good as "I'll ask Mama if she'll read to you when we get home." Or, even better, "when we get home you can ask Mama if she'll read to you. Reminds me of a piece I read here a while ago [1] about how Mr. Rogers would intentionally phrase things very carefully on his show in order to avoid ambiguity. He also emphasized phrasing things in a way that gave the child some insight into the reasoning and a sense of responsibility - so they could feel good about doing the right thing instead of just learning blind obedience. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/mr-rogers-neighborhood-talking-to-kids/562352/ https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/mr-rogers...
socialist_coder 7y ago
I feel like if you don't do this stuff intuitively, you can't really learn it. My only data point is my SO. No matter how many times I try to coach my SO on these very simple parenting rules, she just doesn't get it. She makes threats she cannot follow through with, she doesn't think of simple "if you do this then we'll do that" tricks, and doesn't use the simple 1-2-3 timeout method. All that stuff seems very intuitive to me. But I think some people just don't get it and never will.
astrostl 7y ago
Grunching in a way that I hope doesn't come off as santimomious. I grew up with foster kids and have acute awareness of how creatively foster parents can get around "no hitting" rules with medieval stuff like time outs barefoot in the dark in a winter garage. Ultimately feel that "no hitting" is striking at the branches, but not the root. https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Shoot-Dog-Teaching-Training/dp/1860542387/ https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Shoot-Dog-Teaching-Training/dp/1... was a radically eye-opening book for me, particularly as it related to parenting. I don't believe that hitting, or yelling, or other forms of intimidation, or time outs, or the concept of punishment at all is either good or ultimately effective. And anecdatally that approach has worked out great for us and our kids.
achenatx 7y ago
Another thing I havent seen mentioned is rather than punish (by taking away things) for bad behavior, you should be rewarding for good behavior. Meaning every privilege has to be earned. This is a subtle difference but works well. The default for most people is you get to play electronics. If you are bad we are taking them away. Instead, the default should be you do X, Y and Z, to earn the privilege to play with electronics. This is every single day. Instead of you didnt clean your room, you dont get to play electronics. It would be, you cleaned your room, you earned some electronics time.

555 points by wheresvic1 7y ago

We’ve found timeouts are very effective with our kids. Although one parent is more consistent about applying them than the other. One thing we’ve learned is that time out with an angry child is not especially effective. So as our kids have gotten older we will have them owe us a time out for when they’re more calm and can actually get something from it. We’ve also found devices are gold for discipline. Our routine is 20 min before bed on weekdays, 20 min after meals on weekends. Usually we just have to threaten losing screen time, ie if I ask them to pick up theirs shoes 5 times the sixth time will be “or else”. Generally consistency is key, and picking your battles as the author alludes to. There is one downside to raising children in a consistent, predictable, and logical environment. That is; they’re less prepared to deal with chaotic people and situations as adults.

