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JANUARY 14, 2021 | The Jewish Home OCTOBER 29, 2015 | The Jewish Home
Parenting Pearls
The Real Parenting Moments By Sara Rayvych, MSEd
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any parents tend to place a lot of focus on proper punishment and how to properly give consequences for bad actions. It is a major topic, and there is much debate on how to do so correctly. In this article, I’m not going to discuss in-depth my thoughts on punishing kids. I think that giving children a proper, relevant consequence to their actions is a fine art. I want to clarify that I’m not among those who subscribe to the belief that children should never be told “no.” I do think that giving children clear guidelines and fair expectations are crucial to their development and something that benefits the child. How to strike that fair balance will also not be the subject of this article. There are differences between punishments and consequences, but that’s not a discussion for today. Now that I’ve devoted an entire paragraph to what we’re not discussing, let’s get to the topic at hand. I don’t remember where I first heard this particular idea, but I remember how surprising it was to me at the time. I think it came from a book for educators but I’m not positive. The basic premise is that chinuch or educating a child doesn’t happen with punishment. Punish-
ment is to stop the bad behavior, but it’s not the ultimate lesson. The main chinuch lessons generally occur afterwards or at other times. This doesn’t mean children should be allowed to run wild because you can’t educate a child who is acting out. Additionally, nobody benefits when a child is permitted to misbehave, certainly not the child himself. But it means we need to appreciate that whatever misbehavior we see, or area that needs to be corrected, needs to be dealt with at a later time if we want to truly educate. It is incorrect to rely on the time-out and say our job is complete. I personally think of it as the two phases of dealing with misbehavior. One phase is stopping the child’s negative behavior. While we commonly think of this as punishment or consequence, it can also be redirecting, calming, or distracting the child. An example would be a hungry child tantruming – he just needs to be fed. A child who is overstimulated would be best off being held or removed from the situation. Kids are young and don’t have the same ability to control themselves that adults should have. Not every mistake needs to become a big deal. The second phase is giving the appropriate chinuch lessons so the child
will actually learn. This can be anything from explaining what the child did wrong (they don’t always know!), to showing a better way of handling the situation. I want to point out that not every misbehavior will warrant the second phase. A two-year-old who writes on the wall with markers doesn’t need a lecture or even rebuke because the parent just needs to keep the markers out of reach (the child can help with the cleanup, though). There is no “one size fits all” in parenting, and there are times that a consequence will very effectively match the misbehavior. I can’t say the consequence will never be sufficient to educate the child; I’m simply saying that the consequence isn’t enough in most cases.
How does this change things? The difference is subtle and you may be wondering why this is worth mentioning. This principle changes the equation in small, yet important ways. One difference is that, depending on the behavior, you can sometimes stop what they’re doing with other methods. Not everything needs an immediate, full consequence. For example, toddlers can often be distracted and many misbehaviors by
little ones may not require the full response. There are many times that you can simply distract a child, redirect, or simply remove them from whatever is going on. I can’t tell you how many times a passing truck or construction project has saved the day. “Look kids, truck!” Suddenly, they forget whatever mischief they’re into and off they go to stare out the window. I’ve also found that sometimes the most effective means with teens is to quickly stop the behavior and have that sincere conversation later when they’re calm. Trying to punish or yell back will just escalate the situation, and nobody benefits. It’s been my personal experience that teenagers, in particular, can remember later on what they did and think more clearly once they’re past the initial crisis. An example of this is if a teenager is cursing. Rebuking or punishing them during that time will just cause more cursing. Finding a creative way to stop the behavior in the heat of the moment will stop the cursing and give them a chance to cool off. Later on, once they’re more receptive, you have the chance to succinctly point out that they can’t do whatever it is they did. You may not need to say as much since they may have already thought
