The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and Amazon.com.

We all have our personal stories of how we were disciplined as a kid. I remember my dad's lectures. Oh my god, do I remember my dad's lectures? Do I know how to tune out to lectures? You bet. I remember being sent to my room and pouting and feeling really sad, and I remember the look my dad could give—a look that could kill, or at least it felt that way when you're a little kid. And having some privileges taken away too. My worst, though, was the silent treatment. I had a babysitter who one day said, "I'm not speaking to you for the whole day," and she went on silent mode. That was worse than being yelled at. So joining me to discuss discipline is Charlotte Cushman. Charlotte is the author of Effective Discipline the Montessori Way, and she's taught at a Montessori school for over 40 years with little kids, from two and a half years old to six years old. So, Charlotte, let's say that Jenna, age three, steals the stuffed bunny from her friend and says she didn’t do it. As a parent, what are some ineffective methods of disciplining her in that situation?

Ignoring it, because she'll do it again. She gets away with it. Plain old yelling, screaming—that doesn’t work. Spanking, giving big, huge lectures where you go on and on and on, yeah, and they don’t understand what you’re talking about. If you don’t follow through with action, then they learn to just ignore you.

Yep, I learned how to ignore my dad. I tuned out my dad's lectures. It was like, "Okay, here we go." Yes. So those are ineffective, and parents make it much harder on themselves when they do that, don’t they?

Yeah, because they get really frustrated because they’re not getting the result that they want.

Right. And many times, they don’t know how to read their children. I know you talked about that in your book, that you need to know how to read your own child. You need to know what’s going on with your kids. For example, my son said to me once—a little tyke again—he was standing on our fireplace hearth, and he looked at me, and he says, "I hate you, Mommy." And I said, "Oh, you sound so angry." I just was in a good mood that day, and he said, "Yeah, the kids at school, you know." And he went into the whole story, and he was crying in my arms. And I said, "Oh my god, had I gone the other route and said, 'Don’t you ever say that to me again,' what would that have done to our relationship?"

Right, yeah, exactly. So I knew how to read him, or at least I had the skills by that time—he was the second child. Well, let’s go first to what is the main purpose of discipline?

Well, the main purpose of discipline is to help the child develop self-control so they can learn how to think and make choices on their own. You’re trying to help them develop. I mean, they’re going to grow up; they’re going to have to manage their own life, make choices. You want them to make good choices and be a happy person. So as they grow up, you’re trying to guide them in that direction.

To help them know and set proper boundaries, right? And you had a wonderful kite analogy. I have your book open to it. Your book is Effective Discipline the Montessori Way.

Oh, I remember the kite analogy very well.

Then go ahead, you can rock and roll with it, because I thought that was great.

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Oh, I remember the kite analogy very well.

Then go ahead, you can rock and roll with it, because I thought that was great.

Well, in our Montessori training class, when you take the Montessori training, it’s very, very intense. Some trainings take two years, and some take one. When they talked about discipline, they likened discipline to a kite. Think of the kite as a child and the string as—you know, when the adult is holding on to the string, that’s where you are guiding them in discipline. So if the child exhibits maturity, makes good choices, and is being responsible, you let the string out. But as soon as they flub it up or have problems, lie, or do something wrong, you pull the string back in. So the entire time the child is growing up, you’re holding the string to that kite. When they portray that they are being responsible, you let the string out, but when they need discipline, you pull it back in. It’s a constant process of in and out, back and forth, until they’re an adult, and then you can completely let the string go.

I love that analogy, because it’s so—I mean, you can see the kite kind of going on its own, and they’re developing their autonomy, their independence, and that’s what you want for them. When they make those good choices, you can let that string out very far. And when they lie, cheat, steal, yell, whine, whine, whine, you can pull the string in, and you have to give them more information so they can go back out again. You know, the goal is to eventually let go of the string, right? Which is very hard for some parents to do when kids grow older, but if you’ve done a good job, it’s easier, much easier. So I noticed with the discipline that you say, you shouldn’t have done that. Sarah, age four, pushes her sister and hits her younger sister, and you get upset with Sarah. What would you do in that case? And then Sarah gets sad, and you have to deal with her sadness too.

Again, is this the first time she’s done that, or does she do this frequently? Have you already told her and explained to her why this is wrong? It’s all going to depend on the child and the circumstances as to how you handle it.

But let’s say she gets really, really sad. You tell her she shouldn’t have done that, and instead of getting angry and fighting back, she just bursts into tears. Then you feel so guilty that you told her, “Stop it. No, you can’t do that.” Parents feel guilty and they back down.

Right. If you really were too hard on her—let’s say she had kind of a shy personality, and you overreacted a little bit, and she bursts into tears. If it’s legitimate that you feel bad about it, then I would go to her—and I have done this with children—and apologize and say, “I’m sorry. I didn’t really, you know, I overreacted to that. I know you feel bad about it,” and comfort them. But if you handled it correctly, and you weren’t too hard on her and she’s still crying, then I would still say, “I understand that you feel bad about it, but we don’t do that. You know it hurts other people,” or you might even still comfort them if they need it. Or it could be a situation where even though they are crying, they still need to go into time out. So much depends on the kid and what’s going on.

And that’s what I’m hearing from you—that you really need to know how to read your child, as we’ve mentioned before, so that the child needs to experience some sadness. That’s a constructive emotion, right? When we do something wrong, we can’t just go away feeling happy. We have to feel remorseful or sad or whatever the negative emotion is, and have good role models in our parents or teachers to know how to deal with that so we learn.

Yeah, I think the whole movement in discipline right now seems to be to shelter the child from feeling sad, shelter them from feeling bad. That’s very, very harmful because they need to develop a conscience. If they don’t ever feel bad about doing something wrong, how are they going to be able to correct themselves?

They aren’t, right. So they need to get moral guidance from you. They need to know what’s good and what’s not good, and they need to know why. So, I’ve been talking with Charlotte Cushman. Charlotte, how can people get your book Effective Discipline the Montessori Way?

You can look on Amazon. I also have a website called CushmanBooks.com.

Okay? And you’ve written two other books, Montessori: Why It Matters for Your Child’s Success and Happiness, which I loved, and another book, a children’s book, which I’ve read. My kids are older now, but Your Life Belongs to You: A True Story About the Founding of the United States.

Oh, what did I say?

Your child. Got kids on the brain?

Your Life Belongs to You: A True Story About the Founding of the United States.

Well, thank you so much for joining us today. This has been wonderful.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com.

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