Unconditional Parenting: Moving from Rewards and Punishments to Love and Reason.
Alfie Kohn
When test scores go up, we should worry, because of how poor a measure they are of what matters, and what you typically sacrifice in a desperate effort to raise scores.
effort worry sacrifice desperate poor measure
What can we surmise about the likelihood of someone's being caring and generous, loving and helpful, just from knowing that they are a believer? Virtually nothing, say psychologists, sociologists, and others who have studied that question for decade
knowing loving caring question generous
Most parents want to know what they can do to make their children do as they're told
children parents
We think of ways that we can control them, whether it be with a spanking or a gold sticker or a parent constantly saying, 'Good job, good job, good job.'
control gold good job parent spanking
When we do things that are controlling, whether intentional or not, we are not going to get those long-term outcomes
things
You have to welcome their arguing with you, not to the point of disrespect, but if they are going to stand up for themselves, they need to learn to argue effectively
learn stand arguing disrespect
Sometimes we have to put our foot down,.. But before we deliberately make children unhappy in order to get them to get into the car, or to do their homework or whatever, we need to weigh whether what we're doing to make it happen is worth the possible strain on our relationship with them.
car worth order children relationship unhappy
parenting reason moving rewards love unconditional
What is equally striking to me is this.. There isn't a sense of a community solving problems together, rather there's punishment for aberrant individuals.
community sense problems punishment individuals
You have to give them unconditional love. They need to know that even if they screw up, you love them. You don't want them to grow up and resent you or, even worse, parent the way you parented them.
grow parent love unconditional give worse
In a word, learning is decontextualized. We break ideas down into tiny pieces that bear no relation to the whole. We give students a brick of information, followed by another brick, followed by another brick, until they are graduated, at which point we assume they have a house. What they have is a pile of bricks, and they don't have it for long.
education
In short, with each of the thousand-and-one problems that present themselves in family life, our choice is between controlling and teaching, between creating an atmosphere of distrust and one of trust, between setting an example of power and helping children to learn responsibility, between quick-fix parenting and the kind that's focused on long-term goals.
parenting
People will typically be more enthusiastic where they feel a sense of belonging and see themselves as part of a community than they will in a workplace in which each person is left to his own devices
community
Some people undoubtedly find it convenient to have students arrive having already been stamped PRIME, CHOICE, SELECT, or STANDARD.
choice people
The value of a book about dealing with children is inversely proportional to the number of times it contains the word behavior.
numbers thetimes time
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