spiderfarmer 7y ago
> There is one downside to raising children in a consistent, predictable, and logical environment. That is; they’re less prepared to deal with chaotic people and situations as adults. Do things differently in the weekend.
- dsfyu404ed 7y ago
  >Do things differently in the weekend. <music>Jose Cuervo you are a friend of mine...</music>
wil421 7y ago
If your child is too angry or upset for timeout do you just wait until they calm down and apply punishment? What about tantrums in public or somewhere where timeout can’t exactly work? Expecting parent. Can’t wait for September when my daughter is due!
- marktangotango 7y ago
  It depends on age, they have to be able to understand what’s happening. So for toddlers we’d redirect to something else, then timeouts, then around 5 is when we started delaying them. Seems to work really well. But you’re right, in public is different. Usually taking them out of the situation worked for us. Like tantrum at a restaurant, take them outside till they cool off.
  - logifail 7y ago
    >> What about tantrums in public > Like tantrum at a restaurant, take them outside till they cool off. Our youngest had a gold-plated tantrum (with screaming turned up to 11) on a flight with me last summer, triggered by me insisting that she fasten her lap belt. Short of carrying a tranquiliser gun (joke!) I'm not sure what one can do with an over-tired, over-excited 2 year-old in these situations, apart from try not to get into them in the first place.
    - fuzz4lyfe 7y ago
      I am lucky enough to enable my wife to stay home with our daughter as she grows up and the results have been spectacular (you aren't a bad parent for not doing this, I just was in a position to do so). As an infant she was never ignored or left to get over heated (with the exception of a few times she stayed at grandma's house and her behavior for the next few days changed dramatically) as a result she does not feel the need to scream loudly or throw tantrums as she grows older. Anecdotes are anecdotes of course but we will be doing the same thing for kid two.
      - shearskill 7y ago
        I was a hands on stay at home parent. Kid still had a few tantrums. Every kid is different, you’ll probably observe that when your next arrives.
      - kaitai 7y ago
        Kids are different. My kids also generally doesn't have tantrums, and I don't stay home. She's just a mellow kid (and also was never ignored or left to get over-heated -- what are you implying here?). Compare to a friend of mine whose oldest can turn into a nuclear meltdown in 5 seconds; she stays home. Hope your kid 2 doesn't destroy all your certainties about children :)
thrower123 7y ago
They will start getting experience with arbitrary, petty, random and chaotic behavior as soon as you start sending them to public school.
- thrownthrow 7y ago
  I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at. A thinly veiled insult perhaps?
  - geekamongus 7y ago
    It could be interpreted that way, but it also holds a certain amount of truth.
  - JshWright 7y ago
    That's not how I read it... Going to school means interacting with dozens/hundreds of other people (many of them peers who are still developing social interaction skills). Encountering those behaviors is inevitable in that setting.
    - thrower123 7y ago
      That's about what I was getting at. You also get authority figures that are inconsistent and tyrannical, the wonders of bureaucracy, and extreme limitations of personal liberty. You get to learn how to deal with stupid and illogical people, bullies, and all the other elements of the vast canvas of personality types. It's great training, and not to be discounted. But having a haven of stability in the home is an essential counterbalance.
      - usefulcat 7y ago
        I came here to write basically this. I know some parents who use the attitude of "the world is a rough place, so kids need to learn how to deal with it" as a justification for dealing more harshly with their kids than I would (kind of like valuing a "school of hard knocks" approach). Based on my own childhood, I both totally agree with the premise and come to a fairly opposite conclusion: home must be a haven since it is the only place that has any reasonable chance of being a haven. School almost certainly won't be; other kids can be real assholes sometimes.
ses1984 7y ago
Timeouts did not work for our oldest. He would constantly try to sneak or wrestle out of timeout and it turned into a game for him. We tried to stick with it but looking back I think it was a huge mistake and the contributed to behavioral problems he has today, basically full blown ODD. If it seems like something is not working for you, don't try to force it. If in doubt, love over punishment. Don't lose your temper.
- duderific 7y ago
  This is where we're at too, the timeouts just don't work -- same behavior -- running out of his room etc. What I've found is to give him a little of something he wants (5 minutes of legos) before I need something (getting dressed for school). That way I'm not trying to force something "right away" and thus avoiding a confrontation in the first place. Once the power struggle begins, there's not really a smooth way out of it.
logifail 7y ago
> So as our kids have gotten older we will have them owe us a time out for when they’re more calm and can actually get something from it. Some would argue that any delayed punishment is less likely to be understood (and so more likely to foster resentment) than one that's carried out immediately.
empath75 7y ago
I have a three year old and I don’t think of what I do as punishment at all. I don’t think they have the kind of agency and self consciousness to understand that what they’re doing is wrong, so it doesn’t make sense to think of things that way for me. What I do have is near complete control of their environment so I use that to enforce limits. They can’t engage in some behavior I don’t like if they’re not in a position where they can do it. If they won’t stop messing with the remote, I hide it or move them to another room. If he won’t share toys with his brother, I put the toys away, if he’s acting out in a tantrum, I remove him from the room. There’s no point being angry at what a toddler does, they literally can’t control themselves sometimes.
- Ma8ee 7y ago
  Most three years olds certainly will understand what they are doing is wrong if you tell them and why. But you are right in that they don’t know how to control their feelings and sometimes themselves. But that is true of many adults too.
  - empath75 7y ago
    I am not sure that's the case. Children are very good at putting things into categories. If you give them a list of things that are right and things that are wrong, they will certainly remember it in the same way that they memorize the names of the trains on Thomas, but I'm not sure that the category "right" and "wrong" has any particular meaning to them. It takes quite a while for them to develop what is a rather sophisticated concept that many adults struggle with. In any case, even if they are aware that something is 'right' or 'wrong', I don't think that doing something that we've defined as wrong for them deserves 'punishment' in the way that you would punish an adult who has a fuller understanding of actions and consequences.
    - Ma8ee 7y ago
      I don't punish. Children can certainly learn what makes other people sad or angry, and have a sense of fairness. I don't think there are any metaphysical aspects of right and wrong that kids have to learn.
JshWright 7y ago
> Although one parent is more consistent about applying them than the other. I suspect the "good cop/bad cop" parenting thing is inevitable in most relationships (it's certainly the default for me and my wife). It's something we try to be very aware of and intentional about (I think it can be pretty destructive if allowed to go unchecked). > One thing we’ve learned is that time out with an angry child is not especially effective. So as our kids have gotten older we will have them owe us a time out for when they’re more calm and can actually get something from it. Our view is that the timeout is most effective when a kid is angry (or in any out of control emotional state). The timeout provides a time and space to get emotions under control, then we can have a conversation with cooler heads about expectations and consequences.
- kaitai 7y ago
  My spouse & I try to be explicit with each other about who is good cop and who is bad cop, and switch off. Good cop/bad cop can really be destructive as you say when it's done carelessly or if it pits the parents against each other. We try to use it gently to maintain a united front. For instance, with bedtime on a rough night, we pick which parent will cajole & start things off and which parent will take over if things go south. One's the closer, and if bedtime goes well that parent can actually just sit it out. For us that helps us have more patience, as if tempers get high, parent 1 simply switches out with parent 2, and sometimes that resets the kid's attitude too. We haven't figured out timeouts at all.

