The hair-shaving thread has me thinking about something that came up here recently. I’d like to get opinions without things getting too Great Debatey, but we’ll see how that turns out.
Is it necessary that a child know precisely what the punishment will be for his/her infraction before it’s committedf? Don’t do your homework = no TV, Stay out late without calling = grounded 1 week, etc. Or, should they know right from wrong, but not automatically know what the punishment will be if they chose to do wrong?
I ask because I’m somewhat in the middle here. It seems as if this sets up a “barter” situation, where the kid can decide, “Meh, there’s nothing on I want to watch this weekend, I’m going to blow off this paper.”
I remember in high school there was at least one party that was going so swimmingly, I decided that being grounded was SO worth it. I knew that if I called, mom would come get me, and I didn’t want that. So I just didn’t call, I took the grounding (and delivered a baby nine months later actually, just to terrify you parents out there!)
Seems to me that a little doubt and uncertainty in the area of punishment might make a kid think twice before choosing a negative course of action. On the other hand, I do believe most punishments are most effective when they’re clearly causal to the infraction, which would make “surprise” punishments arbitrary and less of a teaching tool.
Punishments can be related to the crime and still be a surprise. My kids know what most punishments are. I usually save the surprises for when they decide the punishment is worth misbehaving for or they’ve just gone way over the edge with their misbehavior.
Once when they were little they were complaining about not getting to have pop with dinner instead of milk. They NEVER got pop for dinner so I don’t know what they were thinking. When they wouldn’t stop complaining I took the 2 liters of pop out of the fridge and poured it down the sink. The look on their faces was priceless. They never complained about that again. I never told them I was going to dump the pop, there was no yelling or anger, after the third or fourth time they whined about the pop I just decided to remove the problem.
My younger son has decided (he’s in 6th grade) that he doesn’t need to put even the least amount of effort into his schoolwork. He’s gotten all the usual punishments like no tv or video games during the week to allow him time to concentrate on his schoolwork. He’s still not doing his work, so now is the time that a surprise punishment would really be helpful but I just can’t think of one yet.
If my older son got into some sort of trouble related to driving we would take back our permission to let him drive. We haven’t spelled out all the situations that would cause us to do that but he’s old enough to know how to act.
The trick is that the surprise punishment can only be used occasionally, otherwise kids walk around too scared to breath for fear of what will happen next. You do have to use them enough that they remember that it’s a possibility. They’re very effective for extreme situations and for when the kids make the decision to disobey. They’re also helpful in relieving a lot of the stress that goes along with those more difficult parenting moments.
That is the way society operates. We are told the rule AND the consequence of breaking that rule.
Granted my child has not reached the curfew breaking stage yet (stage not age, hes’s 13…almost 14) but I do think that consequences should be well known. So the child decides to blow off the rules because the consequence is not “bad enough”? He suffers that consequence and then it is time to make newer harder consequences.
The new punishments must also be clear and utilsed (if needed).
Shit we were all teenagers. We all had that moment when we evaluated what our parents said vs what our friends said. I don’t know about you, but I chose my friends on more then one occasion. I know I REGRETED that.
All we can do is create a family that the teenager respects, then HOPE we did well by them as a kid, by that I mean hope that we developed a relationship that means we can talk about stuff and have reasonable expectations. Teenagers are wilful creatures not possesions.
As parents we can just hope that we have put enough into them when they were little that they don’t roam too far away.
Overall, consistiency and reliability are important. That said, it is crucial that “the rules” don’t become bigger than the parents–there shouldn’t be a sense that “the rules” are carved in stone and control the parent and the child equally. NOTHING got me in trouble faster than playing the lawyer with my parents–looking for loopholes, claiming I didn’t know something was against the rules because they never specifically said, etc. Encouraging sophistry is a mistake. The parent’s best judgement trumps the rule of law in a household.
