Behavior
Charts Are The “Daddy’s Belt” of The 21st
Century
Take
yourself back a few dozen years.
Go back before the parenting manuals
and magazines.
Go back before political correctness.
Even go back before the invention of
the refrigerator.
And while you’re back that far,
imagine that you’ve done something really
bad, like cut off half of your sister’s hair
or tied your baby brother to the tree out
back.
What
did your mother do?
What did she say?
Did she threaten you with…dare I
say… a STICKER???
Chances
are she didn’t mention a sticker, and
chances are there was mention of a paddle, a
switch, or the infamous “daddy’s belt.”
Whatever
the threat was, your eyes got wide, your mouth
closed, and your hands probably went straight
to protecting your backside.
I
personally received one “licken” as a
child that still stings my mind like it stung
back then.
Of course I deserved it.
When she found me jumping off the couch
over her coffee table, my Grandmother scolded
me and warned me (OK, threatened me) not to do
it again.
But working in what I thought was
stealth mode, the minute she went off to do
the laundry, I resumed my jumping fun.
Boy,
did she give it to me.
And guess what?
I never jumped off that couch again.
My lesson was learned and from then on
I knew she meant business.
My Grandma tells me now that it hurt
her more to give that spanking than it did me,
but I’m sure I didn’t think so on that
fateful day.
Fast
forward about 25 years, and me, champion
coffee table hurdler, am blessed with a son
who has inherited my superb furniture jumping
gene. He
also has the backtalk gene, the
I’m-not-listening gene, the not-gonna-eat-it
gene, and the generally-mischievous gene, all
of which he must have inherited from someone
other than myself.
And
in today’s world, the whole concept of
spanking has been so socially pooh-poohed that
it’s really not an option for anyone
pretending to be a good parent.
What we are left with are tools like
the time-out and the new fangled behavior
chart.
My
family has used the time-out technique.
I think my son spent half of his third
year sitting on the bottom step, “thinking
about what he’s done.”
Now that he’s four, he’s still
acting on that generally mischievous gene and
jumping on the furniture, so I have recently
had to resort to something new.
Something contemporary.
Something
mind-boggling.
The
behavior chart.
A
lot of my friends have devised elaborate
charts that they hang on their refrigerators
-- spreadsheets that graph behavior, both good
and bad.
In
the “positive reinforcement” method,
children are rewarded for doing good things,
like finishing their veggies or not pounding
on a sibling.
Smiley stickers are lined up until the
child accumulates enough that he or she wins
some prize for, let’s face it, doing things
they should be doing anyway.
In
the “negative” method, the kids get their
charts filled with stickers for doing things
wrong, like not finishing their veggies or
pounding on a sibling.
Once so many stickers have been earned,
something gets taken away, such as television
or computer games, things that, let’s face
it, do a good job entertaining our children so
that they stay out of trouble.
With
my son, I have tried both versions of the
behavior chart, all to no avail.
I find myself in a fit of rage, yelling
at him and threatening him with a “bad boy
sticker” and I swear he laughs at me just a
little bit. And
I can’t say I blame him.
I’ve
come to the conclusion that while it may work
for others, the behavior chart just isn’t
for us. I
really don’t know what an alternative is and
what will end up working in our family.
Other
than my Grandma, that is.
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