Does your child have behavior problems? Your relationship with your child likely needs some attention.By Jeanie Lerche Davis

You know the checkout line scenario: 3-year-old child wants this toy, this candy, this something — and she wants it nooooow! The crying starts, escalating into a full-blown tantrum.

In his new book, The Ten Basic Principles of Good Parenting, Laurence Steinberg, PhD, provides guidelines based on the top social science research — some 75 years of studies. Follow them, and you can avert all sorts of child behavior problems, he says.

After all, what is the goal when you’re dealing with children? To show who’s boss? To instill fear? Or to help the child develop into a decent, self-confident human being?

Good parenting helps foster empathy, honesty, self-reliance, self-control, kindness, cooperation, and cheerfulness, says Steinberg. It also promotes intellectual curiosity, motivation, and desire to achieve. It helps protect children from developing anxiety, depression, eating disorders, anti-social behavior, and alcohol and drug abuse.

“Parenting is one of the most researched areas in the entire field of social science,” says Steinberg, who is a distinguished professor of psychology at Temple University in Philadelphia. The scientific evidence for the principles he outlines “is very, very consistent,” he tells WebMD.

Too many parents base their actions on gut reaction. But some parents have better instincts than others, Steinberg says. Children should never be hit — not even a slap on a toddler’s bottom, he tells WebMD. “If your young child is headed into danger, into traffic, you can grab him and hold him, but you should under no circumstances hit him.”

Ruby Natale PhD, PsyD, professor of clinical pediatrics at the University of Miami Medical School, couldn’t agree more. She offered a few of her own insights. “Many people use the same tactics their own parents used, and a lot of times that meant using really harsh discipline,” she tells WebMD.

A parent’s relationship with his or her child will be reflected in the child’s actions — including child behavior problems, Natale explains. “If you don’t have a good relationship with your child, they’re not going to listen to you. Think how you relate to other adults. If you have a good relationship with them, you tend to trust them more, listen to their opinions, and agree with them. If it’s someone we just don’t like, we will ignore their opinion.”

Steinberg’s 10 principles hold true for anyone who deals with children — coach, teacher, babysitter, he says.

The 10 Principles of Good Parenting

1. What you do matters. “This is one of the most important principles,” Steinberg tells WebMD. “What you do makes a difference. Your kids are watching you. Don’t just react on the spur of the moment. Ask yourself, ‘What do I want to accomplish, and is this likely to produce that result?’”

2. You cannot be too loving. “It is simply not possible to spoil a child with love,” he writes. “What we often think of as the product of spoiling a child is never the result of showing a child too much love. It is usually the consequence of giving a child things in place of love — things like leniency, lowered expectations, or material possessions.”

To read on please click here

Raising children demands a vast set of complex skills that can’t be distilled into a Top 10 list like you’d see on Letterman. Still, the lofty fundamentals — love, respect, morality — are surprisingly easy to reduce to simple, achievable daily goals.

Hey, it worked for Moses, the other guy with the Top 10 list.

None of these goals will make you smack your forehead and wonder why you never thought of them before. In fact you probably do many of them already, three days out of four. It’s a matter of being mindful of what you’re doing, rather than acting on reflex. Here are ten little ways to do something good for your kids — today.

1. Really listen to your child.

Nowhere are we more likely to act on reflex than when responding to our kids’ talk. Sometimes it’s the knee-jerk “no” — the easiest of parental answers to a request. It also shows up in our tendency to half-listen, giving our kids the impression that what we’re doing — even if it’s emptying the lint trap on the dryer — is more important than what they’re saying.

Or we interrupt them. “For some parents, there’s a tendency to correct misinformation or try to teach as we’re listening,” says Janice MacAulay, who works with the Canadian Association of Family Resource Programs in Ottawa. “That doesn’t allow enough time for what’s really important to come out.” If your preschooler says, “Mom, I really gots to tell you something…” it’s not the time to correct her grammar, or you may never hear what she gots to say.

