How to Raise Your Kid Right?
by: Kenneth N. Condrell, Ph.D.
Child Psychologist
Child Psychologist
Do you want to become a more effective parent?
Who doesn’t?
The following guidelines have helped many parents successfully raise their children. Follow these 17 basic principles and you will be just as pleased with the results. Your children will become more cooperative, more respectful and better able to deal with life’s ups and downs.
1. As you parent your children, be aware that you are their teacher. Stay focused on teaching them the many life lessons they need to learn.
2. Think of your home as a classroom for teaching your children. This will remind you that a great deal of learning and training takes place right in your own household.
3. Keep in mind that your main mission is to raise children who someday will be able to successfully run their own lives. This thought helps you promote independence and resilience in them.
4. Praise your children when they behave the way you want them to behave. Remember, there’s a positive side to discipline, and that it involves a lot of training and molding.
5. Be sure to make each child in your family an “only child” at least once a week. Children need private, one-on-one time with their parents. The parent who takes time for this experience will be rewarded with fun and more cooperation from all her children.
6. Let your child know how his behavior impacts the rest of the family. Doing this makes a child appreciate how he has helped or hindered a sibling, his parents or even himself. This is one important way children learn to behave appropriately and become mindful of others’ needs.
7. Be aware that your behavior sets the standard for your children. By observing their parents, children learn how a man behaves, how a woman behaves and how married couples treat each another.
8. Structure your home with rules, consequences, routines, traditions and expectations. Discipline at home helps children develop self-discipline.
9. Avoid a frantic lifestyle. Limit your children’s outside activities and your own commitments outside the family. Overscheduling robs families of the time they need to be a family.
10. Teach your child manners. A respectful child is attractive to both peers and adults.
11. Raise your children to expect problems and find solutions. It’s every parent’s job to make their children problem-solvers.
12. Teach your children to work. Kids need a work ethic rather than a sense of entitlement. Start them when they’re young, at age 2 or 3, as your helpers. This is a great age to introduce the idea that everyone in the family works.
13. Avoid the materialism that has infected today’s children.
14. Keep in mind that parenting is not a popularity contest. Many of your decisions will be unpopular with your children, but you know what’s best for them. Stay focused on your goal: to prepare your children to live on their own.
15. Don’t always rescue your children from their mistakes. Some of the best lessons children learn are gleaned from their own mistakes. Think of them as opportunities for your kids to do better.
16. Remember that you’re not your child’s servant forever. Parents start out as servants because infants, toddlers and preschoolers are so dependent. But from age 3 on, children should chip in and do more things for themselves.
17. Be sure to nurture thoughtfulness in your child. When a child misbehaves, you need to say more than, “Stop that” or “Come here.” Let him know how his behavior created a problem or bothered someone. This is how you build sensitivity and thoughtfulness in a child.
Who doesn’t?
The following guidelines have helped many parents successfully raise their children. Follow these 17 basic principles and you will be just as pleased with the results. Your children will become more cooperative, more respectful and better able to deal with life’s ups and downs.
1. As you parent your children, be aware that you are their teacher. Stay focused on teaching them the many life lessons they need to learn.
2. Think of your home as a classroom for teaching your children. This will remind you that a great deal of learning and training takes place right in your own household.
3. Keep in mind that your main mission is to raise children who someday will be able to successfully run their own lives. This thought helps you promote independence and resilience in them.
4. Praise your children when they behave the way you want them to behave. Remember, there’s a positive side to discipline, and that it involves a lot of training and molding.
5. Be sure to make each child in your family an “only child” at least once a week. Children need private, one-on-one time with their parents. The parent who takes time for this experience will be rewarded with fun and more cooperation from all her children.
6. Let your child know how his behavior impacts the rest of the family. Doing this makes a child appreciate how he has helped or hindered a sibling, his parents or even himself. This is one important way children learn to behave appropriately and become mindful of others’ needs.
7. Be aware that your behavior sets the standard for your children. By observing their parents, children learn how a man behaves, how a woman behaves and how married couples treat each another.
8. Structure your home with rules, consequences, routines, traditions and expectations. Discipline at home helps children develop self-discipline.
9. Avoid a frantic lifestyle. Limit your children’s outside activities and your own commitments outside the family. Overscheduling robs families of the time they need to be a family.
10. Teach your child manners. A respectful child is attractive to both peers and adults.
11. Raise your children to expect problems and find solutions. It’s every parent’s job to make their children problem-solvers.
12. Teach your children to work. Kids need a work ethic rather than a sense of entitlement. Start them when they’re young, at age 2 or 3, as your helpers. This is a great age to introduce the idea that everyone in the family works.
13. Avoid the materialism that has infected today’s children.
14. Keep in mind that parenting is not a popularity contest. Many of your decisions will be unpopular with your children, but you know what’s best for them. Stay focused on your goal: to prepare your children to live on their own.
15. Don’t always rescue your children from their mistakes. Some of the best lessons children learn are gleaned from their own mistakes. Think of them as opportunities for your kids to do better.
16. Remember that you’re not your child’s servant forever. Parents start out as servants because infants, toddlers and preschoolers are so dependent. But from age 3 on, children should chip in and do more things for themselves.
17. Be sure to nurture thoughtfulness in your child. When a child misbehaves, you need to say more than, “Stop that” or “Come here.” Let him know how his behavior created a problem or bothered someone. This is how you build sensitivity and thoughtfulness in a child.