Furthermore, no one can anticipate everything kids do, and extenuating circumstances are grounds from changing a punishment–I’d think less of a parent who didn’t lessen a punishment because of mitigating circumstances in the same way I’d think less of a parent who didn’t strengthen a punishment due to exacerbating circumstances.
For me, the ultimate goal of any discipline is to move the person closer to self-discipline. That means a kid has to be part of the process, with the clear ability to choose behaviors for themselves. Whether the decisions are based on fear of punishment, desire for praise, wanting to be liked, or some higher sense of right vs wrong depends on the age and moral maturity of the individual, but in any case, when consequences are random surprises, the person is taken out of the equation and the authority figure takes on the role of god. That is a bad thing when nurturing personal responsibility, so I would avoid it whenever possible.
As they get older (and sexually active!) the stakes are raised considerably, but by then I hope to have instilled enough sense of personal responsibilty that the kids will choose correct behaviors because to do so will clearly benefit them in the end, not just to avoid pissing me off. By the teen years, the consequences of uprotected sex should have been made glaringly apparent, and no contrived punishment I could threaten would be anywhere as painful as the real consequences the kid must face on his/her own. If they understand that, I will consider my job well done.
(Yep, I started out with one OP that was too unwieldly, so I split it up.)
See, I’m not sure I think that’s the best way, or even if it’s true. Do I know what the precise penalty for grand theft auto is? No, but I won’t do it. Not to avoid the punishment, but because it’s wrong and doesn’t serve society to do so. I’d rather teach my kids what’s right and wrong, and not have it hinge so much on the punishment thing.
Remind’s me of Kohlberg’s stages of moral development - at what point do we want to get our kids out of Instrumental Relativist Orientation (“What’s in it for me?”) and moving towards Post-Convential Morality (acting because it’s Right)? And how do we do that?
Now, I’ll be the first to admit that not all of us score very high on Kohlberg’s scale even as adults. I do, but that’s just me. But I guess along with that comes a desire to see my kids attempt the same.
I agree with your whole post, but this in particular bears repeating for me. Thanks.
Good point. Excellent point, in fact. I must think on this further. Perhaps including the child in determining his own punishment is in order?
I think it’s key, especially when dealing with older kids. Sadly, the implementation of child involvement usually lacks any creative thought and the results show it. Instead of just asking the kid what he thinks the consequences should be, provide a menu of possibilities and depending on the situation let him have a hand in deciding his fate. Make it clear (especially as they age) that some rules and consequences are negotiable…others are not! The time to change established guidelines is NOT while they are in play. For example, if he thinks a consequence is too harsh, he needs to discuss it with you before it’s given or after it’s served, not during the conflict. Avoid using a hierarchy of consequences which progresses from slight discomfort to bloody awful, since this is a great way to teach kids how to tease the lines of acceptable behavior instead of helping them internalize the reasons we must behave/treat others in certain ways.
One of the most important things I learned while working with troubled teenagers is that there are many ways we can offer them the power and control they so desparately crave by meaningfully involving them in the discipline strategy. No secrets. No high mucky-muck sending thunderbolts down on their heads. And no timid attempt to involve them in the process. Just a straightforward approach to actions and consequences which places the individual squarely in the driver’s seat…right where he belongs.
How is a “random surprise consequence” taking the person out of the equation?
If the punishment is fair and fits the crime, just because it hasn’t been discussed before doesn’t mean that the punishment can’t be a learning experience for the child. Nor does it take away personal responsibility. It encourages kids to think about their actions first. They have to decide if what they’re about to do is bad even if no one ever told them it was.
I believe kids need to know the general rules and the consequences but they also need to know that pushing the limit on rules can result in further fair consequences. So surprises are usually saved for special occasions but also used for repeatedly breaking normal rules.
My children have complained about certain consequences, known and unknown. I ask them “do you think I should let you just get away with it”, they almost always say no. If I ask them if they can think of a more fair punishment and usually they can’t think of one. I think there is a place for unknown consequenses but it shouldn’t be the norm.