MacAulay believes it’s important for every kid to get focused attention — that means putting down the lint trap and sitting down to look him in the eye. “A little attention goes a long way, and when we give it, it has to be 100 percent.”

2. Do Something Familiar.

It’s not just toddlers who love repetition — rituals and routines are comforting for everyone. Some follow religious or ethnic customs, others are weirdly idiosyncratic. Either way, they help shape a family’s identity.

Carolyn Monaghan and her husband, Glen, look forward to what she calls “a pleasant, predictable sequence of events” each night with their five-year-old daughter, Heather. “At bedtime we ask her, ‘What are you going to dream about?’” says the mother of two from Langley, BC. “She’ll say she is going to dream about something we did that day, or what she’s looking forward to. Then we tell her what we’re going to dream about.”

Alyson Schäfer, a Toronto parent educator, says a fun family ritual — whether it’s Sunday brunch at a pancake house or a weekly basketball game in the driveway — can be an oasis for families where there’s a lot of friction. “You may not be able to solve all of your family’s woes,” she says, “but by doing more of what’s fun, you change the ratio of good times to bad times, and just by doing that you have a happier family.”

3. Kiss your partner in front of your child.

Yes, your kids may cover their eyes and say you’re being gross. But public displays of affection nurture your marriage and model a healthy relationship.

As Schäfer notes, the arrival of children puts a whole new stress on a couple’s bond. “There’s a mistaken notion that your marriage will wait,” she says. “I’ve seen parents with six-year-olds who have never left their child with a babysitter, never gone on a holiday or even gone out for dinner or a movie.”

They might learn something from Kennan Silva of Edmonton. “My husband, Todd, and I do little things for each other. Sometimes he’ll bring me a chocolate bar, or I’ll have coffee ready for when he gets home from work. We hope that when our children are adults, they find the same kind of loving relationship and will not settle for less than what they deserve.”

4. Read together.

This must be the most common public service message out there (after the one about erectile dysfunction), but regular story time can tail off as soon as kids learn to read by themselves. For families who do continue, the rewards go beyond literacy.

“My girls are seven and nine and we read to them about five nights a week,” says Jen Hrabarchuk of The Pas, Manitoba. “Reading to them gives us an opportunity to have cuddle time, which becomes rare at this age. Plus, we get to see how much they actually comprehend from longer stories. Over the past year we’ve read The Hobbit, Little House on the Prairie and A Wrinkle in Time.”

Helen Whitehorn and her husband, Mike, of Newmarket, Ontario, take turns being the narrator with their eight-year-old son, Matthew. “Sometimes he will read a page, we’ll read the next. Sometimes we read and he just listens, and sometimes he will read to us. He likes non-fiction and finds it fascinating to learn new facts. If he doesn’t understand something, he and Dad will talk about it together.”

5. Touch your child.

No one needs to remind parents to cuddle their infants. But like bedtime stories, hugs and kisses often taper off as kids get older and find them embarrassing. Even so, physical affection doesn’t have to mean giving your 12-year-old a zerbert on the belly while his skateboarding pals are visiting.

“For some people it’s awkward, so find the ways that are OK with you,” MacAulay suggests. It may be lying down together at bedtime, a relaxed hair brushing, a wrestling match or even a half-hour on the couch in front of the tube. MacAulay knows of a mom with lots of teenagers who once told her, “I don’t really like television, but I do sit and watch, mostly because I’m hip-to-hip with a couple of kids.”

6. Laugh during a tense moment.

Leah Johnson of Chilliwack, BC, learned first-hand how a laugh can defuse a volcanic situation. She was in the minivan with Graham, six, and Sydney, four, when the bickering got to her. “I felt a yell starting in my throat, and I tried to think of a good threat. Since I couldn’t follow through with the old ‘knock it off or you’re both walking home,’ well, I barked at them!”

Johnson says there was instant silence in the back seat. “Four very round eyes looked back at me in the mirror. Graham started giggling, and the next thing we knew we were all howling with laughter. They both started barking right back at me, and it was a very noisy but happy trip home. I’ve used it quite a few times since then. I wonder if it will still work when they’re teenagers.”

