What is your view on discipline?

Answer 1

In which direction? Discipline for an adult is the ability to monitor his own actions in order to maintain a comfortable environment for himself and those around him. In order to do so, she must be able to start a project by herself, maintain quality standards, and complete it with no supervision. This is known as "working". All adults do this daily and find satisfaction in the process. It is a personal goal and in order to successfully do the work, one must integrate both the physical and mental processes to gain the reward for such activity. For a wage earner, the reward is a pay check, for the unpaid worker, it is satisfaction in the job completed. Household workers such as wives and househusbands fall into the second category.

In order for children to successfully integrate into the world of adults, they must be trained in the concepts of discipline. All discipline should be meted out with a view toward the goal of making a successful adult. One of the goals is to provide training in the courtesies of personal interaction, such as "manners". The successful child is courteous, accommodating, confident, and secure. These qualities are taught with patience and much repetition. For a child, discipline is the means whereby they are integrated into the society in which they are born.

Frankly, while children are a great joy, they are also born with absolutely no social skills. In essence they are equivalent to an animal and must be trained to be a person. Certain things are not socially acceptable, so discipline must be applied in order to make the child a successful being in our society. This is done by parents and later, teachers and peers. A "likable" child is one who has learned the lessons taught by his parents.

Successful parenting involves discipline in sometimes subtle ways. The process of teaching a child to say "thank you" is a weary process in the young child, but is necessary for social graces. It begins when the child has verbal skills, even rudimentary ones. The child is carefully trained to say the phrase when given a reward such as a toy or unexpected gift. Eventually the child will do so on her own, but the parent must be careful to reinforce the lesson until the child does so.

So it is with all lessons in discipline. Self control is the goal, and sometimes a child will not accept the lesson. There are times when the child exhibits unacceptable behavior, such as screaming in a public place. The options are varied, from removing the child from the situation to corporeal punishment. In my opinion, it is not a good idea to attempt to teach the child when s/he is tired or hungry. Little people have very much shorter spans of comfort in such situations. Removal from the situation is the better option in these cases, but when it is not viable, more direct action is indicated.

When faced with a recalcitrant child, you must maintain the system of rewards and punishment. Do not react with anger, but be aware that this is a struggle of wills. A good phrase to use is "I am angry at what you did". Do not use the phrase "I am angry at you" because this will integrate into the child that your approval depends solely on what he does at the moment and not on his overall disposition. Love is not conditional, and this particular phrase implies that your love is conditional.

Punishment is an undesired consequence to a given action. The adult faces this process every day, so the child must be prepared to face it and accept it. Pain is the mechanism that is built into a human in order to preserve it's life. As a parent, we must be prepared to mete out pain to teach the child that certain actions are totally unacceptable. Physical punishment is not always a bad thing, such as a swat to the rear when a child hurts another child.

It is imperative that the child learns that unexpected pain to his person is a result of a willful action on his part. She learns not to touch a hot surface by direct experimentation, so the expectation that she will be spanked is another method of teaching this lesson. Biting is an animal reaction, and a return bite will impress on the child that it hurts. Pain! While it is unpleasant, it does have the advantage of reinforcing the lesson in a way that nothing else can.

Smacking the hand of a child who willfully touches an object that he has been told not to touch is not cruelty, but a lesson that he is being watched. The minor sting of the discipline reinforces the boundaries of his world and makes him more secure because he has the knowledge that he is loved and cherished. I know that this seems like an oxymoron, but a small action will prevent a need for larger action in the future. The shock that he is not able to do as he pleases is part of the process of integrating him into society.

We, as adults, learn this process early or we are not successful as functioning adults. We know that we cannot do certain things because we were disciplined in this fashion to expect certain reactions from society. Laws are the framework that we learn about after we are children. But children do not know "laws", they only know approval or disapproval from their parents. It is up to the parent to apply the discipline for the child to learn to integrate.

After all this nonsense, what is my view? Discipline is a necessary tool for making successful members of society. Corporal punishment should be used as a last resort in this process, but there are times when it can be necessary. Never use punishment in anger, and measure your reaction by the severity of the infraction. Always breathe and calm down before meting out punishment, and never simply react to the situation. Plan beforehand for expected problems, then apply the punishment fairly.

And parent? You'll make mistakes, but if you are consistent, your child will become the model child that everyone else will point to and tell their children that they should be like your child. You will be a successful parent in the chain of parenting. Love them enough to provide consistent parenting.