zubspace 7y ago

There are a few things which helped me get better at parenting: * Timeouts rarely work. Try to respond with something which makes sense. Like if your kid throws around things, they need to clean up (with your help). * If things get out of hand, I stay with or hold my kid until the situation gets better and then discuss/explain the current situation and how we will act next time. * It's always good to figure out how your kid feels in a bad situation. Like: "I guess you're feeling <a>, because of <b>?" Sometimes kids do not understand their own feelings and telling them helps them cope better. * Try to stay calm, always. Sometimes it's hard or even impossible. But getting loud or angry never helps. If I can keep control of myself I usually can control the situation and respond appropriately. * Your job as a parent is to provide your kid with all necessities of life and with love. Everything else is extra, like toys, sweets, leisure activities. Sometimes it helps to tune down the extras if necessary. * Admit your errors and say sorry if appropriate. There's a youtube channel which I actually enjoyed while my youngest one was a bit smaller. It's a bit strange to look for help on parenting stuff on youtube, but a lot of his advice was actually quite good I tought: https://www.youtube.com/user/LiveOnPurposeTV/featured https://www.youtube.com/user/LiveOnPurposeTV/featured

mankyd 7y ago
> * Timeouts rarely work. Try to respond with something which makes sense. Like if your kid throws around things, they need to clean up (with your help). I usually find timeouts to be more of a cool-down period; both for my kids as well as me. They're never long (I have young kids) so we're talking on the order of a couple of minutes. They provide a good break from whatever it is they were doing and give them a chance to re-approach the situation.
- empath75 7y ago
  Yeah I use them entirely for removing them from whatever situation is bothering them.
philshem 7y ago
</b></a> Making me nervous...

jstewartmobile 7y ago

Jesus, hugs, and spankings. If you agree, share, and reply "AMEN"!

aklemm 7y ago
You're 1 for 3 on that list, so no.
- jstewartmobile 7y ago
  Which one? BTW: Y'all really need to friend-up your grandmas on Facebook.

dkarl 7y ago

One thing I think my parents did right was never telling me in the heat of the moment how I would be punished. I knew how I was supposed to behave, and they let me know when I was not living up to the standard, but if they decided to punish me, I wouldn't find out right away what my punishment would be. The only exception was trivial punishments like being sent to my room or having something taken away for a few hours, or if the behavior problem was ongoing and they had time away from me to talk between themselves and decide what would be appropriate to threaten me with. This accomplished two things. First, they never had to back down on a punishment, because they were careful to only threaten me with things they could stand behind. That meant I never felt any urge to misbehave to call their bluff. Proving parents wrong is irresistible to kids, so if you threaten a punishment you can't follow through on, you've just given them a reason to do the thing you're told them not to. Even if you punish them in another way, it's worth it just to prove you wouldn't do what you said. Second, it forced me to actively imagine what an appropriate punishment would be. To get into their heads and imagine how they would punish me, I had to think about why my behavior was wrong from their point of view. Kids spend a lot of time arguing against their parents, in their heads as well as out loud, and I think many kids don't have enough occasion to go through the opposite process of thinking with their parents to try to predict their behavior.

winchling 7y ago
The cold, hard truth I came to realise about punishment is that it's inevitable. Even parents who 'don't punish' actually do punish: they withdraw emotionally. But the corollary of this is that the closer and happier the family is, the lighter the punishments need ever be. For some children even the idea that they're being officially punished is punishment enough.
- Ma8ee 7y ago
  I’m one of those parents that “don’t punish”. I do tell my child when he makes me angry or sad, and of course it is clear to him that I might not want to, say, play or read to him at that point. I still wouldn’t call that punishing him, but rather a consequence of his actions.

J-dawg 7y ago

I bookmarked this article ages ago because the advice seems so sensible. This post just reminded me of it. https://blog.codinghorror.com/how-to-talk-to-human-beings/ https://blog.codinghorror.com/how-to-talk-to-human-beings/

ycombonator 7y ago

No child is the same. Timeouts ended up traumatizing our child. Anyway I came across this and started to experiment some of the principles from here https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/03/13/685533353/a-playful-way-to-teach-kids-to-control-their-anger https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2019/03/13/6855333...

acjohnson55 7y ago

One of my best tools with my toddler is "don't react, respond". My first thought is rarely my best thought, and my reactionary tone of voice is not my most loving and supportive. A kid doesn't need your immediate answer to everything. You can tell them, "let me think about that" and literally take the time to consider your options. Almost nothing is an emergency situation requiring your elevated tone of voice or physically rushing towards them. Another tip is that if you see your kid either doing or about to do something you don't approve of, you can slowly close the physical distance so that you can intervene in a non-reactionary way. Lastly, when it comes to predictability, I totally agree with the author. But don't be too hard on yourself. You're going to establish all sorts of bad patterns. Just establish the new pattern, suffer through the couple days of reaction to change, and move forward. My toddler is much better at adopting new normals than I am. A lot of this I learned from being a classroom teacher and also from listening to Janet Lansbury's podcast (https://www.janetlansbury.com/podcast-audio/ https://www.janetlansbury.com/podcast-audio/).

