Hero Moms Raising Hero Children: Authoritative Parenting

We learned last blog that the Authoritative Parenting Style gave better results than the Authoritarian (I’m the boss, like it or lump it!), the Permissive (Sure, Honey, whatever you say...), and of course the Neglectful (Don’t bother me!) styles.  So how do we become authoritative mothers?  

Amy Morin, LCSW, gives us 12 ways to become a more authoritative parent¹.

1.       Listen

 Russel M. Nelson tells of a time he was reading the paper and his grandchild sat down beside him and started talking.  He was enjoying the child’s chatter while he read his newspaper.  Suddenly the young boy stood up on the couch, grabbed his face and looked into his eyes.  “Grandpa,” he said, “are you in there?” 

It is important that our children know that we are hearing what they are saying.  Steven Covey taught, “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”²

I remember our slightly ditsy teen aged daughter talking to her aunt, going on and on about something that had happened to her.  I thought, your aunt isn’t interested in this minor incident in your life, you are just boring her.  If fact, it was boring me.  But her aunt had the ability to listen to and value everything anyone said, because it was important to them.  All of her nieces and nephews felt loved and esteemed by her.

We should not only listen, but consider what they say.  We should pay attention in regard to rules, policies, disciplines, and needs of our children.

2.       Validate Your Child’s Emotions

My four-year-old great grandson has been learning to name his emotions.  His mother wrote: “Tristan has been doing awesome.  A few times today he told me, ‘I’m really upset’, or ‘I’m really frustrated,’ or ‘really mad.’  I think naming his emotion helped him to stay calm, helped me to empathize and allowed us to work through the problems.”

Too often we label emotions as good or bad.  It’s bad to be angry, or really frustrated, or sad.  Because that is how our child is truly feeling, he sees us label him as bad.  Instead, we should acknowledge their feeling (I can see you are very angry).  We should let him know that it is OK to feel mad, but that there are consequences for behavior resulting from that feeling (It’s not OK to hit).

                                                                                     photo by Mith Huang

Sometimes it is helpful to be specific about the feelings.  If they say “I feel mad,” find out what that means, especially if the child is old enough to have the vocabulary.  Do they feel crabby, cross, impatient, irritated, or exasperated, incensed, indignant, riled up, or appalled, disgusted, furious, livid, seething, violent?

When they know what they are feeling, then they can make the shift from emotion to thinking, and make an intelligent decision of what to do with that anger.

3.       Consider the Child’s Feelings and Opinions

   Take in account your child’s views when making decisions, but let her know that while they get a vote, they don’t get an equal vote.  (That is permissive.)  As mother, you see a bigger picture than your child does.  You see how her actions affects her future.  You are in charge, but you care about how the decision affects her.

4.       Make Clear Rules

“Don’t get home too late,” or “Clean your room,” are not clear rules.  Your “too late” and your teen’s “too late” might be totally different, and he’ll think he’s complying while you are worrying yourself sick.  Steven Covey tells of giving his son the responsibility of taking care of the yard.  “I wanted him to have a clear picture in his mind of what a well-cared-for yard was like, so I took him next door to our neighbor’s.  ‘Look, son,’ I said.  ‘See how our neighbor’s yard is green and clean?  That’s what we’re after: green and clean.  Now come look at our yard.  See the mixed colors?  That’s not it; that’s not green.  Green and clean is what we want.  How you do it is up to you, you can turn on the sprinklers, use a hose or a bucket, or spit all day.  All we care about is that the color is green.’

‘Now let’s talk about clean, son.  Clean means no messes around—no paper, strings, bones, sticks, or anything that messes up the place.  Let’s just clean up half the yard right now and look at the difference.  See the difference?  That’s called clean.’”  He made the rule very clear. ²

                                                                                Green and Clean

 We should state expectations and consequences ahead of time, and the reasons behind them.  This gives our children a better understanding of life and make is more likely they will follow the rules when you aren’t around.

