Positive Parents was a website dedicated to showing practical and useful ways to positively reinforce good behavior in children. Their aim was to make parenting friendly and understanding, instead of a dictatorship.
Children are smart, and they understand so much more than classic parenting tips suggest. Just telling a kid “no”, isn’t enough. They need to know why they have done something wrong, and then be encouraged to try again.
Mighty Kids Academy agreed with Positive Parent’s ideals so much that we are happy to announce a change going forward. We have acquisitioned this wonderful website and cannot wait to show you our future plans.
What Is Mighty Kids Academy?
Might Kids Academy is an online resource for parents of kids all ages. We have always been focused on social and emotional learning, hoping to teach kids how to be focused, self-motivated, and resilient.
There is an old fashioned idea that to be resilient or committed a person needs to push down their emotions and become unfeeling. This is simply not true. In fact, knowing your feelings and understanding the social world around you can help you navigate through tough times in your life.
These are the skills we want to teach our kids, so they will be more equipped to deal with emotional struggles.
Might Kid’s Academy’s Take On Positive Parenting
Positive parenting is when parents become their child’s teacher and leader, operating on the ideals of care and communication.
As a basis, positive parenting is the belief that all children are born good. When we discipline good people, we want to help them to get back to their regular self. This in turn creates a respectful dynamic and builds your child’s self-esteem.
When it comes to practicing positive parenting, we teach our children through guidance and example, instead of excessive punishment. This way our children learn what they have done wrong, and how they should approach the situation next time. If we were to use excessive punishment, our children would only learn to keep their bad deeds hidden from us as we cannot be trusted, or that the bad deed will only hurt them instead of also hurting others.
Using positive parenting will help your children understand social interactions and will allow them to express their emotions. As your children grow, your household won’t be filled with constant conflict because you will all know how to communicate with each other.
There are lots of podcasts to help you with positive parents and to guide you through this new idea.
Or you can read through our articles to learn about the basic practices of positive parenting, including using this method for adolescents and navigating sibling rivalry.
Helping Angry Children
Some people scoff at the idea of using positive parenting, saying that the method creates undisciplined children, but the opposite is true. Giving our children emotional lessons can help them vocalize their problems and reduce their stress.
We have to remember that children are as smart as adults, but they have no experience in the world. This means that they don’t know how to express their emotions, understand their feelings or rationalize their experiences.
Children understand injustice, hierarchies, and double standards, but sometimes all they can say is, “that’s not fair.” The inability to talk about their feelings is often the leading cause of anger in a child, as they are frustrated that you don’t understand them, angry at the problem itself, and annoyed that no one is taking them seriously.
Of course, there could be more under the surface. Although anxiousness and powerlessness are often the main cause of childhood anger, it could also be a sign of learning disabilities, behavioral difficulties, or physical pain.
For example, if your child has a learning difficulty, that doesn’t mean that they are immune to the pressures of the world. They might be feeling “lesser-than” for not completing a task in the same way as their sibling. Or they could be frustrated at their inability to express themselves.
We have an article dedicated to helping you navigate a child’s anger. It also looks at if the anger means anything more and how to calm your child in the moment.
Helping Stressed Out Parents
Of course, it’s not just children that get angry; parents can feel the strain of life too. Being emotionally literate and setting up a calming environment doesn’t mean you won’t feel sad, stressed, or angry at all. Life will throw you lemons every now and then, so it’s important to remember that you’re allowed to have a meltdown too.
We have an article dedicated to helping parents find themselves in a moment of negativity. In the article, you can find inspirational quotes and suggestions to help you recenter yourself.
Being a parent is a full-time job, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t rest.
Teaching Children To Behave Without Using Punishments
Teaching your children right and wrong without using punishments might sound like a fairytale, but there are many effective ways to educate kids without resorting to negativity.
In this situation, punishment means taking away a toy, sending the kids to their room, or hitting them. These are common forms of discipline that, most likely, were used on us as children, too. However, studies have shown that these types of punishments often create a barrier between the child and the parent.
The child will often feel frustrated that their parents don’t listen to them and that everyone is against them. They can quickly become defensive, develop resentment, and will stop trusting you. In turn, your child will likely start lying to cover up their mistakes in the future. This means that the child’s energy will be put into hiding instead of learning.
If a child accidentally breaks a vase, we don’t want them to hide it under the rug and cover up their cuts. We want them to show us the mess so we can clean it safely, and we can make sure they aren’t hurt. If the children don’t think they will be believed when they say it was an accident, then they will try to hide the mistake and hope you don’t notice. This type of behavior shows that they are in fear of you.
Instead of punishing them, the positive parenting technique teaches them about logical consequences. Like we said before, children are smart, they are just inexperienced. When this vase breaks, we should teach our child that throwing balls in the house can cause things to topple. Now, this vase is broken, and mummy is sad.
We have more information on how to help your children behave without using punishment techniques here.
Tips For When Your Children Aren’t Listening
There are a couple of reasons why children stop listening. It could be that you’re using words they don’t understand or that the conversation has become boring. The biggest reason is often due to control. Children don’t have a lot of control over their lives, but they can control their thoughts.
Blocking you out allows them to take back control, especially if they have just done something wrong. So how do we make them listen? We have a whole article dedicated to the subject, but for now, we will break down the tips into bite-sized pieces.
The first idea is to use language they understand and to keep the conversation short and concise. If you give your child a long speech, they won’t be able to follow along with you. Instead, they will likely be stuck thinking about the first couple of things you’ve said, ignoring the rest of the conversation. To keep your child focused, make your instructions clear and short.
Another method is to keep everything positive by saying “yes” more than “no.” If you keep telling your child “no,” they will become frustrated. This doesn’t mean you should say yes to everything your child desires, but instead, you should refocus your sentences. For example, instead of saying “no, you can’t do that,” you can instead say “not right now, but you can do it later.” It would be even better to add in a reason to help your child see the logic behind your request; “not right now because we are shopping, but you can eat your snack in the car.” This gives your child a time frame, a reason, and something to look forward to.
Teaching Your Kids Social Emotional Learning
Social emotional learning is a topic we hold dear to our hearts. This type of learning revolves around social acceptance, social responsibilities, and social interactions. The idea is to help children understand how people around them feel and how they feel in different situations.
This type of skill is important to help your child regulate their expectations and emotions. People don’t learn this skill automatically, as even adults find it hard to understand why they are upset about something or why others don’t respect their emotions.
Teaching these skills to our kids when they are young can help them navigate through tough spots in their life.
In this article, we talk about introducing 25 different emotional learning techniques into your child’s life.
Guides To Help Children & Parents
Throughout our website, you can find a library of knowledge to help parents and children navigate through social and emotional learning. You can find simple tips like a list of phrases to encourage your kids or more detailed advice like methods to help children control their anger.
Summary
With Positive Parenting part of our community in Mighty Kids Academy, we can add more wonderful techniques to help you create a positive environment for your children.