Alternative to Punishment
All children sometimes break the rules by doing something wrong or forbidden. They may, for example, snatch something, lie, destroy property, bully another child, act violently, swear or spit at a teacher, etc. When children do such things adults often think that it is their responsibility to punish the child in order to ensure that the child understands that they have done something wrong, and does not do it again.
Punishment does not always work
The problem with punishment is that it does not always have the expected effect (stop the child from doing it again) and it can, under certain circumstances, be counterproductive.
Why doesn’t it work?
Punishment doesn’t seem to work if
1. the child doesn’t understand why it was wrong to do so
2. the child feels that the punishment is unreasonable or unfair
3. there is a delay between the wrongdoing and the punishment
4. all the adults who are important to the child do not agree on the punishment
When this is the case punishment may trigger opposition rather than compliance in the child, which tends to increase, rather than decrease, the chances that the child will do the same thing again.
When children do such things adults often think that it is their responsibility to punish the child in order to ensure that the child understands that they have done something wrong, and does not do it again.
Not bad but lacking a skill
I like to think that children don’t do wrong things because they are bad but because they lack some skill. For example, children who hit other children are not bad but they lack the skill to communicate their disappointment in a more mature way, or children who steal are not bad but lack the skill of asking for what they want and accepting that they cannot always have what they want.
If you sympathize with this way of thinking, punishing doesn’t seem like the best way to respond to children’s unacceptable behaviour. It makes more sense to help the child develop the skills they need in order to be able to handle challenging situations in a socially more appropriate manner.
An alternative approach
Punishing is not the only way to try to prevent children from doing the same thing again. One alternative, which is often more effective, is to coach children to take responsibility for their action. I have listed the six steps of taking responsibility in the table below. You can find more information, including case examples, about the Steps of Responsibility approach at the Kid’s Skills website under the heading ‘Steps of responsibility’.
The steps of responsibility
If a child has done something wrong or forbidden, instead punishing them, coach them to take responsibility for their action use the following steps as your guide:
- Talk with the child about what the child has done and explain to the child that you are not going to punish them but help them to take responsibility for their action.
- Help the child to understand why it is wrong, or forbidden, to do what the child has done.
- Help the child think of a good way to apologize to whomever they hurt, or offended, with what they did.
- Encourage the child to talk to the person they hurt to find out how that person would want them to compensate, make up for, or repair, the harm that they caused.
- Help the child think about what it is they need to learn, or become better at, in order to avoid doing similar things again.
- Ask the child to think of what they could do to prevent also others from doing similar things.
This article is owned by: Kids’Skills http://www.kidsskillsapp.com/