5.       Give One Warning

When a rule that is clear and understood is broken, there should be immediate consequences such as a time out or loss of privilege, but for minor offences, it is okay to offer a warning, adding a consequence if they don’t change their behavior.  Then follow through.  Avoid multiple warning.  Saying “How many times do I have to tell you….?” trains them to not listen the first time.  I had a friend when I was about 10 years old named Genie.  When it was time for her to go home, her mother would start out calling “Genie.”  Then it was “Eugenia!”  Finally, “Eugenia Richins!!!”  Then she would know that she had to go home.

6.       Use Consequences that Teach Life Lessons

Logical consequences rather than random consequences are more effective in helping our children learn to do better in the future.  “If you don’t turn off your game boy now, you will lose game privileges for 24 hours.”  Short term consequences are also more effective than long term ones.  Losing privileges for a week just makes them discouraged and angry.  We shouldn’t try to make them suffer, shame them (no guilt trips), or hurt them physically.  It’s like the mother that spanks her child saying, “That will teach you to hit your brother.”  Actually, it will.  He learns that hitting is a solution.

Along with the consequence, it is important to teach conflict resolution or anger management.  What can we do to not get so upset?  What are the options or alternatives to hitting?

7.       Offer Incentives

When a child is struggling with a problem of behavior, you can use incentives to help her get back on track.  It can be a simple as stickers for chores done for a young child, tokens to be traded for privileges for an older child (a trip to the park, invite a friend over), and outright privileges for teens (staying out later, skipping a chore, a date night with mom or dad).

Rewards are a fast and efficient way to teach new skills and change behaviors.

8.       Let Them Make Choices

When all the choices are made for a child when they are young, they never learn the art of making choices.  They don’t know how to weigh options, how to consider consequences, how to determine priorities.  Letting them make the small choices in life empowers them to make bigger decisions later in life.

I had a four-year-old daughter who wanted to choose her own clothes to wear.  Often those clothes were chosen from the dress-up box, with frilly petticoats (sometimes with no skirt on top) and draping scarves.  I set some guidelines…it had to be modest (no showing her underpants, no topless) and if we were going to church she had to choose from church clothes.  Otherwise, she got to choose on her own.  When she and I went to pick up my kindergartner, the other mothers always laughed to see what she chose to wear, but she was learning and I had thick skin.  She makes wonderful choices now (and her wardrobe is not quite as flamboyant, thank goodness).

I often gave my children choices when getting them to do something, i.e. “Do you want to clean up  toys now or in five minutes.”  “Do you want to wash the dishes or clean off the table?”  One of my daughters, six-years-old going on thirteen, got back at me.  “Do you want to buy us ice cream,” she asked, “or donuts?”

9.       Give Them Freedom Balanced with Responsibility

   No one likes a nag, not even the nagger.  We just don’t know what else to do when our children don’t do anything unless we tell them over and over.  Help them set up their own plan to handle responsibility.  If they always forget to take their homework, or their lunch box to school, they can make a check list of what they need each day and check it off before they leave.  If they have trouble being on time for school, they can set up a time line of what needs to be done by when.  A time line can also help with that major school project.  They can make a list of what needs to be done before playtime.  Then reaching playtime becomes their goal, rather than yours.  They become self-reliant.  You can provide support initially, but it won’t work if you step back in and take over the responsibility.  They may need to fail before they learn, but they’ll never learn if it isn’t their own job.

Don’t be a helicopter pilot, making all the choices, taking all the responsibilities, always intervening to thwart consequences.  That shows the child that you don’t trust them to be able to take care of themselves

10.   Turn Mistakes into Learning Opportunities

   When your child makes a mistake, don’t embarrass or hurt him.  Instead explain why that was a bad choice and what the consequences may be.  “When you lie, your friends won’t trust you and will think you are lying even when you tell the truth.”  If she hurts someone, help her make amends.  If it is a repeat offence, help them problem solve to come up with a solution to keep from doing it again.

