Parenting

When communicating with children it is important to keep your goals in mind. The younger the child, the more difficult it is to reason with a child. A very young child won't be able to give you the reasoning for his actions. "Why did you hit your brother?" you demand. "Because I hit him?" your child may reply. As your child grows older, his reason and reasoning skills begin to develop. You can converse with a twelve year old in a manner impossible five years previous. So what are goals in parenting? 1. As a child, we'll say between birth and twelve, you want to capture this child's...

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The goal of every parent and authority when dealing with bad behavior is to find some way to correct it. This can be very challenging to say the least and depending on the level of influence you have in that person's life, may very well be close to impossible. Despite that, most people don't know what even causes bad behavior. In this article, bad behavior is the reaction to a given event. An uncontrollable child is the result of little or no training. But a teenager who gets angry at the drop of a hat is the type of bad behavior we are talking about here. WHAT AFFECTS BEHAVIOR? Attitude...

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"Praise the Lord! I Found One!" These are the words spoken by my 5 year old and a 3 year old as they rummage through a toy box looking for leggos. In a society and generation where God takes a back seat to political correctness and social humanism, it is refreshing to hear children reference God with such eager excitement. Some may raise the cry of 'brainwashed', but I care not. My children are incredibly happy and excited about life. If that is brainwashing, so be it. It disturbs me that parents today shy from instilling solid values, even Christian values, into their children. As if cultivating...

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Choosing the right words are perhaps the single most important key to ending arguments and avoiding arguments. You're going to disagree with people, and when you feel it is necessary to voice your disagreement, choosing the right words are essential. No two people can ever agree on everything. When you feel it necessary to voice your disagreement, your approach, your words, your mannerisms all come into play on how other people react to your disagreement. How you approach a disagreement is nearly as important as what you are willing to disagree about. For most disagreements, you should...

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Unconditional love is not what you may think. To love someone unconditionally means you cannot look to the other person to define it in any way. Yet that is what most of us do. Most of us look at the object of our love to define it. Let me explain. Ask the average person why they love their spouse, boyfriend, or girlfriend and they'll say things like, 'Because she is pretty, smart, a good listener, a hard worker, she makes me feel special, and so forth and so on.' This automatically puts conditions on it. He is defining his love based on what the other person is or is not. This is conditional!...

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In an ideal world, we would like to see a positive attitude that promotes a productive action. But, as most parents know, we don’t always get both. So what ought to be more important? The action or the attitude? As parents, should we be more concerned with the child’s attitude or, if a child performs the correct action, is that good enough? For example, you tell your thirteen year old son to take out the trash. He grumbles, procrastinates, argues, but eventually does it. He scowls the whole time. He slams the trash lid down in frustration. He stomps around as if he has been greatly insulted....

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STAGE 1 - CAPTURING YOUR CHILD'S HEART We'll say that this is the ages between 0 and 12. But this can vary a year or two in either direction of the age 12. At this stage of your children's life, you have a very unique opportunity. You can capture their heart. This is the main goal for this age. Yes, you have to teach them. Yes, they need discipline. Yes, you need to provide for them. But all of these things ought to be done with the goal of capturing their heart. Children, at this age, love to be around their parents. They aren't looking to always be off with their friends. They want to help...

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At some point, your children will begin to recognize the hypocrisy in your life. And the truth is we all are hypocrites to some degree or another. Most people will admit that they believe in their hearts that something is wrong, yet haven't found the character or desire to stop doing it themselves. How many parents smoke while telling their children never to do it? How many parents drink while telling their children never to do it? How many parents condemn their children's lies while telling lies of their own? How many parents are asked by their children, "Did you do it when you were my age?" The...

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Rebellion is the result of conflicting authority. When authority can't provide a united front, it is very dangerous. There are several things you can do to provide a unified front before your kids. 1. Discuss rules and discipline together. Come to a full agreement on all aspects of it--before you implement them. 2. Never, never, never, never argue in front of your children. If you have a disagreement, discuss it when the kids are asleep, or when they're not around. All growing up, I never one time heard my parents argue with each other. I can't tell you how secure and happy my brother and I were...

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Setting rules for your children is a fundamental part of discipline. Honestly, you have no right to discipline, or punish a child for doing something that you never made clear was wrong. That's just not fair. Shotgun discipline builds resentment in your children. Establish rules. Make sure that your kids know the rules, and make sure they know exactly what the consequences will be if they break the rules. The first thing to do is to make sure that you and your spouse agree on the rules and the consequences. Setting aside a time where you can discuss this is important. Conflicting authority...

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