Helping a child stay focused on the good path and avoiding risky and bad behavior is essential to developing their mental well-being.As a parent, you can...
Helping a child stay focused on the good path and avoiding risky and bad behavior is essential to developing their mental well-being.
As a parent, you can provide support for children in this aspect when you take your child's privileges to discipline them when they do bad things. When taking away their privileges, ensure you think deeply about it. Don't take away what they don't care about. You need to remove privileges they love so they may understand what they have done and try not to do it again. Also, ensure you tie the privilege to their offense. This means that the privilege should relate to what they have done. Taking a non-related privilege may be unjust and lead to frustration since it will be regarded as unfair punishment. Similarly, you should give the consequence a time frame. For example, you can tell them you are taking the privilege away for five days or two weeks. It will allow you to have a rating for their offenses. So, the worse offense will have worse time frames.
When you want to take your child's privileges to discipline them, you should do these:
Threatening someone with an ineffectual method of retaliation is known not to affect the person. The same occurs in parenting when the child knows that the parent will only dole out a non-painful consequence. Therefore, if you want to take your child's privileges in a way that will be effective in their discipline, you have to take what they will feel. If your child is a sportsperson, you can remove their privilege to attend sports events. This targets their passion and shows that you know what they love. Also, it signifies that you are serious about what they have done and not repeating it. If they love music, you can prohibit them from attending musical classes. You may even bar them from attending musical performances until the discipline is done. Using these methods will show your child your willingness to go through with the consequences of their action. It will show you are ready to discipline them despite their love for a particular thing. It will also make them likely to become better and avoid bad behavior.
Making an offense-based consequence is an excellent method of disciplining anyone. It allows the offender to remember their bad action throughout completing the consequence. As an effective way to discipline children, you should take your child's privileges. If your child watches TV beyond bedtime and wakes up late in the morning, you should curb that behavior. Picking the most related privilege to be removed may be done by preventing them from watching TV at night for a while. Moreover, if they didn't do the dishes at the right time, you may remove the privilege that prevents them from doing the dishes during the weekend. This is related to their offense and a good way to get them to remember their actions. While facing the consequence of their action, they will generally relive their bad moment and blame themselves for it. This will ensure that they reconsider what they have done and try their best to prevent its repetition.
Even in law, punishments carry time frames. These time frames help the convict know how long they will spend and allow the existence of a ranking system to determine how much time an offense should get. To take your child's privileges effectively, you should follow similar rules. Since the time frames will help you rank their wrong actions in severity, you can outline a consequence table. In this table, you will include the number of days or hours per consequence. For example, telling them not to watch cartoons at night can be for a day if they fail to sleep at bedtime, while it may go on for three days if they fail to sleep at all. You will need to pick the best time that works for you and them since you know them best. By quantifying the length of their penalty, they will know how many days they have to bear the consequences, enabling them to prepare mentally for when the privilege comes back. It will also ensure they are prepared to stop doing any wrong action.
When you take your child's privileges, you should explain why to them as it's necessary that they understand what they have done. They will not process information as fast as you; thus, they may not fully understand why you are taking away their privileges. However, with your explanation, they will get the complete details about the rules they broke, how they upset you, why they shouldn't have done it, the effect, and how the consequence will help them think about their action. You don't have to be harsh in the explanation. If they have questions, listen to them. Don't shut them up because you are upset; they may not learn that way. You can ensure that you are calm and settled before you explain to them. If you are stressed with work, try not to snap at them. If you can't explain at that moment, tell them you will tell them later. Make sure you don't forget because you need to allow your child to get used to questioning things so they may carry on with their inquisitive nature.
Being firm with your kid is highly necessary as children generally seek to enjoy every privilege without penalties. When you take your child's privileges and assign time frames to them, ensure you don't return the privilege until the time frame elapses. Although it may not be easy being firm against your child's cute face or changed behavior, you have to carry out the punishment. If you reduce the time frame because of their apologies, you will encourage such behavior in the future. Since they know that you will not discipline them anymore if they apologize to you, they will be more likely to continue the bad behavior. Thus, you have to remain firm no matter the fuzzy feelings inside you. If they keep bugging you, you can just look away. Don't reply to them and leave them to get tired. Also, you can tell them not to ask you about it again. If they ask again, repeat yourself in a louder voice so they will understand you are not joking.
When you discipline a child properly, you are providing mental support to the child to enable them to pick up great habits to build excellent mental well-being. When you want to take your child's privileges, you should take what they will feel, link the privileges to what they did, give it a time frame, explain why you took it, and return the privilege only when the time elapses.
https://www.apa.org/act/resources/fact-sheets/children-angry
https://kidshealth.org/en/parents/discipline.html
https://www.verywellfamily.com/effective-discipline-ideas-for-teen-grounding-1270219
https://www.verywellfamily.com/taking-away-privileges-to-discipline-children-1094759
I am a Licensed Professional Counselor, and owner of Overcomers Counseling. I'm dedicated to helping individuals find strength and healing through life’s challenges. With a deep understanding of mental health and years of professional experience, I specialize in fostering hope and resilience while equipping her clients with tools to thrive. Passionate about empowering others, she creates a safe, supportive space where everyone feels seen, valued, and capable of overcoming obstacles on their path to well-being.
Help your child by providing support and guidance, using positive language, highlighting the progress they have made, breaking down the challenge into smaller steps, and motivating them with positive affirmations.
