Redirecting your Child's behavior

Lesson: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7

Exercise: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Lesson 7 - An Ounce of Prevention

You can minimize the frequency of misbehavior by taking a few necessary precautions.

Learn to discern how your child acts during certain situations. For example, when your child gets hungry or tired, does she become irritable and less cooperative? Knowing your child will help you determine which intervention to use. Below are situations that often cause disturbance in children:

“Once you understand the reasons behind his responses, you can learn to work with them, ease the hassles, teach new behaviors where they are needed, and, most important, help your child understand and like himself.”

Mary Sheedy Kurcinka, Raising Your Spirited Child

We often over-schedule, which creates tension in our family. Stress creates fertile ground for misbehavior. Stress is like a thief in the night – often you don’t know that it’s there, but in the morning many of your valuables are missing. The valuable that is missing in our homes is closeness. I can’t emphasize enough how it important it is to de-stress your family. Allow yourself enough time, so that you do not have to hurry. One way to avoid hurrying in the morning is to have your child get school clothes, books, etc., ready the night before.

Look for patterns that precipitate misbehavior and find ways to intervene during that pattern. For example, if your preschooler has a tantrum while you run errands, arrange to do your errands without her or shorten the amount of time you spend on errands. If your child has difficulty with transitions (moving from one activity to another), create a routine during transitions to make them go more smoothly or focus their attention on the next adventure.

Here is another example: A father noticed a pattern -- he would often fight with his teenage daughter before his dates with her. The daughter would be so mad at him that she didn’t want continue the date. After self-reflection, Dad realized that he initiated the fight because he wanted to work instead of being with her. Dad adjusted his priorities and started to consider their relationship more important than his work. The fighting stopped.

To avoid conflict, we sometimes do not tell our children about changes in plans until the last minute. This makes our child feel like he lacks control and can upset him. Tell your child as soon as possible about changes in plans.

Another time it is helpful to let children know about changes is when you are about to leave. A phrase you can use is, “You have ten minutes to complete what you are doing, and then we will be leaving.” And then again in two minutes give them another notice.

Take time to nurture yourself. When you feel like you have had time for yourself, you are less irritable, more sensitive to the demands of situations and less likely to overreact.

Our children (especially younger children) need routines and rituals. For example: one mom picked her child up from school with a snack that her daughter could eat in the car, and her daughter got to take her shoes and socks off when she got in. This routine made the transition from school to home go more smoothly. Create routines around the following issues:

Rituals are established traditions to celebrate special occasions. Rituals help children to feel like they belong and are connected to something substantial, and they give them something to look forward to.