It strikes me that one could have a situation when explaining the punishement before the “crime” would actually encourage the crime. Take underage drinking, smoking, or using drugs. Maybe the kid is tempted, maybe not, maybe they get drug education in school, maybe not. But on the day that you say to the kid (without any reason to believe that the kid has been engaging in said behavior) “If I ever catch you drinking/etc. you’ll be grounded for a month” you are encouraging the kid to drink and avoid being caught.
Or maybe not, I was never tempted to drink/etc. And I’m certainly not a parent.
It just seems to me that there are times when a degree of standardized punishment (out past 10, grounded for the next weekend) is appropriate, and times when flexibility is important- the fact that you never told the kid what the punishment for breaking a window is does not mean that the kid does not get punished for breaking a window. (Especially if you had no reason to believe the kid would break the window.)
I guess it depends on your real objective. You can certainly teach a child about crime, punishment and the woes of getting caught in mistaken behaviors by giving out random consequences for breaking rules he didn’t even know exist, but if you want to foster responsible behaviors grounded in principle it’s best to clue the kid into your strategy, the processes by which you plan to implement it, and the overarching reasons we value certain behaviors over others in our society. Extra points to a kid who can extrapolate the rules and figure out right vs wrong before having it explained, but I think it’s asking a lot for kids to divine our expectations without being told.
Predictability is the cornerstone of any effective discipline plan. Technique seems to matter much less than relentless consistancy, and you don’t get that by throwing out random consequences for undefined behaviors.
The thing is that it’s simply not feasible to lay out punishments for every single infraction a child could possibly commit: not making the bed, dripping on the bathroom carpet, sassing his/her parents, being late for curfew, being caught speeding, getting bad grades, hitting a sibling…the list goes on and on.
I’m not sure how you would even go about implementing such a system. (Unless, of course, you have a one-size-fits-all style of punishment, which I’m not at all into.) Any thoughts?
We really only use 4, but two of them can be tailored to fit most any situation.
reminder of the expectation is sometimes all that’s required. any more than that would breed resentment in certain situations.
warning. this doesn’t follow the reminder – it’s in place of it. For behaviors you know the kid understands are verboten but in cases where you feel a second chance is needed
make a plan. This planning period involves the child coming up with alternative choices and usually takes place in place of a desired activity.
Make restitution. Used in cases where damage/harm resulted from the child’s unacceptable behavior choice. Again, this usually takes place in lieu of a favorite activity.
I think there’s a difference in what types of rules we are talking about.
There are rules for predictable things and the kids know them. There are rules for categories of things too, like damaging property, being mean to a person, disobeying house rules, doing unsafe things, etc. The kids pretty much know what will happen if they break the regular rules.
Then there are no rules for unpredictable things, because who can predict? I’m talking about sometimes kids do things that they absolutely know are wrong. There has to be consequences even if we never discussed this particular situation. I can’t think of anything that wouldn’t fit into one of the categories but I’m sure some day they’ll do something and if it’s bad enough they won’t get away with it just because I never thought of it. Again I’m talking about things that they know are wrong.
There are also things that fit into the categories but are so bad, extra severe consequences are in order. Then sometimes the usual consequences are ignored and something needs to be added to make a kid realize that he can’t just do whatever he wants.
What if a child sneaks out of the house at night and the usual punishment is not getting to play outside or have friends over. This may have worked in the past but suddenly it doesn’t and he keeps sneaking out. I think it would be perfectly fine to, without telling him in advance, make him sleep in the same room with his brother who is light sleeper and would wake up and tell if he tried to get out.
t’s not like I’m advocating slapping them for not knowing we only use forks on odd number days.
And I just also wanted to say there is no one correct way to teach children right from wrong
There are different types of family situations that would make one theory or another impossible to work with just like there are different types of children. As long as punishment isn’t abusive mentally or physically, too harsh for the situation, and somehow fits the misbehavior and tries to help the child correct his own behavior in the future it all turns out OK.