Don’t you sometimes wish you had a remote control to stop your child’s behavior with the click of a button before things start to spiral out of control?

I remember thumbing through the Parents Magazine a while back and reading about a kid who told his pesky little sister — “I wish you were a toy that required batteries so I can take them out.“ 

I sometimes wish my kids had removable batteries in them too!

Then again, forget about a remote control or batteries… I’ll settle for a simple pause, just one tiny moment, to collect my wits and figure out the best way to deal with a situation without blowing my top off.

Sigh!

Since none of these fantasies have a chance of coming true any time soon, I’d like to propose a modification to a strategy Sumitha suggested some time back to keep ourselves from yelling at kids even when we are hopping mad –

Assuming you are not angry at the moment, now is the time to decide how you will respond at a later time when you are indeed angry. Making a list of possible responses and then reaching out to your pre-committed choices when you are angry, substantially increases your chances of success [at not yelling at kids]. There is a whole body of research to support this.

Here’s my suggestion. Let’s make a list of all the positive discipline techniques that we know of, and spend a few minutes looking at some example scenarios where they work well. This way, when the time comes for us to react (and sooner or later, it will), hopefully we’ll come up with an appropriate gentle response without having to think too hard. Or blowing our fuse. Sort of. Maybe.

Anyway, I’ll start out with 8 of the positive discipline techniques that I’m familiar with. How about you help grow this list by sharing your favorite techniques in the comments?  [Read more…]