arkitaip 7y ago
Any specific episodes you would like to recommend? Thanks!
- acjohnson55 7y ago
  Not that immediately come to mind. I kind of nonlinearly cherry-pick, splitting between ones I think I can relate to and ones I don't immediately think I relate to. The latter are interesting to me because I find my increased emotional distance to the problem she's talking through helps me better understand her logic, if you know what I mean. Plus, I never know when something not applicable might become applicable :) The other thing is that her approach has a very nuanced logic to it. There's kind of a gestalt behind it that's a bit hard to internalize from individual examples. I should probably just read her books, which I'm guessing would be a more direct way to understanding her full philosophy.
asdfghjkl 7y ago
a

DumbBoy 7y ago

You can avoid this whole class of problems entirely by simply choosing to be an antinatalist.

geekamongus 7y ago
Ah, I see they have a name for people that don't like kids now.
bigred100 7y ago
You don’t have to be an antinatalist to simply not have kids

ca98am79 7y ago

I've read a lot of parenting advice and it all sounds good in theory, but in practice everything goes out the window. I'm in the throws of it now with a 9-month old and a 3-year old. It is hard to think about advice you read in an article when you have not slept and the kids are screaming and having a trantrum. Or you try to do what the article said and then it doesn't work at all and only makes things worse. I think you just have to wing it and do your best. Just be intuitive and as empathetic as possible with your kids.

asark 7y ago
With three kids (or even two!), any advice from someone with one comes off as at least as grating as advice from people with no kids did when I only had one. All the time-consuming "just hang out with them and talk to them like humans! Hug them for ten minutes! Make them complex, healthy dishes for every meal! I do it and it all works so well! I mean I also have a night nanny and cleaning service but I won't mention that..." goes out the window when one kid's about to kill themselves with furniture, somehow, you're not sure where another snuck off to but you suspect the worst, the third's making some god-awful noise in the other room that you're pretty sure will end up being expensive one way or another (oh no... did they make that sound or did the dog?) and meanwhile if you take your eyes of this sauce for one second it's gonna burn and it'll be pizza night... again. Yes it's not constantly like that but it's always kinda like that. I understand it gets better when they're older. And I've heard from multiple people with four or five that the difficulty levels off after three kids. Up to three it's certainly non-linear. When for some reason we're down to one it's about as easy as having zero, now. Yeah, I bet whatever crap you read about on the Internet works, one-kidder. F*cking anything would. One's nothing.
- vianneychevalie 7y ago
  Being the second in a family of six kids, I would never imagine my parents getting on a horse half as high as the one you're towering from.
  - asark 7y ago

alexandercrohde 7y ago

I used to spend time and energy collecting thoughts on how I could be a great parent. Then one day my aunt told me she was mad at her father for being "too logical" when raising her because it gave her unrealistic expectations. Then I started to question everything... If a parent never misbehaved is a kid going to be thrown for a loop when they meet emotional teachers? Did my own fathers weaknesses force me to develop greater strengths?

jrumbut 7y ago
You always want what you didn't have, and no one is perfect, but I do think that you make people (not just kids!) around you better and stronger when you model goodness and strength. I'm not in favor of being a bad person to teach people how to deal with bad people. Chances are, despite your best efforts, you'll do plenty of bad stuff anyway. Where logic and emotion come into this is anyone's guess, but showing some affection is a good idea in a household, as is showing how to deal with negative feelings.
throwayEngineer 7y ago
The whole identical twins separated at birth thing makes me believe environment is the only thing a parent can provide. Children do not listen to their parents for very long. A decent school, technology like a laptop, and maybe an awareness to dissuade bad friends. That seems like all you can do.
- Xcelerate 7y ago
  > Children do not listen to their parents for very long. I disagree with that. I listened to my dad growing up because I respect him and think he is a good person. I probably would have gotten into more things if that hadn’t been the case.
- war1025 7y ago
  I don't know that I "listened" to my parents very well, but I did watch them a lot. Their actions influenced mine quite a bit.
- 7y ago

RobertRoberts 7y ago

We have some family friends that are decent people, but lousy parents. After about 16 years of observation two of their kids have graduated (one with honors) and the older they get, the more decent they have become, very similar to their parents. What I learned: Kids will turn out like their parents. And poorly skilled parents can still raise decent and well behaved kids. Who you are and how you treat people is more important than technical skills to get your kids to behave.

