Through our Facebook page, a reader tells us that UNICEF has launched a great campaign called Costa Rica Let's educate in positive aimed at fathers, mothers and educators. It is based on five basic steps to follow to breed positively and without punishment. Before a conflict:1) Calm down, 2) Listen, 3) Talk, 4) Explain and 5) Reach agreements.
It highlights the importance of positive communication and respectful upbringing, without violence, or shouting, and appeals to adults responsible for childcare to adopt attitudes and practices of participatory discipline.
We have talked several times about the physical and psychological consequences of whipping and abuse, both physical and verbal, in children, yet half of the parents confess to hitting their children.
You can't justify whipping or mistreating children. Hitting a child is a crime, however when correcting actions that we consider unacceptable in children, opinions are divided.
Education based on scourges, shouts and blackmails is not an education focused on respect and equality. The adult is positioned above the child and not at the same level to discuss, explain and find solutions. You have to know that correcting is not hitting and that there are alternative breeding patterns to whipping.
The order of the five steps is fundamental:
1) Calm down
The first step is the most important: Know how to recognize the symptoms of anger and calm down when we feel that the volcano is about to erupt.
Many times we feel overwhelmed, angry, full of anger, but we are adults for a reason and we have to learn to put the brake When we are about to lose control.
2) Listen
Knowing how to listen is the basis of communication with children. Punishment is used as a "shock" measure before hearing the reasons that have led the child to have such or such behavior.
It is easier to raise your hand or to scream, but although it seems to be an effective measure, punishment is an uneducated method.
You have to listen to the child, who of his version, and then continue with the next steps.
3) Talk
It's fundamental teach children that conflicts are resolved by talking, listening to the arguments of others and exposing our point of view, always with respect.
We must not forget that we educate by example. If we explode when we don't like something, we are projecting that behavior also on our children and they learn that conflicts are resolved with violence, and not with dialogue.
4) Explain
Once the points of view are exposed, we have to focus on explain to children why what they have done is wrong. Why it hurts another person, why what they have done may have undesirable consequences, why it can be dangerous, etc.
If the child or we are angry, it is better to wait a little to calm down to explain things with serenity so that they can assimilate and understand them better.
5) Reach agreements
That we are the parents does not mean that we have the absolute truth. Many times children give us great lessons. The last of the steps is get to reach agreements between both parties. As if it were a negotiation, there will be points at which sometimes it will be necessary to yield, both on one side and the other.
The importance of establishing agreements is that both the child (and the parents, if applicable) commit to improve or correct attitudes for the future. Next time, it will take into account what we have discussed and what we have explained, and will try to do better or not. And if not, we will have to restart the five steps again until I can understand it.
Yes, indeed, apply these Five basic steps to breed positive and without punishment requires large doses of patience, common sense and affection, three fundamental pillars for respectful upbringing. In my opinion, the only effective one.
