Safety Rule Breaking

The following is a selection from the book Raising Children Who Think For Themselves by Dr. Eisa Medhus. From the chapter titled "Specific Child Rearing Challenges - How to Handle Them to Encourage Self-Direction", the following introduction is offered.

"The best way to make children good is to make them happy." - Oscar Wilde

Here are some inner-directed suggestions that will help with some of the most trying child-rearing difficulties we may stumble upon. All of these approaches are designed to preserve your children's ability to rely on internal dialogue instead of external influences to assess and correct their behavior. Using this section as a ready reference will help you raise a self-directed child, even if it means carrying the book, tattered and tear-stained, to the market, in the car, or at home. There are some challenges that, I hope you will never have to face, but others will be as inevitable as a pimple on prom night.

To get to self-direction, there are a few universal caveats for every one of the situations that follow. First, our children need to understand and agree with both the need for the furl and the consequence for breaking it. Only when they come to agree with our rules, through their own internal dialogue, will they become self-directed. Second, look to your own parenting strategy as the possible source of some of the problem. Are you over-controlling or over-protective? Either trait can elicit an externally directed response, as your children react to an unhealthy situation. Third, remember for all these parenting challenges how important it is for you as parents, to model the right behavior. If you're expecting your children to act one way and you act another, the double standard will throw a monkey wrench into their whole internal dialogue machinery.

And lastly, don't forget to laugh.

Why they do it

Some rules are non-negotiable regardless of the circumstances. This includes most safety rules. Wandering away from us in public, running out into the street or parking lot, playing with matches and, yes, that timeless classic "sticking a knife in the toaster," are just a handful. Some kids break these rules because they forget, they don't understand the reasoning behind them, or they just want to get a rise out of us!

Logical consequences

If your children break a safety rule outside the home, take them home immediately. Say something like, "I'm afraid you're going to get hurt because of the bad choices you're making. We'll try this again when I think you'll choose to be safe."

If your children play with matches, take them away. If they are overly curious, put them in a bathtub full of water, and let them light matches under your watchful eye until they're sick and tired of it.

Solutions toward self-direction

Come up with a list of safety rules you want your children to follow. Explain each one along with the logic involved. Use questioning: "What's our rule about playing with firecrackers?" "What do you need to do now to be safer?"

Offer choices: "When you make better choices with your Boy Scout knife, then I will return it to you." "When you have your seatbelt on, then I can start the car."

Try the minimalist parenting technique: "Erik . . . bike helmet."

Don't use scare tactics. Reading the gruesome front-page news about child abductions will just make your children overly fearful of their surroundings. This kind of fear will make them react blindly to external threats, perceived or real. For instance, say things like, "Leaving Mommy in the grocery store is not safe," instead of terrorizing them with the details of what could happen. For the same reasons, don't make them fear others by telling them not to speak to strangers. Anyway, sometimes it's people they already know that can put them in harm's way. I tell my children not to go anywhere with anyone unless they have my personal okay, even if they're just going to the park with Uncle Larry.