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Last week I left a post with you 10 Key to face disobedience. In this post I talked about the 10 things that you must always do if you want your kids will not "go wild".

When moms and dads ask me about how to change a particular behavior of their kids, I always tell them to use positive reinforcement, but it is true that often is not enough and there is no choice but to resort to punishment.

Punishing is not bad, but you have to know how to punish, and the most important: Punishment alone is not effective. Be aware that the punishment try not to change behavior, but eliminate the behavior. When we punish not usually explain to children what to do, but what they should not do. Therefore, it is essential that when we punish, We explain to children what they have done wrong and how they should do it next time.

On the other hand, punishment in isolation is very effective, but when we use it again and again completely loses its effectiveness. So remember that we can not abuse.

Taking into account what we have discussed, and that sometimes there is no choice but to punish, we will see How should we do it to be effective?.

1. Use punishment with positive techniques. As already we discussed. Punishment by itself is not effective. If we decide to punish the little one, we have to be clear about the positive behavior we want to achieve, explain it to him and praise him if he does it. And The, for example, we are punishing the child for crossing without looking. We must explain to him how he should cross, that should stop, look from side to side, and when you see that no cars are coming to cross. If you do this as we have explained, We must praise and reward him when he performs the desired action.
2. Use punishment sparingly. Any punishment of any kind loses its effectiveness if it is used habitually.. Punishment should be used in isolation and at specific times, otherwise it will be of no use.
3. Punishment should be focused on reducing unwanted behavior. At school it is very common to punish children by sending them to the principal's office, or to another class, but this “punishment” is usually not effective because the child “has fun” going from here to there and receiving attention from other classmates.. The same thing happens when we send punished children to their room to “think.”, if children have access to their toys, more than a punishment this will be a reward. It is important that we observe if the punishment we have chosen is effective, If it is not, we must look for another that can change the unwanted attitude..
4. Do not delay punishment. It is essential that the punishment comes followed by the unwanted behavior. We cannot delay punishment until later because we run the risk that the child will not associate it with the unwanted behavior and that, therefore, lose its effectiveness.
5. We must always explain the consequences. We cannot simply punish. It is very important that we explain everything to the child. First, what have you done wrong, secondly how should I have done it. Also explain why we punish him and what we expect from him..
6. You have to be firm. If we tell the child that we are going to punish him with a certain action or consequence, we cannot change it later.. The moment your children see that you “slow down” any punishment will lose its effectiveness..
7. Don't threaten in vain. This point is closely related to the previous. If you decide to punish him, do it, but don't tell him that you are going to do it and then don't carry out the punishment. No opportunities. If you have told him once not to do something, you have told him the consequence that action will have, and keep doing it, you must punish him.
8. Give him a chance to perform good behavior. After the punishment you must give him an opportunity to demonstrate what he has learned.. Prolonged punishments do not give the opportunity for this and, therefore, They are not as effective.

I hope these are some tips to punish useful results, and combined with the keys that we saw last week, you will be able to change unwanted behaviors in your little ones..

Thanks for being there!

“The community is infinitely more brutalized by the habitual use of punishment than by the occasional occurrence of crime.”

Oscar Wilde

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Tags: attitude, punish, punishment, how to punish, guidelines, means, positive reinforcement

This entry was posted on Monday, June 6th, 2016 at 1:17 pm and is filed under Means. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.