A great article by Megan Devine about holding a child accountable.
How to Create a Culture of Accountability in Your Home
by Megan Devine, Parental Support Line Advisor
The father’s voice on the other end of the Parental Support Line sounded exhausted and overwhelmed when he said, “I know you told me that I have to hold my child accountable, but what exactly does that mean?”
It’s an excellent question, and one that we receive often on the Support Line. You’ve probably noticed that we talk a lot about “accountability” in Empowering Parents, as well. But have you ever wondered what it really means to hold your child accountable?
It’s never too early—and it’s never too late—to start a Culture of Accountability in your home.
I think it’s often helpful for parents to break big concepts down into bite-sized pieces in order to fully understand them. The word “accountable” itself means responsible, or taking responsibility for one’s actions. So when we’re talking about our kids, the question becomes, how will you make sure your child accounts for his or her actions? In other words, how will your child take responsibility for their behavior after the fact? And how can we help them think about that responsibility before they behave inappropriately?
Remember, we want to promote a system of responsibility and accountability for actions in our home. James Lehman calls it a “Culture of Accountability,” and it means that each member of the family is responsible for their own actions and behaviors, each person is responsible for following rules and expectations, and each is responsible for how they respond to stressful or frustrating situations. The simple truth is that most kids, and even some grown-ups, don’t take responsibility for their actions. Without accountability in place, kids blame others for their actions, refuse to follow rules they find unfair, and find ways to justify their behavior. For example, if your child breaks the house rules by calling his siblings rude names or being physically aggressive with them, he may be in the habit of blaming his brother or sister for his verbal abuse. You’ll hear things like “She wouldn’t get off the computer and I wanted to use it!” or “He wouldn’t move, so I pushed him.”
Understand this: when you have created a Culture of Accountability in your home, your child will know that no matter who started it or what happened first, everyone is responsible for their own behavior, and everyone has to follow the rules. Just because he was using the computer doesn’t mean he can call his sister foul names because blaming someone else doesn’t change the rules. As James says, “there is no excuse for abuse, period.”
Giving consequences and sticking to them is another important piece of the accountability puzzle: your child should know that if he chooses to break the rules, there will be a consequence for that choice. The bottom line is that no one in the family should get away with changing the rules to fit their needs or feelings.
Let me use an example from the work world. Let’s say it’s your job to make sure that a shipment of light bulbs arrives safely at their destination, but you were preoccupied and did not check the shipping boxes, and many of the light bulbs arrived damaged and broken. Your boss will likely hold you accountable for the breakage. You may not like it, but it is your job to meet those expectations—and if you don’t meet them, you won’t get paid. You can’t blame it on someone else, as it was your responsibility to check the boxes. Since your job’s Culture of Accountability says that you’re in charge of the light bulbs, you understand that you need to take responsibility for what happened. You may have to discuss what went wrong, and explain how you will make sure to do it differently next time—and you will probably have to work a little longer that day to fix the problem. That’s the heart of what it means to be responsible.
This is similar to what James is talking about when he says you need to hold your children accountable. You have rules and expectations for your child, and they are responsible for following those rules. If they don’t follow them, they do not get “paid” with the privileges and rewards they value. Again, blaming others or acting inappropriately does not relieve them of their responsibility to meet the expectations of the family.
You might be thinking “I know my child is responsible for meeting our expectations and following our rules, but how do I hold him accountable when he doesn’t want to be?” Remember, as James often says, you can’t get your child to want to do something he doesn’t want to do. You can, however, use effective parenting strategies in combination with rewards and consequences to get hold child accountable.
How to Be Clear about Expectations and Set Clear Limits
If you have a rule in your home of no name calling, here’s how you can set clear expectations and limits around it. Let your child know the following: “In this house, we don’t call people names. It doesn’t matter if someone makes you really angry, or if they started it. Each person is responsible for following the rules. If you call someone else names—remember, it doesn’t matter who started it—you will lose some of your game time today.”
Kids will often try to shift the focus to someone else. If this happens, you can say, “It sounds like you’re blaming your brother for the fact that you called him names.” Be sure all members of the family know that putting the blame on someone else will no longer be acceptable. In a Culture of Accountability, each person is responsible for their own actions, and for following the rules, no matter what someone else does. Be clear about the rules, and what each person can expect to see happen if they choose not to follow those rules.
