What does Gentle Discipline me to you?

[Adaline'sMama]

What Gentle Discipline means to me:
I believe all children should be respected as fellow human beings and not looked down upon just because they are younger.
I think children need guidance, support, and help as they learn the basics of how to exist in a world that does not cater to them. I do not believe that hands are for hitting, or that screaming and yelling do any good.
I believe in redirection, natural consequences, and a clear set of boundaries to begin with.

To elaborate:
I think the littles should be kept safe but allowed to do things where they learn the natural consequences of their actions. For example, when DD tries to climb on the kitchen chair over and over again and will not be redirected and is super focused on it, I eventually just let her do it. When she slips and hits her chin on the seat of the chair I will hold her and comfort her. This is only after attempts at redirection have failed.

I think older children should be given rules for safety and the freedom to do a lot of things at home, but when it comes to going out in public, I dont want my kids ripping and romping everywhere they go and disrupting everything that is going on.(My grandma was knocked over by kids running up and down the aisle at Payless. The mom's excuse, "well, no one was in that aisle, so I told them it was okay." What? IMO, that behavior is never okay.) You run in the backyard, at the park, from the store to the car, but not in the store. Dont talk in the movie theatre, dont run in the restaurant, dont chew with your mouth open and completely gross out the people sitting next to us. Im not sure how to teach my child all of these things, but I have time to figure them out

Basically, I think that kids should be allowed to be kids most of the time. That means run around, play, explore, pretend, climb on things, ect. But in public I feel that children should act (mostly) calm, civilized, and respectful of others around them.


I might edit this if I realize Ive left something out. And please note that my only child is less than two, but I am the oldest of 5 and I have seen time and time again the things that DONT work and am trying not to repeat them. My interest in Gentle Discipline is greatly influenced by the fact that I did not grow up with it, and I want my children to grow up in a safe, respectful, non-hostile environment.


I haven't posted in this forum very much, and its mainly because I often feel like my view of what Gentle Discipline means to me are quite different than a lot of other moms. After participating in the thread in Questions and Suggestions about the problems in this forum, I thought it would be nice for moms to share their views about what the term means to them. I ask that before you respond to my beliefs, or other posters' that you share your own.

[oaktreemama]

I will be back for more later but one thing I am working very hard on (and failing at some of the time) is remembering Gentle Discipline shouldn't just apply to our kids.

[Keakie]

For what it's worth (and it may not be much because I'm a new member and I've yet to have any bio-children) I completely agree with what you've outlined as gentle discipline. 

It's not permissiveness, which I think is a common misunderstanding. It's just knowing what is age appropriate, leading by example and allowing/enforcing natural consequences ("allowing" in examples like in the OP and "enforcing" for things like colouring on the kitchen table - depending on the age, have the child either clean it up or help you clean if up if they're little and the child loses crayon privileges unless they can be supervised, not to make them feel ashamed or to "punish" them but because clearly they are not ready to be unsupervised, and we can try again in a few days/weeks/etc).

I agree that children are people and should be treated as such. I believe in laying out clear boundaries and showing that our words as parents have power - we will make it happen (getting shoes on/getting in the bath) if someone is unable to do it themselves but it needs to happen. I believe in choosing battles and not creating a stigma around things that don't need to have them. I believe that power struggles are a waste of time - we are the adults. There is no struggle. ;) If we lay out a boundary that we may need to rethink or if we mess up, we change it or we apologize to a) model humility and model apologies and b) to keep in mind that we're working towards a goal (raising the children in a way that teaches them to make good decisions and teaches them WHY those decisions are good) and not getting wrapped up in a combative/adversarial stand-off.

A big part of it, too, or at least something big that helps me understand GD and helps me know how to apply it is knowing what is developmentally appropriate. For example, if a 3yo says something that isn't true, it isn't because they're being "bad" - it's because they're still figuring out how to separate reality from imagination and they're also either just starting or in the midst of learning a lot of language. In that situation, we say, for example, "That is not true. I know __________." and not dwell on the lie because it's not an issue of defiance so much as it is a development issue. On a related note, I have found that when there is trust between a child and an adult and when they aren't afraid they'll be shamed or hit, they're more likely to learn that it's "safe" to tell the truth about things in the first place, which makes the transition and the development that much smoother. I also believe in trying to figure out what is a phase, what is caused by a growth spurt/teeth/lack of sleep/hungry/etc and if possible, remedy that situation (in my short experience, I have found that if you can identify the source of a behaviour and remedy it, the behaviour corrects itself).

We also try to set them up for success. For example, if it's getting close to bedtime and we suddenly realize we need something from the store, either one of us will go alone and the other will stay with the kids or if there's just one person, we decide whether or not it can wait until tomorrow - if so, we do so as to avoid dragging a tired child out to the store when they should be winding down for the night. If we have a big day and we know we won't be able to stop for lunch between errand X and errand Y, and we know that during that time the child(ren) usually eat, we bring snacks to tide them over until we're able to get lunch instead of expecting them to wait and not have meltdowns (even if it is only an extra 30 minutes or so - it's an easy fix to bring some fruit or crackers and it can make all the difference in the world, at least for us). I've heard that standpoint criticized as teaching the children that the "world revolves around them" but I really don't see it that way. If something is NOT possible (like if we ran late for lunch unexpectedly and didn't have any snacks on hand) then it's just not possible and they will have to deal with it.

They're allowed to be sad/frustrated/angry over a decision we make that they do not like. We do not insist that they be happy all the time because happy is not the only emotion in the world; we would rather teach them to accept ALL of their feelings and learn how to deal with them in an appropriate way.

Is all of that easy all of the time? Of course not. A lot of it sounds very idealized and a lot of it is hard to stick to after a long day when everybody's tired and frustrated. In situations with multiple children, it's sometimes hard to be able to take the time to redirect over and over and enforce boundaries over and over. At the end of the day, though, the focus is on teaching them to make good decisions and focusing on how *we* as the adults handle ourselves. They are the children; they are immature and they will make mistakes and we expect that. We are the adults and while of course we have and will continue to make mistakes, we have a lot of the tools we're trying to teach them and we should be utilizing them. It's about giving them the tools and leading by example, at least for us. :)