Shining the Light
We start in the first chapter by explaining why children say “no.” Then we help you define your goals as parents—think of it as your parenting wish list. Creating goals and making a plan to achieve them is a skill you will find useful time and time again as you raise your children. We show you how to determine the goals you set for your children and how to encourage progress toward those goals. As your children's best teachers, you set them up for success and then reward their many small achievements. We call this shining the light on the behavior you want to grow. Our strategies will help you balance positive reinforcement with negative sanctions in a way that leads to cooperation.
When teaching children how to thrive in today's society, you have to give them room to make mistakes. Your children will make mistakes. So will you. They don't have to be perfect, and neither do you. As a general rule, well-adjusted young children, whether they live in primitive rural villages or upscale suburban neighborhoods, comply with their parents' directives about 70 percent of the time. As children get older, their compliance rises to more than 80 percent. We use these figures as a benchmark for successful parenting. Knowing that children (and parents) don't have to be perfect allows you to concentrate on what they (and you) do right.
Changing unwanted behaviors that are already established is tougher than teaching new behaviors. That's normal. In fact, changing entrenched behavior is one of the most challenging things we do as human beings. How many times have you made New Years' resolutions only to find yourself slipping back into the habits you wanted to break? So, we ask you to remember that, sometimes, the positive steps you and your children take are so small that you can overlook them and allow mistakes to overshadow them. We will show you how to break goals into small steps and, as part of teaching through encouragement, how to “catch” your children being good.
As we all know, parenting involves a lot of trial and error. We have spent our careers studying the many challenges of raising children so that we can help you avoid common errors and adopt parenting techniques that have been proven to work. You can finally stop wasting time on hindsight and its latent 20/20 vision. We offer foresight that will allow you to create a vision for the family you want. You have the vision and we have strategies to encourage the positive behaviors that are shared by happy children and functional families throughout the world.
Our parenting approach prevents behavior problems from arising and improves stability in families, including those undergoing stressful changes like divorce, relocation, starting in a new school, or adjusting to a new step-family. Recently, we published a prevention study in which we followed the progress of single mothers for nine years after they participated in our parenting program. The results were exciting. After intervention, the lives of the mothers and their children continued to improve dramatically: mothers' parenting practices improved; their depression levels dropped; their children's cooperation improved and behavior problems often vanished; mothers obtained better jobs and achieved higher incomes; and most important, families were happier and more functional compared to those that did not receive the training. In another of our studies with step-families, we found that parents who used our techniques increased cooperation within the family, reduced children's aggressive behaviors, relieved problems at home and school, and built happier marriages.
Practice, Practice, Practice
In the pages that follow, we address social skills, tantrums, discipline, chores, routines, communication with children and partners, connecting with teachers, ensuring children's safety, sticking together as parents when the kids pit you against each other, and having fun as a family. One of the most effective ways to transform our strategies from words on a page into new skills is to practice them with a spouse, partner, or friend before you try them with your children. Choose a specific family situation you are experiencing—anything from not doing chores to arguing with you and other adults. Then focus on one parenting tool at a time in the order we've presented them.
Play the role of parent while your partner plays the child. Play out the scenario as it takes place in the worst of times—for example, as you have seen it happen in other families. Consider exaggerating. Most families enjoy some good laughs from this exercise. Take turns playing different roles so both you and your partner have a chance to see the experience through the eyes of your children. Then try the role play again using the strategies presented in the chapters. This approach of doing it not so well and then using new tools works much like the rewind scenarios we give throughout the book.
Role play dramatizes the power of the techniques and makes it easier for you to see what a difference they can make. Feeling shy about role playing is normal. But parents tell us how enlightening it is when they use this approach. Role play allows you to practice the techniques before using them with your children. Parents say that the better they become at applying our strategies, the more they feel as if they have gained superpowers. If you take the time to role play, our techniques will come to life for you as you move through the chapters.
Each new skill presented here adds to a repertoire that you can use for increasingly complex situations and behaviors for your children. Because the skills are practical, they are easy to learn. Nothing that follows on these pages is based on opinion (we all have them) or on the parenting “fad du jour.” You will not hear about helicopter parents, indigo children, detachment parenting, or Training Up. What you will read is as close to a commonsense parenting manual as you will find.
By the time you finish this book, you will be using these skills automatically. When you need to refresh your understanding of a specific technique, refer to the list of strategies and resources at the back of the book. Whether you are just starting your family or are well underway, the present behavior of your children is the best predictor of their future behavior. So, if you want to make changes, now is the time to begin.
Chapter One
Imagine
As parents, we shape our children's behavior from the day they are born. Their behaviors—desirable and undesirable alike—become established as we reinforce them through our own actions, reactions, and inactions. In this chapter, we'll discuss how you can encourage cooperation in your children and help you to become aware of behaviors that may innocently send the wrong messages.
As Jerry studied families in their homes, he developed what has become known as “coercion theory.” Coercion starts out as a vital, natural survival instinct that can be found in infants as well as baby birds. Before children develop language, they communicate their needs to be fed, held, or have their diapers changed by crying. Unattended infants can fly into little fits of apparent rage. It's their only way of telling you that they need something, and they need it now. As they begin to develop language, we have to teach children to ask for what they need. If we don't, that coercive behavior can allow toddlers to control their parents. To see unadulterated coercion in action, watch a three-year-old throw a temper tantrum in a grocery store. See how the parent and child react to each other. Observe the escalation in the intensity of emotions during the exchange. This is a battle of wills between a little kid and a grown-up. Watch how it ends, who wins, and why.
Coercion lies at the root of most of the battles we see between siblings and between parents and children. You can think of coercion as a dark side of human nature inside all of us. Understanding what coercion is and how it interferes with loving relationships can enable you to recognize it when it arises and do something about it. Because coercion is the cause of so much of the trouble between parents and young children, reducing it is a core component of our parenting techniques. When parents learn to reduce coercive actions in their children—and in themselves—cooperative behaviors have a better chance to grow and thrive. When we first become parents, many of us start out with vague dreams for ourselves, our individual children, and our families as a whole. You have probably had some kind of vision of the family you wanted ever since you were a child—though it is rare for anyone to sit down with us