How to Raise Polite Kids in a Rude World (page 3 of 4)

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Prompt and Praise

"You're such a mess; you never clean up your room." "You'd better write that thank-you note or you're not watching TV." "Don't you raise your voice to me." Most parents have said these things to their children. They're meant to correct behavior. Why, then, do they fail so miserably?

Because rude behavior in children is more often the result of thoughtlessness than of deliberate aggression. Criticism, name-calling and orders only make a child angry and defensive. They reinforce the notion that the child is incapable of good behavior without coercion.

A better approach is something Alan Kazdin, a psychologist at Yale University, calls prompt and praise. Before an event the parent explains the expected behavior in a noncritical way: "When we visit Aunt Mary today, I'd be so proud if you could shake her hand and pull out her chair at dinner." Afterward, praise the child: "I really liked the way you shook Aunt Mary's hand and offered a chair."

Says Kazdin, "The idea is to do this often enough so you can eventually move away from the prompt and just give the praise."

But what about the times when a child has already committed an offending act? "Correct the child by blaming it on the house rules," advises etiquette consultant Joan Hopper. Every family should have some basic rules that everyone agrees on and will follow.

So rather than saying "You're such a slob. Get your elbows off the table," a parent can simply state, "Our family rule is that elbows don't go on the table." By correcting the behavior rather than the child, you defuse a child's defensiveness and keep the correction from sounding like an order.

A criticism delivered this way does tend to get results, as Ellen Weeks, 15, of West Hartford, Connecticut, will attest. Every morning Ellen's parents or one of her friends' parents would drive a group of students to school. When the car pulled up, Ellen used to wordlessly plunk herself in the back seat, sit silently, then rush out of the car at the school curb.

One morning after Ellen had hopped into the car, the driver, a father of one of the girls, turned around and asked, "How come no one says 'good morning' to me?"

"I'd never thought about it from his perspective before," Ellen admits. "I'm glad he told us how he felt." Now she and the others say "good morning" when they get into the car.