a beginning of another long step

I have read a lot of books on how to discipline a child. I have also observed how children are being taken care of by their parents that end up spoiled and brat. I usually laugh when I remembered how I strive to discipline my child using every book I’ve read. But still, it does not apply to all children. 

One of the books which interests me comes from Dr. Fitzhug Dodson. You won’t believe me but it was published thirty years ago. I bought it online few years back. I thought HR’s job starts when you establish a company but I was wrong. HR’s more work starts when you have a baby. I learn that discipline is teaching. Good rapport is the foundation. I am weak in this area but my wife seems to master this kind of skill because every time we arrive home, my son automatically goes with her mom. I have noticed this good rapport when my 5-year old son asked me one time to go outside our residence late at night for a walk. I did not dig deeper on why he wanted to go out but I’ve realized that I started to reestablish rapport with my child. What I mean for rapport is spending part of the time with him simply enjoying being together. No commands, requests, lectures or moral messages are being issued. I take a walk together. I am amazed on the questions he raised to me on why he could not count the stars, why the moon is following him including his shadows! Establishing rapport needs to go on continually between me and my child.

I have also learned from the book mentioned the discipline strategies for teaching my child’s desirable behavior. In my opinion, the most effective method is a positive reward system. This was also taught when I attended a parenting seminar four years ago. The essence of a positive reward system is that there is always a payoff for desirable behavior but there is no payoff for undesirable behavior. I have noticed before that every time my son wants something, he cries. Every time he cries, I usually give him something in return to stop him from crying. This is repeated several times. I come to realize that when an action is followed by reward or payoff, that action is likely to be repeated. So we decided to do the opposite. At first, I unknowingly give payoffs to my child for undesirable behavior. Now, when my son is playing cooperatively and amicably with his playmate or obeying our requests, we usually give him a reward. I am sure millions of parents are unwittingly teaching their children undesirable behavior with the opposite action. We also learn that by praising our child for good things, we are unconsciously training ourselves to concentrate on positive things.

Another thing I’ve learned from the book is all about spanking. I felt guilty one time when I hit my child’s legs using a stick. He had so many bruises. I could say that spanking is a very poor and ineffective method of teaching. If I were 100% perfect, there would be no need for spanking at all. From the psychologists and psychiatrists point of view, whenever we spank a child, we are teaching him to hate us, fear us and avoid us. This was my experience when I spanked my child. For two days, he tries to avoid me. I also recalled how I knelt with salts on my knees for my undesirable behavior when I was still the same age with my son. Although spanking ranks low in the effective techniques of discipline, it would certainly be an absolute saint of a parent who could not raise his children without giving them a few good wallops now and then.

I believe that even how good is my method in teaching my child but if he has no ethical sense, a sense of right and wrong, and of values, then I have failed in a very important part of my job as a parent. The responsibility for teaching my child a sense of ethics and values belongs primarily to me and to my wife as parents. The church, the school may all share in the job but first and foremost, it is my job and my wife’s job to teach my child ethics and morality. Sometimes, when I overdo it, it also bounces back to me. One thing that I should be careful with my child is to promise things when I know I can do it because we have a common understanding that when one promises, he or she has to do it. At first, my child always remind me of my promise to the extent that he cries because I was not able to fulfill the promise. This is also the reason why I should be careful when I give my word to my son. I also remember last week when we had dinner together while my wife had not yet arrived from work, we talked a lot during our dinner. My son told me, “Dad, have you not finished?” I replied that I was just waiting for him. He further said, “your spoon and fork are not yet together, that means you’re not yet done.”

I smiled and said to myself. “at least I made an initial step but this is just a beginning of another long step.”