In the last post, I introduced 5 different types of misbehavior: disobedience, attention-getting, breaking rules and routines, deliberately hurting others, and wrong behavior rooted in real problems. Today we look at how to respond to the first of these, disobedience. There are two tools in the hands of parents that are very useful for dealing with simple disobedience. The first one is what I call the kinetic assist. Kinetic means “motion” or “causing to move.” The kinetic assist is helpful when a small child is learning to obey simple commands such as, “come here,” “pick up the toys,” and “bring that book here.” Think of this as a teaching tool…

It happens to all of us as parents. We are at a loss for how to deal with a child’s behavior. Is it a time out, a spanking, a lecture, take away a privilege, give an explanation, ignore them, physically move the child to another room, put him on restriction … what is the right consequence for a particular behavior and how do I administer it most effectively?! We have now come to Passionate Legacy Principle #6: Have a plan for discipline. Learn what consequences should be applied to which behaviors, so that when the situation arises you are prepared to act decisively. Before we can respond with the best…