Last Updated on March 23, 2021
2. Don’t be disrespectful towards other people
If you ever find yourself thinking, “wow, my child is defiant and disrespectful”, you should try to understand where they are picking that behavior from. Good parenting is a 24/7 type of job – you need to remember that all the life skills for kids come from the parents (or at least they should). Kids will have you as their leading example, and the way you manage your anger, your frustrations, or your annoying social interactions will be what they will have as an example. Learning skills for toddlers are dependent on their parents, and this is why, as a parent, you should always be on your best behavior in front of your kids. You need to be respectful to teach respect, and you need to be coherent in what you tell them to do and how you act yourself.
3. Don’t take their side
Imagine a situation where your child is complaining about their teacher – saying they are stupid and annoying for sending too much homework. They are expressing frustration, but they are being disrespectful at the same time, and this is something you should address because disagreeing with someone does not give them the right to be insulting. However, you do believe this teacher sends way too much homework. Even though you are on an agreement, fully taking your children’s side on this issue will send them the message that it is ok to be rude towards someone you don’t agree with. So, how to correct a disrespectful child in a situation like this? The best path would be to carefully explain to them that, regardless of the fact that they don’t agree with someone, they still need to find a way to express themselves in a proper manner. This type of skill development will be very useful in their adult life and formative years because, let’s face it, they will find a million people with whom they don’t agree.
4. Notice their good behavior
Every single parent has thought about how to punish a child for bad behavior, but how many have considered rewarding them for good behavior? It is within our nature to only remember the bad stuff, but the truth is, when educating a child, it is super important to reinforce good behavior – being praised feels good, it will make them feel proud of their actions and it is always nice to receive good feedback. Not acknowledging their success while simultaneously reprehending them for every single failure will make them feel that no matter what they do, they can never win, and this will end up contributing to an increase of their disrespectful ways.