kungfooey 7y ago
This is the whole thesis of the (very good) book by Bryan Caplan, "Selfish Reasons to Have More Kids."
watwut 7y ago
Why are they lousy parents?
- RobertRoberts 7y ago
  It's a combination of a lot of things. Heavy drinking, gambling, lying to each other (parents), kids don't have bed times or waking times, miss school when they are too tired. Force the older kids to watch the younger kids so they can smoke, drink and talk with friends instead of watch their own kids. Kids would scream and fall on the ground when aren't noticed... the parents will be in the same room talking with friends while their kids scream at them... etc... Keep in mind, I like these people, odd as they are, we just don't participate in much of what they do/have done that I disagree with. Our friendship overlaps a nice quiet area in life where we barbequed together, and mostly relax and let kids play or school activities. They do sometimes overcompensate it odd ways, sending their kids to camps and overly involved in sports and outside school stuff. But they are kind, helpful, hard workers. And despite the fact that they don't do many things well, they do spend time with their kids. Maybe there's something valuable about time spent, even if it's not "well" based on parenting experts advice?
  - cloverich 7y ago

bjcubsfan 7y ago

Advice from Alan Kazdin from Yale has influenced my parenting of my 4 young boys more than any other single source. His recommendations against punishment are based on the fact that research shows they are not effective for long-term behavior change in children. It is challenging to use the methods in heated moments, but even without perfect application, they have been helpful. Here is an article that introduces the ideas: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/03/no-spanking-no-time-out-no-problems/475440/ https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/03/no-spanki... Here is his book, that has full details and many examples: https://www.amazon.com/Everyday-Parenting-Toolkit-Step-Step-ebook/dp/B008LQ1VU8/ https://www.amazon.com/Everyday-Parenting-Toolkit-Step-Step-...

ludicast 7y ago
Thank you for recommending this. I'm going to try this method with my "less easy" kid.

canercandan 7y ago

You may also try Non-violent Communication, that's the way I would do with my kids.

sambeau 7y ago

One of the easiest ways to be predictable is to tell children what is happening and what is about to happen soon—especially if it will cut short a game or a play session. I have experienced so many tantrums of other people's children when they surprise their children with home time when the child is completely engrossed in playing. Children are constantly making their own plans and may have been expecting their turn with a toy or be only half-way through building something when they are told to pack up and leave. If it was me I'd be furious too. I like to give a few warnings so that they can get a feel for how long they have left and I tell them to start thinking about packing up, to get to a checkpoint as soon as they can so they can save their game and if they are waiting their turn with something, now would be a good time to have a final swap over. I can't recall a time when my kids had a tantrum at leaving time.

thenobsta 7y ago
Agreed, My (almost) 3yr old responds really well to this technique. I'll give give her a 10 or 5 min heads up and reminders at each halving of the countdown. When we get to zero she's ready for action. I almost never have issues when I do this. But, if I forget, I'll often get pushback.

happy-go-lucky 7y ago

Sometimes I pity myself for I’m currently not able to spend an adequate amount of time with our only child. Until a couple years ago we used to go play in a playground on a daily basis and this helped us properly bond with our child. Even my child’s academic performance was better back then. Now that we are less outdoorsy thanks to being too busy to have fun, we have become weary of our monotony. It is my experiential learning: the less time we spend together, the more we lose in terms of our family bonding.

lazyant 7y ago

A pattern that I see a lot in parks etc is parents wanting to leave and telling the little kids "5 more minutes!" then after 5 minutes "just one more minute!" or whatever. Pro-tip: kids are not aware of what 5 minutes looks like, make it a specific number of activities: "going down the slide 10 times more", you can count together and it looks initially like a large number. Not a magic wand but works way better than the time warnings.

JshWright 7y ago
We generally use the 5/1 minute warnings, then when it's time to go use the (Daniel Tiger) "pick one more thing to do" approach.
asdf21 7y ago
Lol, I would drag out going down the slide 10 more times to like, 40 minutes.
- RandomBacon 7y ago
  "We have to go soon, we have enough time for you to go down the slide about 10 more times." Both you and the OP are right. Phrasing like this example though should help. This way it's not you restricting the kid, and there's no hard requirement. If they try to drag it out, you tell the kid that they had the time; it was their choice to take longer than usual to go down the slide those last few times. That explaination also helps them realize that they can choose to either make the best of a situation or the worst of a situation, but the situation will happen regardless (the time limit).
Scarblac 7y ago
Also in general the trick "I will count to three, and when I say 'three' you will have put that down and stand here. One..." is a far more successful method than it has any right to. I count to 10 for getting them dressed. The trick is to always let them be successful at reaching the goal, slow down as much as needed, say "two and half, two and three quarters......", they should never find out that I have absolutely nothing planned for the case when it finally fails.

leokennis 7y ago

The author rightfully states that being rich(er) helps in being more predictable. Likewise, to be good at parenting it also helps a lot to have “nice kids”. That’s why I take a lot of advice with a big grain of salt. My 4 year old is a really soft, sweet and sensitive boy. Just saying something like “it would be great if you cleaned up that mess of Duplo!” results in him immediately doing it. So is my tip to get kids to clean up “just suggest they do it?” No, because it will probably not work on most other kids who are more stubborn and less sensitive to maintaining a positive atmosphere.