One week my junior high school son was late for school each day because he couldn’t find his shoes in the morning.  I lost my temper and shoved him out the door shoeless.  It was a stupid thing to do; I knew he wouldn’t go to school without shoes.  It was mean.  Instead I should have sat down with him earlier in the week and helped him figure out possible solutions: putting his shoes in a certain place when he took them off, or finding them the night before, or whatever solution he could come up with.  Then it would have been a learning opportunity, not a disaster that did no good and made us both angry.

 11.   Encourage Self-discipline

Sometimes we just want to control our children, make them do what we want them to do, but the Authoritative parent teaches them to control themselves.  It eliminates the constant nagging when they learn to be responsible for themselves.  This can be done with incentives and consequences. 

One of my grandsons was a mediocre student.  His parents were always pushing him to do his homework and it became a nightly battle.  His younger brother developed cancer and because of hospital stays and treatments, his parents no longer had time to nag about homework.  This grandson was on his own.  He started going to an after school homework study hour.  He decided he wanted to go to college and therefore needed good grades.  He started completing his assignments on his own, and his grades went up.  It has been five years, and he just graduated from high school and will start college in the fall.  All on his own.

Don’t calm your child every time she is upset.  Teach them how to calm themselves.  I have a granddaughter who has anger management problems.  Her parents have taught her techniques for calming her anger, such as pretending her anger is a bowl of hot soup and she has to blow on it to cool it down.  The deep breaths and time out while doing this exercise help her return to reasoned thinking.  Impulse control, anger management, and self-discipline skills will benefit your child throughout their lives.  (Wouldn’t hurt for us to gain these skills, either).

12.   Nurture your Child

It is important to keep a healthy relationship with your child, warm, loving, full of affection.  I asked one of my children (now a wonderful adult), what worked and what didn’t when she was a rebellious teenager.  She said, “I always knew you loved me.  Things might have turned out very different if I hadn’t known that.”

In a class on raising non-compliant children (Some of my children were very compliant.  Others were very non-compliant.  They take different parenting techniques), our instructor said to always express our love, verbally and physically, even when doing things the child doesn’t like.  He would say to his teenager, “I love you more than you will ever know, so I am going to drop by your party sometime tonight to make sure you are where you say you will be and that there is supervision, and that there is no drinking, and no drugs.”

   

Spending quality time with your child, where you can give them undivided attention, will let them know they are loved and valued, especially if you listen rather than lecture.  Even on days when they are behaving badly.  Sometimes bad behavior is a plea for attention.  Positive attention will help your child feel self-confident about who she is and what she is able to accomplish.

1.      Amy Morin, LCSW, 12 Ways to Become a More Authoritative Parent, Very Well Family April 20, 2017

2.      Stephen R. Covey The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, Franklin Covey Co.

What Type of Parent are You?

What is your parenting style?

Diana Baumrind, a developmental psychologist, divided parenting into 3 types. Baumrind studied preschoolers and realized that they exhibited three types of behavior and decided to study their families.  She found that the children’s behaviors correlated with the type of parenting the children had.  The three types of parenting she found were Authoritarian, Permissive, and Authoritative.  They are divided by the amount of demands or control the parents require, and the amount of responsiveness or warmth the parents give.

Remember the dad (Danny DeVito) in the movie Matilda?  “I’m smart, you’re dumb; I’m big, you’re little; I’m right, you’re wrong, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”  That’s authoritarian.

The authoritarian mother has high expectations for her child and is very critical with mistakes.  She expects strict compliance with her rules.  “Why?  Because I said so!”  She spends little time teaching her child how to make better choices.  Her children aren’t allowed to get involved in solving challenges or obstacles, because she is always right and the child should be submissive.  There is no room for negotiation or explanations.  The child’s emotions are repressed.  The authoritarian mom believes in tough love; she often has a short fuse and is quick to punish.  She wants to make her child feel sorry he “was bad.”

