Follow through with punishments. Don’t give empty threats.

Crucial parenting tip! Always, always, always be willing to follow through with a punishment you dish out. If you took your son’s gameboy away for a week, make sure it stays away for a week. If you told your sixteen year old daughter she’s not allowed to talk on the phone for a month, make sure it’s a month. The hardest part of following through with a punishment is when it interferes with a day trip, a family vacation or your son wants to spend the night at a friend’s house. You cannot give in! Giving in sends the message that if they want it bad enough, they can pester you until you give in.

Parenting means avoiding empty threats. Empty threats are when you tell your child you’re going to do something that really isn’t possible for you to do. Like when you’re playing at the park with your three year old and he doesn’t want to leave. You say, “You need to come now or I’ll leave without you.” You know you would never leave without him so that’s an empty threat. You might say to your fifteen year old daughter, “You need to change your attitude or I’m going to ship you off to military school.” If you’re not really willing to send her off to military school, don’t make the threat. The kids will learn real fast that you don’t mean what you say.

As a daycare provider to twelve kids, the kids need to know that I mean what I say. I will not spank or use any form of physical punishment, but I do train the kids that when I tell them to do something, they are expected to do it. If they don’t, they will (not might), they will lose priviledges. If they know for certain what the end result will be, it will not be worth the bad behavior to begin with. Of course, I have children testing this policy every single day and every single day the end result will be the same. As I write this, I know I sound like a tyrant, but it really isn’t that way. I have a very friendly relationship with all my daycare kids. They love coming to my house because they know what to expect when they’re at my house. Even the kids I have to be toughest on tell me they want to live with me.