ahaferburg 7y ago
What are you doing after he's cleaned up? I'm guessing you're doing something to reinforce his behavior, and that that is way more important than the initial suggestion.

beat 7y ago

Raising twins pushed me way over to the nature side of nature vs nurture. What works well for one child may be entirely counterproductive for another. That said, one thing this article really gets right is the importance of not letting your emotions control your mouth and making threats/promises that you can't/won't keep. I also think it's very important that when you screw up while parenting (and you will screw up), that you be sure to take responsibility and apologize to your children. I think a lot of parents think apologizing will make them look weak or diminish their authority, when it's really the opposite.

shearskill 7y ago

The book 1-2-3 Magic tames even the wildest kids if you are consistent. It feels humane to give kids a few chances to change their trajectory. Highly recommend.

bg4 7y ago

We've had a lot of success with praising desired behaviors rather than discipline of unwanted behaviors. Also, using 'think throughs' has been an effective teaching tool (ask the child to think through and say out loud what needs to be done etc) Per: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14391149-calmer-easier-happier-parenting https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14391149-calmer-easier-h...

ben7799 7y ago

My kid is a bit of a behavior problem. The worst thing about some of this is these days so many of us are stuck leaving our kids with day care/school so much of the time, and plenty of these "professionals", don't get this stuff. Day care here ran about $2k/month and the education level of the teachers was just not up to par for that amount of money. I always wondered where the money was going, they all had college degrees but got paid 1/2 or less what public teachers do in this area. There was a ton of bragging from management at the day care about how great the academic start was (this chain even brags about higher SAT scores!) and I think it was mostly hogwash. I was always thinking someone was making a lot of money on the day cares as it was not hard to figure out their approximate gross revenue/month. So often the day care was making things worse... take one step forward at home and 2 steps back at day care. Thankfully my child is in public school now, we have a great school system, and the teachers are a million times better at dealing with this stuff in productive ways.

pjdemers 7y ago
for a while I was on the board of a day care. We were not -for-profit, but charged only a little less than for-profit day care. Some things about cost: Running the building cost more than I thought, and we got free rent. Heat, insurance, repairs, etc, were all more than I expected. Plumbing & HVAC repairs alone were more than I would have thought for the whole building. We had only two teachers with benefits, but it cost about $10k per month just for their benefits and statutory taxes. That is, we spent $10k every month on labor before the teachers received dollar one.

namuol 7y ago

Apparently parenting is all about consistency in punishment. What about reward?

mekane8 7y ago

I really like these tips. My wife and I have followed a very similar approach, and I like to think we have two well-behaved, considerate, and appropriately responsible 5-year-olds. We find timeouts to be quite effective, and we use the clear "you need to do X or it's a timeout" and then clearly counting to three. This is often after a few attempts to ask in a regular tone of voice and/or cajole. In fact I have found the number of timeouts we actually give has decreased dramatically, and just counting does the trick now when we need them to respond quickly. My wife and I were both classroom teachers in the past, so we've both been able to use some of those tools with our kids. We do of course let them be kids, let them have their occasional freak-out moments, and we couch all of this in a lot of love, affection, and communication.

jwr 7y ago

If you want to be better at parenting, get a dog first, and learn how to deal with dogs. Properly, using modern behavioral techniques. You will find that many rules apply both to dogs and kids (which shouldn't be surprising, really). Things like consistency (try to set as few rules as possible, but if you do set them, enforce them without exceptions), deciding ahead of time and sticking to it assertively (do not change your decision based on pleading), calmness (dogs do not follow or listen to people who are agitated and nervous), avoiding too much control (do not issue too many commands), enforcing control (when you do issue a command, it needs to be obeyed, and not repeated), and punishment (calm, immediate, understandable, predictable and linked to the transgression) — you can learn all of those while properly raising a dog. Also, never lie to your kid (or dog) and answer their every question seriously.

selimthegrim 7y ago
And then you have the kid and the dog at the same time...
fjsolwmv 7y ago
It also works to practice with coworkers, friends, and really anything with a modicum of intelligence and a limbic system.

jefftk 7y ago

I hope my post ends up being helpful! Here are a few others I've written about parenting that might be interesting: * https://www.jefftk.com/p/equal-parenting-advice-for-dads https://www.jefftk.com/p/equal-parenting-advice-for-dads * https://www.jefftk.com/p/parenting-optional-vs-required https://www.jefftk.com/p/parenting-optional-vs-required * https://www.jefftk.com/p/street-training https://www.jefftk.com/p/street-training

cm2012 7y ago

There's a pretty large body of twin study evidence that says as long as you don't abuse your kids, your parenting styles don't matter to their long term personality (or outcomes, when you adjust for parental income) One such study here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07418820701864599 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0741882070186459...