Talk to Your Child and Help Them Figure out How They Will Follow the Rules
It isn’t enough to simply say “don’t do that;” kids often need to know what they can do, not just what they can’t do. Help them problem solve. Ask your acting-out child, “What can you do to help meet our rules and expectations?” Remember, it doesn’t matter if they think the expectations are fair or not; they simply need to take responsibility for meeting them. Remind your child: “It’s your responsibility to control your temper. Just because your brother is bothering you does not mean you can push him. If your brother is annoying you, and you’re tempted to call him names, what can you do instead?” You might have your child write down a list of the things they can do to help themselves follow the rules when they are tempted to break them.
Use Cueing
Once your children have come up with ways they will help themselves follow the rules, you can use what James calls “cueing” – giving a reminder of what is expected. When you hear your child start to get annoyed, you might say, “Remember what we’ve been talking about. You are responsible for following the rules. Why don’t you go check your list of things that you’re going to do when you’re having trouble following the rules?” To help create that Culture of Accountability for everyone, you might also consider posting the family rules in a public area in your home, like the refrigerator door.
Use Consequences to Hold Your Child Accountable
Once you have clarified the rules and helped your child come up with some ideas on how he might behave, let him know what he can expect to see happen if he still chooses to break the rules. Remember, tie the consequences to your child’s behavior, and keep them short-term. For example, let your child know, “If you choose to call your brother names, you will lose access to your electronics until you can speak appropriately for two hours.” Be sure to follow through with the consequences you set; remember, without clear consequences, there is no real incentive for your child to become accountable.
The good news is that creating a Culture of Accountability is a very reachable goal for parents. In fact, effective parenting helps your child learn to be accountable—to both accept responsibility for meeting the expectations of your family, and to develop the skills they need to meet those expectations. And when all the members of your family start becoming accountable to each other, your kids will have a clear understanding of the rules and will be much more motivated to uphold them. You will even see your kids trying to follow the rules when they don’t want to do so, because they will know that they will be held responsible for their choices, no matter how they feel or what excuses they give you.
Realize that when you first try to put the Culture of Accountability into place in your home, your kids may fail to meet their responsibilities, even with clear limits and good problem solving techniques. It will take practice to help them understand that they will be held accountable for their actions. But as James says, “parents are the solution, not the problem.” You can teach your children the skills they need to take responsibility in their lives now, and for their future. With consistency and practice, your kids will learn that they are responsible for their actions and behaviors. It’s never too early—and it’s never too late—to start a Culture of Accountability in your home.
How to Create a Culture of Accountability in Your Home reprinted with permission from Empowering Parents. For more information, visit www.empoweringparents.com
 |
Megan Devine is a Parental Support Line Specialist and writer. |
Filed under Accountability, Empowering Parents Articles, Parenting, Total Transformation 
The Truth About Bullies
by James Lehman, MSW
The public perception of bullying is that bullies are acting out to cover their own fears. They may indeed be afraid, but accepting this as a reason makes bullies sound like victims of their fears — like we’re supposed to feel sorry for them and not hold them responsible for their abusive actions.
The issue is not whether bullies are afraid. Bullies bully other people to feel powerful around them and to feel power over them. Bullies start out feeling like zeroes, like nobodies. When they intimidate, threaten or hurt someone else, then they feel like somebody. The key is the feeling of power.
We often think of the child bully as being male, but the percentage of girls who intimidate their classmates and siblings is increasing dramatically. Bullying doesn’t stop at the end of the school day, either. Whether bullies are at home, at school, or they’re threatening and intimidating other kids on the Internet, they’re going to act out to make themselves feel powerful. Many kids who are bullies at school are bullies at home. The most common victims are their innocent siblings.
What are the consequences of bullying? You may have heard about post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) when it comes to sexual victimization or assault. PTSD can occur any time people feel they have no control over the way their pain is delivered. They live in fear, not knowing when they’re going to be hurt. Kids who are constantly bullied and not protected will develop symptoms of PTSD — constant anxiety, constant fear, idiosyncratic behaviors to compensate for those feelings. They’ll fall behind in their development.
Dealing with bullies requires holding them strictly accountable for the abusive, hurtful or disrespectful things that they do to feel powerful. They need to practice appropriate ways to feel powerful — using social skills, articulating their feelings, communicating honestly with others and solving problems. Those skills are difficult to develop. It takes work; it’s like learning how to multiply or learning how to add. But it can be done. Holding bullies accountable for inappropriate behavior gives them boundaries and gives them a roadmap for doing that work.
If your child is a bully
If your child starts to exhibit bullying behavior, the first thing to do is realize it’s something you need to address. You can’t kid yourself that it will go away on its own. If adolescent bullies are not stopped, and not taught more appropriate ways to solve problems, they become abusive parents, spouses and bosses. We all feel powerless at times, but there are better ways to deal with that than to abuse other people.
