“Children need to learn that there are consequences for their actions!” If I had a dollar for every time I have heard that expression, I wouldn’t need to work!
While there is truth to that statement – there ARE consequences for every action we take or don’t take, and children do need to learn this – what people really mean when they say this is “We need to punish children when they misbehave.”
Essentially, There are Three Kinds of Consequences:
Punitive – a random negative punishment is doled out by an adult as a response to a child’s action or non-action.
Logical – a punishment that is related to the child’s behavior is handed down from an adult.
Natural – something happens without action on the part of any person as a result of the child’s action or inaction.
Punitive Consequences
A punitive consequence is the least effective of these three. An example of a punitive consequence would be taking away your child’s tablet because they did not finish their dinner.
There is a behavior you want – in this case, your child eating the dinner you prepared. Because the behavior isn’t happening, you take away something they enjoy (the tablet).
What a child learns in these cases is that adults control their world, even down to what goes in their body in this case! They may start eating more dinner so that they maintain the tablet ownership, but there are other unintended consequences to your actions.
In this example, the child may eat beyond the point of fullness in order to keep the tablet, and over time can develop an unhealthy relationship to food.
Logical Consequences
Logical consequences are more effective than punitive ones, because in this case there is a link to what happened and the later consequences.
In the dinner example, a logical example would be that your child does not get to eat dessert because they did not eat enough of their dinner. Dinner and dessert are linked together, and we can logically explain that our bodies need the healthy foods more than they need the sugar.
While this particular example can also set up some unhealthy dynamics around food, it is less harmful. We are teaching the important lesson that we need to fuel our bodies in a healthy way. However, it still maintains a power dynamic of the adult in charge, and the child at the effect of that adult’s choices.
Natural Consequences
The most impactful consequences are natural consequences. These require no additional action on the part of the adult. If your child doesn’t eat dinner, later they will be hungry. That’s it – it naturally happens on its own.
When they do express hunger later, they can be offered the choices of eating the food they set aside, or something else appropriate and healthy.
In this situation, the child begins to learn how much food feels good for their body. The adult is not in the position of having to step in or be seen as ‘the bad guy.’ They are simply the observer, and can help solve the problem of hunger when it arises later.
Here are a Few More Examples of Each Type of Consequence:
*Your child hits their friend.
Punitive: you send them to their room.
Logical: you end the play-date and don’t let that friend come over for a few days.
Natural: that friend no longer wants to come over to play.
*Your child can’t find his shoes, and there is no time left to look.
Punitive: you assign them extra chores.
Logical: you create a rule that they must always put the shoes in the same place, and monitor this until it becomes a habit.
Natural: your child has cold feet, or can’t climb the playground equipment well because they need shoes.
*Your teen doesn’t do her homework, and spends the time on her phone texting friends. Punitive: you ground her and don’t let her go to her friend’s party.
Logical: you take her phone away during homework time until the work is done.
Natural: your daughter fails her class.
*Your ten year old steals $5 from your wallet.
Punitive: you ground them from the sleep-over they were going to attend.
Logical: you have them work off $5 worth of chores around the house.
Natural: you express your hurt and concern, and have a difficult time trusting them for a while.
In each case, the punitive consequences are those that punish the child, but don’t really address the issue at hand. The logical consequences are related directly to the behaviors, and give an opportunity to teach. The natural consequences are the most related, as they took no action on your part (other than communication in the last example) – these too can be an opening into teaching.
When your child is upset that their friend doesn’t want to play anymore, you have an opportunity to talk about what happened, and why they might feel that way, as well as what they could do to regain the friend’s trust.
If your daughter fails a class, it’s not the end of the world. In fact, having her be responsible for her own success or failure can be the most effective way to teach that she alone gets to determine her life path. I’m NOT saying just let a teenager run their own life – this requires many conversations and a lot of input from a parent. I do advocate, however, that allowing a child to fail or succeed on their own is usually more impactful than all of the fighting and manipulation that often goes into making sure our kids always succeed.
Let Children Learn from Their Mistakes Using Appropriate Consequences
In general, when possible natural consequences are the most useful Children need to learn from their own mistakes without a parent always dictating that learning.
When it is clear that intervention is needed, logical consequences are the way to go. Not only do they keep a dynamic of punishment for the sake of punishment out of the picture, but they can also help solve the problems at hand.
At some point, our children will be adults in the world, making their own mistakes and dealing with the consequences that their actions have. If they learn to do this when they are young, they will be ready when the time comes.
If you are looking for more support in positive parenting approaches, be sure to read more about Time-Ins, and Punishment vs Discipline along with other posts here.
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