perlgeek 7y ago
Even if parenting doesn't matter for long term outcomes very much, it certainly affects how parents and kids feel in the 20ish years that typically stay in the same household.
- cm2012 7y ago
  Also true!
User23 7y ago
One thing parents do has a huge effect on outcomes and that is controlling their child's environment. For example, children that attend school with more children with an incarcerated parent are more likely to get in trouble with the law[1]. Similarly, sending a child to a school with a culture of academic achievement, where doing well increases their social status, will have better outcomes. Simply put, childrens' peers influence their development more than their parents, but parents do have some control over who those peers are. [1] https://www.nber.org/papers/w25730?sy=730 https://www.nber.org/papers/w25730?sy=730

rotrux 7y ago

I think it's better to be unpredictable. Once or twice a year I like to throw my kids into a pit-maze, which I've been digging for the past several months, and fill it with various kinds of dangerous creatures and turn on strobe lights. Do they hate it? Sure the ones who make it out definitely do, but that's life. I'm preparing them for life.

kr4 7y ago

A good reading on mindful parenting is [0]: >>> Mahatma Gandhi’s son Manilal Gandhi moved to South Africa to carry on the work his father had left behind – fight against injustice and discrimination. One day, Manilal had a daylong meeting in Johannesburg and he asked his son, Arun Gandhi, to drive him there. Arun thought this would be a good opportunity to also get his car serviced. They left for the meeting in the morning. In Arun’s words: I dropped my father off for his meeting and got the car to the garage by one. Since it was a long time until five o’clock, I figured I could go to the movies, which I did. That day there was a double feature being shown, and when I got out I checked my watch and realized that it was past five o’clock! I rushed to the corner where my father had said he would be waiting for me, and when I saw him there, standing in the rain, I tried to think of excuses I could make. I rushed up to him and said, ‘Father, you must forgive me. It is taking them longer to repair the automobile than I thought it would take, but if you wait here I will go and get the car. It should be ready by now.’ My father bowed his head and looked downward. He stood for a long moment and then he said, ‘When you were not here at our meeting time I called the garage to see why you were late. They told me that the automobile was ready at three o’clock. Now I have to give some thought as to how I have failed, so as to have a son who would lie to his own father. I will have to think about this, so I am going to walk home and use the time during my walk to meditate on this question.’ I followed my elderly father home that rainy, misty night, watching him stagger along the muddy road. I rode behind him with the headlights of the car flashing ahead of his steps. And as I watched him stumbling towards home, I beat on the steering wheel and said over and over, ‘I will never lie again! I will never lie again! I will never lie again!' What struck me as particularly interesting in this story was how Manilal didn’t shame his son, he didn’t start shouting at him or telling him how Arun had failed him as a son. Instead, he seemed to have understood one thing clearly: children do love their parents. They may act or behave otherwise but deep down they love their parents and need their parents’ love and presence in their lives. We can never inspire anyone to do anything by creating fear in their minds or by shaming them. We may force a child – or even an adult – to do something and they may do it well temporarily, but to instill in them a lifelong habit or to inspire them, love remains the only potent weapon. And no, by this I don’t mean mollycoddling. I simply mean embracing a sense of acceptance. 0: https://www.amazon.com/Children-Tomorrow-Monks-Mindful-Parenting/dp/9353029341 https://www.amazon.com/Children-Tomorrow-Monks-Mindful-Paren...

tmp2846 7y ago

One my most painful realizations as an adult was realizing that my parents were emotionally negligent and that I have long suffered from CPTSD as a result. They treated parenting as if it was just providing food and shelter and failed to realize that good parenting is actually about teaching your kids to be emotionally mature. I struggle with feelings of emptiness, depersonalization, and numbness in ways that make it hard to feel normal most days.

jvagner 7y ago

My single greatest piece of advice: Institute a safe word with your child. It goes both ways, no exceptions. When the safe word is issued, whatever was safeworded stops. Typical rules of safe words, but my kid is 15 and we still use the safe word when things are going wayward (jokes, fights, annoyances, repetitions, references). Probably started it when he was 1 or 2. Second favorite bit of advice: Routines (brushing teeth, going to bed, leaving the house) should be as close to silent, w/r/t instructions, as possible. Talk to each other, but don't negotiate "whatever's next" or "c'mon" or "hurry up".