You as the parent have to set a standard: No excuse for abuse. There’s no excuse for cursing someone out, for breaking something, for hitting anyone. The bully always has an excuse, a way to justify this behavior. This justification is so powerful that it takes the place of empathy for the other person. That’s why you have to have a no-excuse standard.
A kid may curse out his sister and say foul things to her and then make up some justification about what she was doing to him — “She went into my room again” or “She wouldn’t get off the computer.” Let the kid tell you the excuse, and then reiterate, “There’s no excuse for abuse.” Don’t shut off communication, but don’t validate the thinking errors that go into the justification of abusive actions. There should be consequences for abuse. Later, you can talk about appropriate ways to handle a problem.
If your child is bullied
If your child is a victim of bullying, it may be because he is the sort of child who has difficulty standing up for himself. Bullies look for easy targets, because that makes them feel powerful. If you can teach a child not to respond to bullying, to walk away, bullies are less likely to press that child.
The most effective strategies for dealing with bullies are “avoid” and “escape.” These are things you can teach your children: Avoid bullies when you can. Walk away from them if they’re in your vicinity. If you’re being bullied and that doesn’t work, you need to get help from somebody who has more power than the bully. You shouldn’t have to fight because somebody else is a bully. Go to someone who has more power than the bully, like the teacher or the police. Teach your child that he has to hold that person responsible. Getting hit in school is still assault, and parents shouldn’t back off if that happens. You want the other kid’s parents down at the police station. You want them to be as uncomfortable as you are.
It hurts to be bullied, and this fact should never be minimized. Teachers, parents and school officials are sometimes inclined to say, “Well, they’re only kids. It happens.” It shouldn’t happen, and it’s adults’ responsibility to provide a healthy environment for our children. The best schools are the ones who develop a zero tolerance for violence and zero tolerance for bullying, and parents should demand that and support it.
At the same time, if your child is experiencing abuse at the hands of another child, ask this question: “What would you find helpful?” Find out what your child would find helpful to improve the situation. Here’s why this is important. If a child is being bullied at school and his parents just take over the situation, then he’s powerless on both ends. Be encouraging, give him a chance to work it out, offer some help and ideas. But also let him know that if it’s still a problem, you’re going to step in and protect him.
The Truth About Bullies reprinted with permission from Empowering Parents. For more information, visit www.empoweringparents.com
 |
James Lehman is a behavioral therapist and the creator of The |
Being a parent of 5 adopted children, I’m constantly struggling with child behavior problems, and how to deal with them. It just goes with the territory. But last week, it came to a head, and I came to a few realizations that I don’t think I had before. Here’s what happened:
My oldest son has a new “friend” that’s a girl (we don’t want them to be boyfriend and girlfriend yet, but it looks like they’re moving down that road pretty fast. More on our feelings about that in another post). Anyway, Sarah came over after school to watch a movie with Bobby. That’s it – pretty benign, right? Well, not as far as my kid’s are concerned!
You’d think the sky was falling, or we were going to Disneyland or something. They all just became out-of-control kids: loud, no manners, saying inappropriate things, and on and on. This type of child behavior problems went on all night – long after Sarah had gone home for the evening. It was crazy! I was totally embarrassed, enough so that I canceled a fun family weekend we had planned.
What I came to realize is that my kids need to have a pretty structured schedule. They feel very out-of-control when anything is out of the ordinary at all. I believe this goes back to the very first months of their lives, when they weren’t cared for in a healthy way. So we are trying to keep it orderly and under control – therefore avoiding this type of children behavior issues.
I just happened to be browsing the Empowering Parents website, and I found an article by James Lehman called Are You Embarrassed By Your Child’s Behavior? 5 Ways To Cope that helped me out concerning my embarrassment. It gave me a few tips, and I’ll share a little bit from the article.
- Don’t guess what people around you are thinking. Unless they say flat out “You’re a horrible parent”, you don’t really know what they’re thinking. They could be thinking “I remember when my kid did that”, or “I’m glad I’m not going through that phase with my son anymore”. Don’t be a mind reader.
- Focus on the behavior at hand: It’s not about you, it’s about the child. When your child misbehaves in public, they need something from you – focus on their needs, not your feelings.
- Use “avoid” and “escape” as short-term strategies. If you know the type of situations that cause your kids behavior problems, try to avoid those situations. Also, give you and your child an “escape” plan – a way to get out of the situation if things start to break down.
These are just a few strategies I learned from this article. To read the whole article, click here.
For many more tips and techniques to deal with child behavior problem’s, check out The Total Transformation. It’s one of the best child behavior programs I’ve ever seen – it worked for our family, I’m sure it can work for yours!
Recent Comments