7. Find out one important thing about your child’s day.

For some parents and kids, catching up comes naturally around the dinner table, before bedtime or in that most popular of family meeting places — the car. Others may need a conversation starter. “One way to get kids to open up is to briefly share your own experiences with them first,” MacAulay says. Some families even have a ritual in which parents and kids share one good thing and then one bad thing that happened to them during the day.

Like everything else, though, there needs to be a balance, MacAulay says. As kids mature, they need space to grow and that means we shouldn’t be involved in every aspect of their daily lives. “It’s important to become comfortable with not knowing.”

8. Resist the urge to be a saviour.

This isn’t the best advice when your preschooler decides to try out dad’s acetylene torch or explore a divided highway. However, when your 11-year-old forgets her school project (after you reminded her twice), or when your son’s T-ball swing isn’t going to get him to the majors, you sometimes just need to back off.

“I like to talk about developing a child’s psychological muscle,” says Schäfer. “We want to prepare our kids for life, not protect them from it. Otherwise we interfere with important developmental processes.” When the consequences aren’t huge, allowing our kids to fail helps teach them to succeed next time. And we can give a nudge to their problem-solving abilities. “You forgot your homework today? What do you need to do so it won’t happen tomorrow?”

9. Do something nice for your caregiver.

Finding and keeping good child care is difficult, but the payoff is big for your peace of mind and your children’s comfort. Whether they’re live-in nannies or workers at a daycare centre, caregivers don’t like to be treated like indentured servants. Take the time to let them know you appreciate what they do for your kids.

A survey of nannies on Todaysparent.com revealed that many don’t even get a gift on their birthdays or at Christmas. Those who did made it clear that it meant a lot. “One family I worked for would leave me little notes, flowers or baking as a way to show that they valued the work I did for them,” says Vicki Sims, nanny to two girls. “It does take a bit of effort, but it’s worth it.”

10. Don’t worry about the previous nine items.

Half a century ago, a guy named Dr. Spock told parents, “You know more than you think you do.” Then along comes a blasted magazine article to point out all the things you’re forgetting.

Of course, that’s not the point. All the goals we’ve listed are worth striving for, but no one will ever accomplish all of them, every day. So don’t beat yourself up trying to do the impossible. And while there may be dads who have hang-ups about bringing the best cupcakes to daycare, this is mainly a chick thing. “Their expectations are going through the ceiling,” Schäfer says of moms. “Look for improvement as opposed to perfection.”

It’s easier to be realistic if you spend time with others in similar situations. “So many women tell me one-on-one how awful they feel because they don’t like to play Barbies for four hours. They think that’s what good mothers do, and that every mother is doing it.”

Schäfer feels it comes down to cutting yourself the same slack you give your children. “Parents get the concept of encouragement when it’s applied to their kids, but they forget they need to be self-encouraging as well.”

To read on please click here

Are you constantly searching the latest on parenting to make sure you are doing everything exactly right? It’s time to relax. Temple University psychologist, Laurence Steinberg, says that perfect parents just don’t exist.

“Most parents are pretty good parents,” says Steinberg, “But I’ve never met a parent who is perfect 100 percent of the time. We all can improve our batting average.”

Sports analogies are useful to Steinberg, the concept of the book came from his own desire to improve his golf game. “I was reading, probably for the 10th time, Harvey Penick’s Little Red Golf Book,” he says. “It is built around a series of very short essays that cover very basic principles.

“As I was reading it, I was thinking that this might be a good way to teach people how to be better parents.”Steinberg, the Distinguished University Professor and the Laura Carnell Professor of Psychology at Temple, wrote the newly released The Ten Basic Principles of Good Parenting (Simon & Schuster). This easy to follow how-to book uses the formula that works for golf to improve parenting. He believes it is the perfect format for today’s busy parents.

Here is a quick overview of the Ten Basic Principles:

1. What you do matters.
“Tell yourself that every day. How you treat and respond to your child should come from a knowledgeable, deliberate sense of what you want to accomplish. Always ask yourself: What effect will my decision have on my child?”

