Ditch Spanking and Adopt Mentor/Coach Parenting

 

The Delima

When our kids were very young, my wife and I experimented with all types of parenting techniques, including spanking. If one of our children did not follow the rules, did not do their chores, or acted inappropriately, it was possible they would be spanked.

During the same period, I launched my training company and hired a small staff. I noticed something very interesting about how I administered discipline at home and at work. When my employees failed to follow the rules, did not complete their work on time, or acted inappropriately, I pulled them aside for mentoring and coaching to correct the behavior. However, that was not what I did with my kids, and I asked myself, Why not? Am I not trying to get the same thing from my kids that I want from my employees?

• Obey the rules
• Do your work, do it on time, and do it well 
• Be on your best behavior

Then I asked myself, Why am I using two different behavior modification styles? Why am I not using the same style for both groups (employees and kids)?

Denial of the Need for Change

I tried to justify my actions by noting the fact that kids are not adults and need to be treated differently; however, all of the research on motivating people to high performance drew the same conclusion: that the best way to teach new skills (regardless of the age of the trainee) is to use a mentoring/coaching style. I decided that if I truly believed kids are little adults and my job is to help them grow into independent adults, then I should be treating them like adults as early as possible.

Finally, the scientist in me came out, and I asked myself the most profound question of all: What would happen if I treated employees and our children the same? I posed that question to my wife, and we agreed we should conduct an experiment to test the hypothesis.

Results of the Experiment

What we learned from the experiment was eye opening. Our children not only responded well to the mentor/coach style… they responded better than they did to spanking. For example:

Spanking: When we spanked our preschool children, they would cry and pledge to do better; however, an hour later, they would have forgotten what they did to get spanked and would be repeating the same behavior.

Mentoring/Coaching: When we shifted to mentoring and coaching, Renée was able to introduce tools and techniques she used in the classroom to not only teach new behavior, but to reinforce it in such a way that it became part of their long-term memory. Tools like mnemonic devices, rhymes, art, music, etc. made learning new behaviors fun and permanent.

The results of our experiment were so impressive that we abandoned spanking and adopted the mentor/coach style as our preferred behavior-modification tool. In the process, we shifted our thinking about our role as parents from disciplinarians to mentors and coaches.

When you think about it, coaching children to perfection just makes good sense. The good news for parents who currently use spanking as their preferred behavior modification tool is that with mentor/coach parenting, you can spare the rod and not spoil the child.

Need More Convincing?

Shifting to mentor/coach parenting was the single most important change we made in our parenting style. It laid the foundation for many of the other discoveries we would make on our parenting journey. However, convincing others to abandon spanking was difficult until I started sharing my parable about Training A Dog. Let me know if it convinces you.