The Family Puzzle... Putting the Pieces Together
Session 2 - Encouragement - The Key to Your Child's Self-Image
Lesson 5 - Five Ways We Discourage Children
It is almost never our intent to discourage our children. Most of us use the same parenting skills our parents used with us. These methods often produce the exact opposite of what we want to accomplish! Here are five ways we unwittingly discourage our children:
1. Negative Motivation – Making children feel bad about themselves. Examples include:
- guilt
- punishment
- shame
- name calling (i.e., lazy, bad, irresponsible)
- yelling
- threats
- sarcasm
2. Overdoing It – Doing for them what they can do for themselves.
- rescuing them from consequences
- making decisions for them
- talking for them
- being more invested in an outcome than they are
- getting them into situations they haven’t worked for
- rewarding for good behavior
3. Excessive Demands – Asking too much from them.
- expecting high achievements in areas they have no interest in
- wanting them to be “the best” out of everyone else
- giving too much responsibility and not allowing them to be children
- over-scheduling the family
- telling them what to do and when to do it
4. Discounting Them – not having time for your children
- not having time for them
- making other things consistently more important
- not asking their opinions
- not valuing their contributions to the family
- denying or minimizing their feelings and wants
5. Permissiveness – allowing freedom without responsibility
- allowing them to watch too much T.V.
- giving in to their demands
- not following through with consequences
- letting them treat you or your property disrespectfully
- not have them contribute by doing chores
- bribing children to behave
- inability to say "no" - See Refrigerator Wisdom below.