2. You cannot be too loving.
“When it comes to genuine expressions of warmth and affection, you cannot love your child too much. It is simply not possible to spoil a child with love. What we often think of as the product of spoiling a child is never the result of showing a child too much love. It is usually the consequence of giving a child things in place of love—things like leniency, lowered expectations or material possessions.”

3. Be involved in your child’s life.
“Being an involved parent takes time and is hard work, and it often means rethinking and rearranging your priorities. It frequently means sacrificing what you want to do for what your child needs you to do. Be there mentally as well as physically.”

4. Adapt your parenting to fit your child.
“Make sure your parenting keeps pace with your child’s development. You may wish you could slow down or freeze-frame your child’s life, but this is the last thing he wants. You may be fighting getting older, but all he wants is to grow up. The same drive for independence that is making your three-year-old say ‘no’ all the time is what’s motivating him to be toilet trained. The same intellectual growth spurt that is making your 13-year-old curious and inquisitive in the classroom also is making her argumentative at the dinner table.”

5. Establish and set rules.
“If you don’t manage your child’s behavior when he is young, he will have a hard time learning how to manage himself when he is older and you aren’t around. Any time of the day or night, you should always be able to answer these three questions: Where is my child? Who is with my child? What is my child doing? The rules your child has learned from you are going to shape the rules he applies to himself.”

6. Foster your child’s independence.
“Setting limits helps your child develop a sense of self-control. Encouraging independence helps her develop a sense of self-direction. To be successful in life, she’s going to need both. Accepting that it is normal for children to push for autonomy is absolutely key to effective parenting. Many parents mistakenly equate their child’s independence with rebelliousness or disobedience. Children push for independence because it is part of human nature to want to feel in control rather than to feel controlled by someone else.”

7. Be consistent.
“If your rules vary from day to day in an unpredictable fashion, or if you enforce them only intermittently, your child’s misbehavior is your fault, not his. Your most important disciplinary tool is consistency. Identify your non-negotiables. The more your authority is based on wisdom and not on power, the less your child will challenge it.”

8. Avoid harsh discipline.
“Of all the forms of punishment that parents use, the one with the worst side effects is physical punishment. Children who are spanked, hit or slapped are more prone to fighting with other children. They are more likely to be bullies and more likely to use aggression to solve disputes with others.”

9. Explain your rules and decisions.
“Good parents have expectations they want their child to live up to. Generally, parents overexplain to young children and underexplain to adolescents. What is obvious to you may not be evident to a 12-year-old. He doesn’t have the priorities, judgment or experience that you have.”

10. Treat your child with respect.
“The best way to get respectful treatment from your child is to treat him respectfully. You should give your child the same courtesies you would give to anyone else. Speak to him politely. Respect his opinion. Pay attention when he is speaking to you. Treat him kindly. Try to please him when you can. Children treat others the way their parents treat them. Your relationship with your child is the foundation for her relationships with others.”

There is no guarantee that following these guidelines will result in perfect parents… remember, there is no such thing!

“Raising children is not something we think of as especially scientific,” says Steinberg. “But parenting is one of the most well-researched areas in the entire field of social science. It has been studied for 75 years, and the findings have remained remarkably consistent over time.”

“The advice in the book is based on what scientists who study parenting have learned from decades of systematic research involving hundreds of thousands of families. What I’ve done is to synthesize and communicate what the experts have learned in a language that non-experts can understand.”

Good parenting, says Steinberg, is “parenting that fosters psychological adjustment—elements like honesty, empathy, self-reliance, kindness, cooperation, self-control and cheerfulness.

“Good parenting is parenting that helps children succeed in school,” he continues. “It promotes the development of intellectual curiosity, motivation to learn and desire to achieve. It deters children from anti-social behavior, delinquency, and drug and alcohol use. And good parenting is parenting that helps protect children against the development of anxiety, depression, eating disorders and other types of psychological distress.”

“There is no more important job in any society than raising children, and there is no more important influence on how children develop than their parents.”

To read on please click here