Correction

All children misbehave, or “miss the mark” of desired behavior. When they do, parents can chose any number of ways to address the misbehavior. Most methods have some measure of short-term effect on the misbehavior. But if parents want long-term results that effectively teach kids to be internally motivated and responsible for themselves, it’s best to be more thoughtful. The “Connected Family Framework” principles provide a great “lens” for this deeper thinking.

Foundation - The thoughts and emotions a parent experiences when the child misbehaves usually guide the parent’s response. Reflecting on those thoughts and feelings can give parents a deeper understanding of why they act the way they do, and can lead to new, more effective ways of dealing with the misbehavior.

Connection – When children misbehave, parents are provided perhaps their most powerful opportunity to communicate unconditional love. Love expressed meaningfully in the context of conflict or misbehavior has great power to cut through the difficult emotions, and lead to better behavior.

Direction - The traits the child displays during the misbehavior might actually be good traits, coming out badly. This gives the parent the opportunity to affirm “what is good” – even in the misbehavior. A parent can then proactively seek to set the child up to succeed using that same trait, at a later time. Click here for examples of this.

Correction – Of course misbehavior must also be addressed with some concerted effort to correct the misbehavior. Various methods of enforcing consequences, chastisement, and punishment may be fully appropriate. We find however, that those parents with the strongest Foundations are best suited to employ these various methods.

Effective Correction Methods

Prescribing corrective methods can be a very dicey proposition. The best method, flowing from a weak foundation, may have little to no long-term effectiveness in shaping the heart and behavior of a child. Conversely, when a questionable method flows out of a parent with a strong Foundation, that parent is generally able to evaluate what happened and why, and effectively adjust the method in the future. The effectiveness of the method is not ultimately judged based on whether it “worked” (controlled) at the time, but on its long-term impact on the child. Assessing this requires a thoughtful, reflective, even prayerful process.

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