sequoia 7y ago
In our household the word "badingo" means "I recognize that you are doing a joke premised on being annoying or repetitive,* I acknowledge your joke, it is funny, now please stop." I've never used a "safe word" for anything else but it's an interesting idea. *for example an impression of a person who gives far too detailed explanations, or singing a repetitive song with no end
- hathawsh 7y ago
  Hmm, if we did that, here's what would happen. Kid 1 does something too repetitive. Kid 2: "badingo!" Kid 1 stops, but does something else too repetitive. Kid 2: "badingo!" Kid 1: "You're saying badingo too many times. Badingo!" Kid 2: "badingo badingo badingo badingo badingo!" Kid 1: "badingo times infinity!" Kid 2: MOM! Actually that kind of discussion impresses me because it shows they comprehend infinite loops and recursion at some level.
  - jvagner 7y ago
    Our safe word has become sacred, because there's a lot of benefit to having it, so yielding to it works. I did date a woman who had two daughters.. she needed a safe word in their dynamic but tried introducing it too late in the game. I think you have to start this one early.
- jvagner 7y ago
  Ours has become very multi-use, but it's pretty righteously observed. My girlfriend and I may be in the car with my son, and the conversation may steer into very adult territory, the kind of thing that makes my son uncomfortable, and after a bit of the talking, we'll hear a moderately voiced "baaaadingo..." from the backseat, which we know means he thinks we've gotten too far into adult-land and he's not feeling comfortable. But sometimes when we lose our tempers, the safe word can be a gift. He's 15, his teenager-ness is kicking in just about now, and we can use the safe word to disrupt a self-esteem spiral. He'll stop whatever rant he's on, and sit down and wait it out. The safe word most often stops a behavior and introduces silence... everyone can use that gift regularly enough.

sequoia 7y ago

My advice to new parents is to ignore most people's advice & trust their instincts. The best response to the deluge of "you're parenting wrong" articles is to tell the authors of such articles, politely but firmly, to go pound sand. Sure, read books and articles to learn strategies you can try, tools for your toolbox, but ultimately, "relax–you'll figure it out!" is the best advice. Most parents care immensely about their children & this fact is more likely to lead them to parent well than any article or "tip." Source: I've been a parent about my entire adult life (since 20), I have 4 kids, I've read a ton of stupid parenting articles, as a young parent everyone felt comfortable giving me parenting advice.

fjsolwmv 7y ago
Your first paragraph contradicts your second paragraph.
seer 7y ago
Sorry for the short reply, but I couldn’t resist the obligatory parenting xkcd: https://xkcd.com/674/ https://xkcd.com/674/

hamilyon2 7y ago

This article ignores large body of knowledge about parenting, unapplicable in most cultures and families in the world. I tried it personally. Techniques described serve no good purpose, just irritate everyone and ultimately destroys family from inside

guest2143 7y ago

This book changed how I parent: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/6162649-healing-stories-for-challenging-behaviour https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/6162649-healing-stori... The ability to modify behavior by singing a couplet from a story I read -- no raising of voices, or wagging of fingers -- was revelatory. It's from the waldorf educational tradition.

sudosteph 7y ago

I'm glad the author here called out that being predictable via following through on "rules" isn't enough - rules need to comprehensible and reasonable in their own right to be understood. He's also got a good grasp on the importance of properly phrasing things for children to understand. His point here seemed spot on: > Similarly, adults understand that you don't have authority over everyone around you, but with kids phrasing like "Mama can read to you when we get home" isn't as good as "I'll ask Mama if she'll read to you when we get home." Or, even better, "when we get home you can ask Mama if she'll read to you. Reminds me of a piece I read here a while ago [1] about how Mr. Rogers would intentionally phrase things very carefully on his show in order to avoid ambiguity. He also emphasized phrasing things in a way that gave the child some insight into the reasoning and a sense of responsibility - so they could feel good about doing the right thing instead of just learning blind obedience. [1] https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/mr-rogers-neighborhood-talking-to-kids/562352/ https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2018/06/mr-rogers...

socialist_coder 7y ago

I feel like if you don't do this stuff intuitively, you can't really learn it. My only data point is my SO. No matter how many times I try to coach my SO on these very simple parenting rules, she just doesn't get it. She makes threats she cannot follow through with, she doesn't think of simple "if you do this then we'll do that" tricks, and doesn't use the simple 1-2-3 timeout method. All that stuff seems very intuitive to me. But I think some people just don't get it and never will.

astrostl 7y ago

Grunching in a way that I hope doesn't come off as santimomious. I grew up with foster kids and have acute awareness of how creatively foster parents can get around "no hitting" rules with medieval stuff like time outs barefoot in the dark in a winter garage. Ultimately feel that "no hitting" is striking at the branches, but not the root. https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Shoot-Dog-Teaching-Training/dp/1860542387/ https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Shoot-Dog-Teaching-Training/dp/1... was a radically eye-opening book for me, particularly as it related to parenting. I don't believe that hitting, or yelling, or other forms of intimidation, or time outs, or the concept of punishment at all is either good or ultimately effective. And anecdatally that approach has worked out great for us and our kids.

achenatx 7y ago

Another thing I havent seen mentioned is rather than punish (by taking away things) for bad behavior, you should be rewarding for good behavior. Meaning every privilege has to be earned. This is a subtle difference but works well. The default for most people is you get to play electronics. If you are bad we are taking them away. Instead, the default should be you do X, Y and Z, to earn the privilege to play with electronics. This is every single day. Instead of you didnt clean your room, you dont get to play electronics. It would be, you cleaned your room, you earned some electronics time.