The 10 Basic Principles of Good Parenting

While it may seem obvious to some or many, we all could benefit from a review and an update on parenting skills, whether we have a little one in the house at the moment, or just access to one. Children are our most precious gifts of all, and we need to take care of them. I found this book on display at the library recently, and was drawn to read through it. It's a fast read, and most of it is common sense, as the author pointed out.

It is not based on "one person's opinion, or someone's experiences in raising a couple of children, or the observations somebody made over the course of working with a few dozen families in a clinical practice." It is based on decades of systematic research by many scientists and literally thousands of well-designed research studies.

Anyway, enjoy!

The Ten Basic Principles of Good Parenting
By Laurence Steinberg, PhD

1. What you do matters
2. You cannot be too loving
3. Be involved in your child’s life
4. Adapt your parenting to fit your child
5. Establish rules and set limits
6. Help foster your child’s independence
7. Be consistent
8. Avoid harsh discipline
9. Explain your rules and decisions
10. Treat your child with respect

These are the chapter subheadings. I do recommend reading the book if you get a chance, it was helpful as a reminder for most things and was a creative inspiration for others.

1. What you do matters

• Be a mindful parent
• Genes don’t make parents irrelevant
• Children learn by watching
• Handling influences outside the family
• Learn from your mistakes

2. You cannot be too loving

• Can you spoil your child with love?
• Expressing physical affection
• Praise your child’s accomplishments
• Responding to your child’s emotional needs
• Providing a safe haven

3. Be involved in your child’s life

• Be involved
• What is quality time?
• Take an interest in your child’s interests
• The importance of school involvement
• Avoid intrusive parenting

4. Adapt your parenting to fit your child

• keep pace with your child’s development
• adjust your parenting to your child’s temperament
• your child is unique
• have patience during developmental transitions
• your changing role as a parent

5. Establish rules and set limits

• All children need rules and limits
• Be firm, but be fair
• The importance of monitoring
• Handling conflicts over rules
• Relaxing limits as your child matures

6. Help foster your child’s independence

• Your child’s need for autonomy
• Coping with oppositionalism and argumentativeness
• Give your child psychological space
• Don’t micromanage your child’s life
• Protect when you must, but permit when you can

7. Be consistent

• Be consistent day to day
• The significance of routines
• How important is a united front?
• Be consistent without being rigid
• Identify your nonnegotiables (safety, etc.)

8. Avoid harsh discipline

• Should children be punished?
• Never use physical punishment
• Don’t be verbally abusive (incl. yelling)
• Controlling your anger
• The right way to punish

9. Explain your rules and decisions

• Be clear about what you expect
• Reasoning with your child
• “Because I said so!”
• Hear your child’s point of view
• Admit your mistakes

10. Treat your child with respect

• Getting and giving respect
• Have two-way conversations
• “Don’t talk back”
• Let your child act his age
• Children treat others the way their parents threat them

Five Elements of Effective Punishment

1. identification
2. impact
3. alternatives
4. punishment
5. expectation

Effective punishment needs to include these five elements, in the following order:

• an identification of the specific act that was wrong
• a statement describing the impact of the misbehavior
• a suggestion for one of more alternatives to the undesirable behavior
• a clear statement of what he punishment is going to be
• a statement of your expectation that your child will do better the next time