Children live in an adult world where they are constantly told what NOT to do. Parents and teachers fill their day with “don’t touch that,” “stop doing that”, and there is always the old standby that simply says “NO!”Honestly, as a parent of three children myself I agree that many times it feels like it is much easier to identify and warn them about the risks of their behavior than it is to take the time to help them practice what they should do. As a counselor and owner of a behavioral coaching business, Independence Behavioral Coaching I recognize the power of positive parenting strategies in working with difficult behaviors in children.It should not be surprising that with all of that negative direction, children quickly learn how to tune us out. And as children start tuning parents out, the parenting message easily becomes distorted. Parents telling their children to “don’t hit your brother,” start hearing “… hit your brother.”Redirection and substitution (behavecoach.com/behavioral-problems/blog/) are two powerful positive parenting strategies that are often forgotten. Sure we use it with our infants and toddlers, but quickly forget that it also can be one of our options in our positive parenting bag of tricks when helping older children manage their anxiety and anger.Redirection and substitution are positive parenting techniques that help children learn appropriate behavior and prevent disruptive behavior while maintaining their sense of exploration and discovery. Read more about positive parenting here. (behavecoach.com/parenting-tools/positive-discipline/) Redirection is a technique used to break the path that a child is on that will lead to inappropriate behavior. Emotions can quickly escalate a child to the point where they are in crisis and out of control. Redirection can sometimes bump a child off of that escalating crisis path and on to a different emotional path that may be filled with discovery and wonder.With infants and toddlers our redirection is more simple and stimulation based. When my boy was two, for some reason he was amazed by birds. Sometimes he would fall down or not get the scissors that he wanted. As he started crying I could pick him up, take him outside and as soon as I pointed out a bird, I could begin to help him bump out of that emotional state and onto a state of wonder about that bird. Parents quickly figure out this technique but as their children get older, this simplistic approach begins to lose its power.Young children need a more sophisticated version of redirection. Young children are more verbal and are beginning to problem solve and think abstractly. For them, give positive redirection by using neutral words such as “You need to…” or please do this behavior and then make a positive statement of the correct behavior.For example, you could say “Please put the scissors on the kitchen counter. Scissors are for cutting paper.” 7 times out of 10 if I say this to my now three year old boy, he will either put those scissors on the counter like I asked or ask me to help his cut some paper. If just say “no” and try to take the scissors from him, 10 times out of 10 he will run from me and play tug-of-war with me as I try to pry them from his little hands. And then, once get I get the scissors back, he escalates into a tantrum.Redirection can also be physical such as moving a child into another room to avoid safety hazards or potential confrontation. My daughters are nine and ten years old. I encourage them to work out their own battles but sometimes they are just on edge waiting to blow. Maybe it’s because of lack of sleep, their hungry or just one of those days. Directing them into other rooms, sometimes can be in everyone’s best interest.Substitution offers the child a choice of something else to replace behaviors that can lead to disruption.For example, when two children want the same toy, you might offer a substitute toy for one of the children to play with, which could avoid a fight over the first toy.Another substitution option could be to encourage the child to do something that is incompatible with the disruptive behavior. It is like the old saying, “you can’t smile and frown at the same time.” Some examples could include, singing instead of biting or holding an imaginary bubble in your mouth instead of talking.Redirection and substitution are not the solution to all problems. They are just two options that are available and should not be forgotten in your positive parenting bag of tricks.For more information see our website, behavecoach.com.
Archive for the ‘Positive Parenting’ Category
Positive Parenting: Rediscovering the fine art of redirection and substitution
Thursday, August 26th, 2010New Technology Exhaust System
Wednesday, August 18th, 2010With the current performance of vehicles, engines, a considerable amount of heat produced by the engine. These extreme temperatures can increase the overall performance and strength of the outer parts of the engine failure prematurely. Fortunately, there are rolls of film that may exhaust system available fall under the hood temperatures of more than fifty percent.
Integrated exhaust products are not new to automotive performance. For a long time, wrapping exhaust is made of fiberglass and is normally filled store shelves by car. There are, however, new developments in technology exhaust system designed to surround the superior thermal protection against the fibers wrapped in the old style plug. These days above the exhaust coats are made of pulverized lava and thermal power of about five to one hundred degrees Celsius higher than that of fiberglass offer.
Installing Exhaust Wrap is a relatively simple process that most car lovers can do. The sensors are packaged in just one quarter inch of flap. The starting point and the end of each envelope must be provided with special steel equal nominal steel at high temperature. This prevents the film from collapsing.
In most cases, it is easier to implement the package of the vehicle safely removed. If the exhaust fiberglass shelters are difficult to model, installers, and many think that the film first exhaust wet it is much easier to adapt to difficult corners. Pulverized lava exhaust wraps are extremely flexible and can easily be exported into the package without getting wet.
Positive Parenting and the Use of Hypnosis for Children
Monday, August 16th, 2010The use of hypnosis for children is starting to be a common method in dealing with children who are having difficulties in advancing into adulthood. Aside from using hypnosis to deal with different behavioural and health problems, hypnosis parenting or using hypnosis with your children at home is also starting to get known.
Hypnosis parenting, experts claim, is a method o positive parenting. What are ideas behind this parenting and how do they work?
Hypnosis is not ordering or becoming authoritative to other people. This is something that we should understand and be clear about. Hypnosis, unlike what we commonly know, is not about making people do something which they would not remember or stop doing. Hypnosis is about suggestions.
Experts said that our children are already suggestible from their parents. Almost all parents are familiar with their baby’s emotions and facial expressions. Actually, if we smile in a baby and make eye contact it is highly possible that would be smiling back. Children learn from the parents through the parents’ actions and expressions. If a parent want to teach something to their children, it is important to show an example that we are also following these rules that were set out for them.
Hypnosis parenting is not only applicable when you want your children to do their homework or do household chores. You can only use hypnosis to help them with difficulty in sleeping or nervousness and tension before exams, school presentation or a game.
How to do this?
You can start by talking to them before they go to sleep. Make sure that they are comfortable and make them close their eyes. You could start telling a story which would show the protagonist succeeding in the challenges that he faced. Use positive images when telling a story. This would help your child ease the tension. Aside from helping your child ease out the tension, the parent and the child also got the chance to spent some bonding moment together.
What the parent say have an impact on how children feel about themselves. An example would be the behaviour they show. If the child is refuses to follow certain rules in the house, and you get a heated discussion over it, more probably that the child would still be the same.
You could replace the heated discussion with random positive statements, like saying that the child are improving much on their behaviour and acknowledging their efforts to behave. The child will feel better and eventually will believe that he is indeed behaving well. Soon enough, the child will change his behaviour for the better.
These simple suggestions helped the children’s mind or its subconscious to accept and believe in them. So if the statements made or the statements that a child can hear are all negative, the subconscious would believe it and the child will follow it in real life.
But if positive statements are heard by the child, even if they are randomly dropped statements, the subconscious perceive this as the truth and would eventually translate into their actions.
Hypnosis for children can even be used in encouraging them to do household chores. All you want to do is look at them straight into the eyes and ask them to do the household chores. A little bobbing of the head, would encourage your child to agree to do the job delegated to them.