The permissive mother is very loving, the child’s best friend.  She wants to avoid confrontation and contention.  Her child has equal say in family dynamics and she encourages give and take.  She is warm, indulgent, lenient and lets the child do whatever he wants, setting rules but rarely enforcing them.  She doesn’t set consequences often, and when she does, she is quite forgiving and lets them out of the consequences if they beg and promise to be good.  She uses manipulative control tactics such as bribery and praise.  She believes her child will learn best with little interference from her.  She believes in unconditional love with no consequences.

The authoritative mother also has high expectations and is often more strict than the authoritarian parent, but there are fewer rules and the rules are clear and consistent.  She listens to input from her children, respects their opinion, and is supportive and responsive.  She validates her children’s feelings.  She offers help for mistakes instead of punishment.  She uses positive discipline strategies, like praise and rewards, to prevent behavior problems and reinforce good behavior.  She values her child’s independence, yet makes it clear that the adults are in charge.   She has a balance between tough and unconditional love.

Child psychologists have added a fourth type, the Neglectful or Uninvolved parent.  One of my son’s has adopted four children that were raised by a neglectful mother (absent father).  The neglectful parent is cold and unresponsive, without love and nurture.  They are uninvolved in the child’s life.  There are no rules or randomly changing rules made up on the spot.  Two sisters my son and his wife adopted were 18 months and 3 months old.  The 18-month-old was the caregiver for the 3-month-old, because the mother was totally indifferent.  Neglectful parents expect children to raise themselves without parental attention.

                                         Photo by binu kumar

Of course we aren’t fixed in only one type—we vary from day to day and year to year or in different areas.  Sometimes we are more permissive and other times when we tend to be authoritarian.   If we get depressed or overwhelmed, we may become neglectful.  Most of us are more authoritarian with our older children and more permissive with our younger children.  The older ones feel this is totally unfair that the younger ones are getting away with everything. 

So what behavior did Baumrind see in her preschoolers that resulted from these types of parenting?

Children raised by authoritarians are either high achievers or rebellious.  They are often dishonest and hide behaviors to protect themselves from punishment, either lying about what happened or blaming others.  They only obey when observed with no desire to obey when they won’t be found out. They have low-self-esteem because their opinions aren’t valued.  They tend to have lower grades, and poorer social skills.  They may become hostile or aggressive, focusing on the anger they feel towards those in authority rather than about how to do things better in the future.  They are more likely to have mental illness, drug and alcohol abuse, and delinquency. 

Children raised by permissive parents are very self-centered and don’t like authority and rules.  The world revolves around them.  They have impulsive behavior, not thinking of consequences.  They also have poor social skills and problematic relationships.  They have low self-esteem and report a lot of sadness.¹   Because permissive parents don’t enforce good habits like limiting junk food or brushing teeth or regular bedtime, they are more likely to be fat, have cavities, and always be tired.

Children raised by neglectful parents have low self-esteem because their parents don’t value them.  They don’t do well in school and aren’t very happy.  They are likely to struggle with impulsive behavior, drug and alcohol abuse, delinquency, and suicides.

Children raised by authoritative parents are usually happy and successful.  They have higher academic performance, more self-esteem, better social skills, less mental illness, and lower delinquency.  They have good problem solving and decision-making skills, are comfortable in expressing their opinions, and can evaluate safety risks on their own.  “According to Diana Baumrind’s studies, and many parenting studies made since then, authoritative parenting is the parenting style that has been most consistent terms of being associated with positive outcomes for children.”¹  Children with authoritative parents are more likely to become responsible adults.  These are the results we want in our children.

How do we become authoritative parents?  Stay tuned to part 2, arriving June 1 here at https://californiaamericanmothers.blogspot.com/

1. Positive-parenting-ally.com 12 Different Types of Parenting Styles and Child Discipline Strategies)